Mississippi State’s Leo Lewis was arrested. One of WLBT’s journalists, said she “enjoyed” writing about it.
Mississippi State fans often complain about media members having a skewed bias. Sometimes it’s justified. Sometimes it isn’t. It often depends on the context and what is going on. But, well, in this case, it’s certainly justified.
Just about every fanbase does this to some extent.
And, in the realm of college sports, it can be difficult for sports writers to remain objective in their day to day jobs. Often, sports writers are fans that earned a communications degree and found their way into writing.
When it comes to a journalist covering a non-sports story that involves an athlete, still, there is a level of professionalism that is expected. It’s not hard to meet that level of professionalism. Essentially, report the facts, be unbiased, and present the story. It’s rather simple. I’m sure there are more complicated aspects of it that can be broken down. But, that is more or less the gist of things.
And WLBT’s Waverly McCarthy almost went through with that. That is up until she just didn’t.
Early this morning, Leo Lewis was arrested for disorderly conduct after reportedly driving the wrong way in traffic. WLBT, a news station out of Jackson, Mississippi, reported on it. Everything about the report is totally normal and okay. News stations should report the news. This is, well, news.
What’s not normal and okay is for a journalist, a professional, to tweet out that she enjoyed writing the report. That’s exactly what McCarthy did in this case. She then quickly deleted said tweet.
But because the internet is the internet, screenshots exist of said tweet.
Seems a bit unprofessional. pic.twitter.com/MztM1DVFV5
— The CoonDawg™️ (@CopiahDawg) May 4, 2018
Why did Waverly McCarthy enjoy writing said news report?
After all, it’s a fairly bland, straightforward article that reads like a press release. There’s nothing inherently exciting about it. And, beyond just that, maybe it’s just me, but I’m not used to enjoying seeing other people arrested for driving the wrong way in traffic.
The only reason as to why Waverly McCarthy might have enjoyed that vanilla posting is that Leo Lewis plays for Mississippi State while McCarthy is an Ole Miss alum. Per her twitter bio, she’s even a “sports junkie.”
If I had to guess, McCarthy enjoyed writing that Leo Lewis was arrested because, well, she’s an Ole Miss fan. In that moment, she completely lacked anything that might resemble professionalism.
In the end, regardless of sports affiliations, this a weird thing to celebrate and it’s even weirder to celebrate writing about it. More than likely, with how minor this arrest is in the grand scheme of things, Lewis won’t miss any real playing time.
There’s nothing to really celebrate here.
It’s a fairly insignificant crime that doesn’t appear to have any long lasting effects. There’s a generic article about it that doesn’t have any sort of real insight or analysis beyond just the facts. Despite that, Waverly McCarthy said she enjoyed writing the news about it. Objectively, it doesn’t make much sense that she enjoys it. And, objectively, tweeting that she did just makes McCarthy look unprofessional in this instance.