Regret the Error

Below is a front page article from the Star Press in Muncie, IN:

We screwed up.
And to Tom Collins, we’re sorry.
What was reported on this newspaper’s sports pages yesterday and on our Web site for much of the day on Wednesday was wrong.
Collins, athletic director at Ball State, did not apply for the AD’s job at Dixie State College. A Tom Collins did apply for that job, but it was a different Tom Collins, not Tom Collins of BSU.
But just as much as this is an apology to Collins, this is an explanation. This is your newspaper, and the way we see it, you’re owed that at least.
Reporter Doug Zaleski had been chasing a rumor for about a week and a half that Collins was leaving. That’s when a source had originally told him that Collins had applied for the position at the school in St. George, Utah.
Now, understand that these sort of out-of-the-blue rumors aren’t uncommon to us. So as we often do in trying to flush out the validity of a rumor, Zaleski called the local newspaper, in this case, The Spectrum, which covers Dixie State. What, he wanted to know, was its sports staff hearing? If anything.
That practice, you should know, is commonplace. We, for instance, get calls all the time asking if we know anything about this rumor or that.
Anyway, The Spectrum didn’t know anything about Tom Collins and, indeed, first became aware of him thanks to us.
Still, our contact with other sources led us to believe there was reason to keep chasing the story. There was no real reason to call Collins himself, yet, but enough suspicion to forge on.
So we did, and in that regard Zaleski called Dixie State’s sports information department and asked specifically about Ball State’s Tom Collins. The response was that the school had no response. It would have saved us all a lot of grief had the school, then and there, denied that Tom Collins of Ball State was a candidate for its AD job.
But it didn’t and on Tuesday night, Zaleski received an e-mail from The Spectrum that it was publishing a story on Wednesday that Dixie State College was hiring Jason Boothe as its next athletic director. To go along with its story, The Spectrum had requested a list of finalists for the position to be included in its report. That list had four names on it, one of which was … Tom Collins.
As a result, The Spectrum told Zaleski late Tuesday night — about three minutes after our print deadline, actually — that it would be publishing a story on Wednesday listing those candidates, including Ball State’s Tom Collins.
We called Collins, but it was late, real late.
He didn’t answer, and we had to make a decision.
So with our backs against the deadline wall and knowing everything we had learned in a week and a half of trying to validate rumors, we reported what The Spectrum reported — that Collins was a finalist for the athletic director position at Dixie State College but did not get the job.
By midday Wednesday, it was clear a mistake had been made.
The list of finalists provided to The Spectrum did include names, but not school affiliations. We did not know that until Wednesday.
It boils down to this: After conversations between our two newspapers, The Spectrum made the assumption that the Tom Collins on its list was Ball State’s. And we made the assumption that The Spectrum had confirmed that.
That old saying about the word assume? It’s true.
We were all wrong. And because we were, we brought potential harm to Tom Collins.
The bottom line: We should have called Collins when we first heard the rumors. We should have taken more care with our reporting. We should not have allowed a lack of decision time to rush our decision.
Sure, in a world that has come to expect stories quicker than instantly, news is perishable, but that’s no excuse.
Please understand, the words we publish day in and day out, from top to bottom of this newspaper, are not written lightly. And Wednesday’s story was no different.
Neither is this apology to Tom Collins, nor this explanation to you.

Romenesko also had a link to the offending story.

 Report an error