By Jeff Moss
DetroitSportsRag@GMail.com
October 21, 2016
If you enjoy this website and the main page articles, you can thank Drew Sharp for that. So, I guess that’s the one nice thing I can write about the longtime Detroit Free Press columnist who passed away today at the age of 56.
Back in May of 2011, this website was deader than disco. I had stopped writing posts for the DSR because I had basically been beaten down by the awful Detroit sports media and I didn’t feel I was having any impact whatsoever in this market.
It was probably the seventh time I had quit the site — that number is only eclipsed by the number of times I broke up with my wife before we eventually got married — and I really thought I was done forever.
And I might have been, if not for Sharp. Because as I was watching Justin Verlander toss his second career no-hitter in Toronto, I felt no compulsion to come out of self-imposed retirement. That was until I read Sharp’s column about that historic game.
I am not going to go into all of the sordid details about that infamous Sharp column, but it was clear from Sharp’s writing that he didn’t actually WATCH the game. He wasn’t in Toronto and his boss obviously told him the paper needed a column to commemorate JV’s no-no so Sharp wrote it — presumably from his sofa.
You can read what ended up being a three-piece expose into Sharp’s journalistic malfeasance and his paper’s refusal to admit what occurred here, here and here.
So I guess it’s ironic that the only reason I am about to publish this piece — which I am sure will rub many of you the wrong way — is because Drew Sharp was not an ethical journalist and behavior compelled me to continue the DSR.
When I first got the news from my sister this morning that Sharp had tragically died at such an early age, I didn’t think I would even write anything about it. I had no feelings about the news whatsoever. I wasn’t happy (obviously) or sad or anything. I was just totally indifferent.
There is a price to pay when you have spent three decades INTENTIONALLY trolling your audience and making your readers (and sometimes listeners) despise you and that cost is apathy when something like this occurs.
Look, if Sharp was just a disingenuous writer who made his bones by PURPOSELY infuriating his readers, I would probably feel some sadness today. But he was much worse than that.
Here is the deal, I probably wouldn’t even be posting this if not for the insane number of articles and social media posts we are currently being inundated with extolling the virtues of Sharp’s journalistic INTEGRITY.
You want to say you liked Drew personally? Wonderful.
You want to write that he was a wonderful dinner companion on Pistons’ road trips? Have at it.
But if you are going to say the man was an outstanding journalist and wonderful human being, I am going to call bullshit based on what we learned about the guy in the last year.
Here is just a sampling of what baited me into writing this article …
But the worst was the article by Lynn Henning mentioned in this Tweet ….
In that article, the buffoon Henning said things like this …
A fine journalist.
A professional.
I am sorry, but when you die your sins don’t magically disappear. If that were the case, the first paragraph in Richard Nixon’s obit would not have included Watergate.
If you are going to write a piece about Drew Sharp in a professional sense, well you HAVE to mention his 2015 plagiarism scandal. Like Crain’s and Awful Announcing did in their articles about Sharp’s death today.
Hell, even Sharp’s colleague at the Freep, Carlos Monarrez, vaguely referenced the white elephant in the room in this Tweet …
Of course, the “one thing” was Sharp plagiarizing the work of iSportsWeb’s David Harns last fall — an article Harns wrote about MSU quarterback Connor Cook’s relationship with a fan of his from Ohio named Miranda McCoy.
Miranda is a 25-year-old woman who was severely injured in a car accident and is currently in a quadriplegic state. I say currently because I hope modern science will one day progress to the point that Miranda will walk again.
(Full Disclosure: I have become very good friends with Miranda since the Sharp scandal occurred and maybe that is part of the reason I am so infuriated by the phony eulogization of Sharp.)
Here is the real story of what kind of journalist Drew Sharp was. In December of 2015 he was caught red handed plagiarizing Harns’ work.
He subsequently told bald-faced lies to his boss Kevin Bull regarding how he gathered information about his own Connor Cook/Miranda McCoy story.
Sharp then refused to publicly apologize to either his readers at the Freep or his audience on Detroit Sports 105.1. Even though his then- co-host Matt Dery wanted him to do so.
He was given MULTIPLE opportunities to apologize to Harns PERSONALLY and yet he never did. And now he never will.
Now, David Harns is a much more forgiving person than I am. He is a very religious man (unlike me) who believes in second chances and redemption. All Harns wanted out of Sharp was a simple “I am sorry,” but Drew refused to speak those words as recently as August 29th of this year when they were face-to-face in East Lansing.
There was someone else who was owed an apology and that was Miranda McCoy. Sharp took what was a beautiful story about her friendship with Cook and turned it into a melodramatic soap opera that she didn’t want any part of.
Because of Miranda’s current situation, she is basically completely dependent on the assistance and the kindness of others. And yet, Sharp couldn’t be bothered to offer her a simple apology for dragging her into this controversy.
As you probably know, Sharp was the reigning champion of the DSR’s Worst Detroit Sports Media Personality tournament. The goal is to deliver the Horse’s Ass Trophy to the winner every year, as we had done with Terry Foster and Scott Anderson in previous years.
We never had an opportunity to honor Sharp, but the plan was to have Miranda there with us when we did.
And about this crap that Sharp was a wonderful guy and we didn’t really know the REAL Drew Sharp? Whose fault was that? The man was in the public eye for nearly 30 years. Maybe if he would have been a genuine journalist instead of an African-American Skip Bayless, every obituary today wouldn’t have required a qualifier.
I received this note today from a former iHeartRadio co-worker of Sharp’s at WDFN: “I never made an effort to get to know him. I was told by others he was a great guy and nothing like his columns. I was never given a good reason why we were paying a guy to be as dishonest to the listeners as he was to his readers.”
So no, this wasn’t JUST about the plagiarism. It ended up being about his behavior after that original sin as well. Not unlike Tricky Dick himself.
And about this crap that Sharp was a wonderful guy and we didn’t really know the REAL Drew Sharp? Whose fault was that? The man was in the public eye for nearly 30 years. Maybe if he would have been a genuine journalist instead of an African-American Skip Bayless, every obituary today wouldn’t have required a qualifier.
I received this note today from a former iHeartRadio co-worker of Sharp’s at WDFN: “I never made an effort to get to know him. I was told by others he was a great guy and nothing like his columns. I was never given a good reason why we were paying a guy to be as dishonest to the listeners as he was to his readers.”
I am sorry for his wife, Karen, and the rest of his family for their loss.
But I am not going to sit back and watch the media’s revisionist history of this man’s career. He was a mercenary troll who frequently took shortcuts regarding his craft and, when called out for those transgressions, refused to even address them.
And I am sure there will be a lot of folks out there outraged that I wrote something like this on the day of his death.
Do me a favor. When I die one day, please be honest in your thoughts.
If you enjoyed the DSR when I was around and an article or Podcast helped get you through your day, say that.
If you thought I was a fucking monster with no compassion and evil incarnate, please don’t let my expiration soften your stance.
Just don’t be a fucking phony.
(You can follow the writer of this piece on Twitter @JeffMossDSR. Also, you can join in on the discussion of this article on Facebook by clicking here.)
