Maybe the Worldwide Leader needs a copy editor
I've been having a love-hate relationship with Bill Simmons's writing lately. Today, though, I checked espn.com a couple of times in anticipation of his promised column on the Red Sox-Indians series. Surprise of surprises, it never appeared.
What did come up, though, was a new set of links. One of the links wasn't actually a link, but an "interesting note" from some guy in New York -- I think his name was John F. -- justifying LeBron's choice in supporting the Yankees, despite the fact that he's from Northeastern Ohio. The "interesting note" is gone now, but it ran something like this:
- John F. from New York sends along an interesting note on LeBron wearing a Yankees hat which we surprisingly haven't heard before: "Why is everyone making such a big deal out of LeBron wearing a Yankees hat? He's from Columbus, which for decades was home to the Yankees' AAA team, so really, it's not that big of a shock that he ended up a New York fan."
Of course, this prompted me (and I'm sure 100 others) to send Simmons an e-mail explaining the fact that Akron and Columbus aren't the same thing, and that Akron is actually -- believe it or not -- 125 miles from Columbus. Needless to say, when I just checked tonight, the "interesting note" had been removed without explanation. It may as well have never existed.
I normally wouldn't fault a member of the national media for not knowing basic Ohio geography. In this case, it's something that could have easily been verified. A Google search would come up with a thousand pages noting LeBron was born and raised in Akron, not Columbus, and that Columbus, the state capital, is in the middle of the state, hours away from Akron, which for all intents and purposes is a part of Cleveland (usually all of Northeastern Ohio just gets lumped together).
In this case, though, Simmons himself should have known better. People the world over know that LeBron went to Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary high school, and that Cleveland-Akron isn't Columbus.
Of course, supreme authority Thurston Moore has made the same innocent mistake, so I'll give Simmons a pass. This time.
