Negativity in the media hasn't helped so far. So why not change it?
Entry posted by TOMapleLaughs
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The Vancouver Media.
While they're serving the public and the information is in demand, they sometimes cross the line and/or dwell in the negative. Either by making up stories, misreporting them to serve their agenda or by merely exposing what the Canucks would like to keep under wraps.
While a story is a story, they sometimes forget about the effect the story might have on the team that is in fact their main source of income in this town.
If they say it all has little to no effect on the team, they're lying. Depending on the story, the team/franchise could be hurt significantly to varying degrees.
Most recently, Rick Rypien, who was supposed to have the flu at the time, was reported to be in a bar with Kevin Bieksa.
So... Why do we need to know that? Is this important? Are Canuck players not allowed to do that? Are we supposed to think that Rypien is somehow not a good teammate because of that? Because that's what the media is portraying when they go on-air to say that out of the blue.
The only reason for reporting that Rypien was hanging out with a teammate in a bar (time, place and reason unknown) is to shed him in a even more negative light than the one shone on him last Tuesday. There is absolutely no other reason to report it. Only absolute negativity. Totally needless reporting. If you can call it reporting instead of rumour-mongering, that is.
And then let's go back to how Mats Sundin was (How dare he!) hanging around in Whistler instead of working his tail off in Vancouver during the 2009 all-star break. Afterall, the 'saviour' wasn't doing much to save this team at the time. He needed to shape up, dammit! What was it, a week of ripping Sundin's apparent laziness and lollygagging about in Whistler? Nevermind that he was in fact working out every day. The talk got so bad that Mike Gillis had to come on-air to defend Sundin's actions and after some forehead-knocking, Pratt and Taylor's reaction was, "Oh. Well i guess that makes sense."
And this is a daily thing with the local media in Vancouver. Afterall, a story is a story, right? Who cares about taking responsibility for how the information (or lack of it) might be portrayed?
However, it's not all local media to be certain. A lot of negativity comes at us from good ol' TO. TSN and the CBC are generally not Canuck fans and any negative story regarding the team will come to the forefront in most instances. Augergate and Maclean's ripping of Burrows' character comes to mind. Certainly the same comments wouldn't be made of the immortal Tie Domi, even after he delivered a sucker elbow to Scott Niedermayer in the playoffs. And don't forget about Cherry going on record to call Bure a 'Russian weasel' in the playoffs and start talks about how he wouldn't play in the finals unless he got a new contract. Meanwhile, Doug Gilmour gets dryhumped be the same man on-air. It never ends.
Even a story from the TO Maple Laffs' website directly and most certainly negatively affected this team. The leaked trade rumour involving Burrows, Bieksa and Tampa Bay's 1st rounder in 2009, which ended up being Vic Hedman. That leaked rumour sparked Burrows and Bieksa to question Gillis' actual intentions and the Canucks to promptly complain about the video to the league. I mean, why in the hell does Brian Burke open his yap about this on the Laffs' website when it has absolutely nothing to do with the Laffs? This is just an example. And they wonder why we hate TO so much.
Anyway, i could go on forever with examples about how negatively the Canucks have been portrayed over the years.
No, we can't control what the outside media says about the Canucks, but we sure could change things locally.
Since we're talking about all the things tried in the past that just haven't worked, like how playing Luongo a ton of games during the season hasn't worked, how about we get the media in this town to, oh, i dunno, be just a little bit more positive?
And i don't mean the sarcastic "This just in: The Vancouver Canucks will be Stanley Cup champions" version of 'positivity' that the media might portray now and then, but honest-to-goodness positivity. Heck, if they think it's just too mushy to report about, then forget all the outright homerism. Just try to eliminate some of the outright negativity. It'll be a start.
Because all that negative crap reported in the past?
Yeah, it's been 40 years. And it hasn't helped.
Time for a change.
-TOMapleLaughs
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