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Earlier this week, a national NFL insider provided the sports world with some insight on the Aaron Rodgers/mandatory minicamp saga.
As you know by now, Rodgers missed the Jets two-day mandatory minicamp last week. It was supposed to be three days, but the Jets head coach Robert Saleh canceled the third day to reward the players for their hard work.
Saleh shocked many when he announced in his press conference at the beginning of the camp that Rodgers was not there.
We suspected that Haason Reddick wouldn’t be there. He’s embroiled in a contract dispute with the club, but the Rodgers news came from out of the blue.
Why would he miss this event after attending the lion’s share of the team’s off-season program leading up to his event?
Saleh said the Rodgers’ absence was “unexcused” which made big news. Since it’s “unexcused,” Rodgers is subject to fines since the camp was mandatory.
Saleh said he knew for a while Rodgers would miss this camp, so why was it “unexcused” and subject to fines?
Breer announced why while appearing on NFL Network:
“They communicated to him that they wouldn’t be able to excuse him for that, and again, it’s because that’s how you maintain credibility with your locker room. You can’t do something for one person that you wouldn’t do for other stars of the team, let alone, like, guys on down the roster, right?”
This was the best information by far on the reason why the team handled like they did.
So this begs the question – why didn’t any of the team’s beat writers have this information?
The answer to that is simple, but before I continue, I want to make it clear I’m not complaining, bitter or anything like that, just explaining to you how the sausage is made.
National insiders get stuff that beat writers don’t for two significant reasons.
One is pretty obvious, and it goes in all sections of the media – news, sports, whatever category you want to choose.
People who get scoops generally don’t criticize their sources.
So while local beatwriters might criticize a GM over some missed draft picks or free agent signings, the national insider isn’t going to do that.
They generally take the high road with people they are getting stuff from.
So who might you give scoops to, those who criticize your work or those who don’t?
It’s a quid pro quo dynamic.
Also, some of the insiders are represented by the same firms that have a lot of players, coaches and GMs. So it behooves the agencies to move the information around from the football side to their media side.
I’m not calling out Breer. Of all the national insiders, he might be my favorite to read or watch on TV, because he really understands football. Some just regurgitate what they are told by their sources with nuance, but Breer has a high-level knowledge of the sport, so he takes the info he gets, and offers really deep interesting takes on things.
Just trying to explain to you why so often, scoops on these sorts of things, come from national guys, not local guys.
I just wish CAA, who represents Reddick, would tell one of their media clients what is going on with the defensive end so we can advance that story a bit.
June 19, 2024
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