I get that John Sleeper, the most recent sports columnist to copy a Rick Reilly column and get fired for it, has personal problems. I do, really. And I feel bad for him. But I have to wonder … if you are going to cheat at your job as a writer by copying someone else’s work, why the hell did you pick Rick Reilly, dude?
I’ve learned what it is to hit bottom.
Because I did. I hurt so many people I care about. I hurt people I’ve never met. And I hurt this newspaper.
In college, this was the newspaper at which I wanted to work. In January 2005, I’d finally reached the job I’d wanted since I got into this business 21 years ago. I was sports columnist at the paper I loved. I’d made it.
Then why did I throw it all away? I don’t know yet. I hope to. I hope therapy will help me understand. I suspect the answer lies somewhere in the fact that, as I wrote my editor of my plans to resign, I could feel stress flow out of me. At that moment, I felt better than I had in months.
Whether that qualifies as “bottom” is debatable. Embarrassing and life altering, sure, but I imagine there are a few homeless drug addicts that might disagree. Still, to each his own.
Still though: why Reilly? He’s pompous. He’s lazy. He hasn’t cared about anything for the last 10 years in terms of actually putting it all into a column.
So here’s some advice for future columnists so desperate for future pieces that they go scouring the mainstream media for articles to grift: just rip off Reilly’s style — not his column — and slap a stamp on that puppy and mail it in (like this). Please. You’re only giving him more credit when you rip his shit off.
