Go to Sports Headlines

Sports Reporter Missing

HOUSTON -- Veteran Mudcat Falls THPPPGT sports reporter Spike Divot was reported missing while on-location in Houston, where he was covering the NFL's Super Bowl XXXVIII. He was last seen at a Saturday night party in the company of members of the Carolina Panther's "Top Cats" cheerleading squad. Houston police have not yet ruled out foul play, though their investigation into the matter continues.

Divot recently found himself at the center of controversy when editors started scrutinizing his stories following the airing of an I-Team Report by MFTV, which discovered numerous discrepancies calling the veracity of his reporting into question. The THPPPGT has since found fraud, plagiarism and inaccuracies in 36 of 73 articles examined to date.

"Spike makes Jason Blair look like George Washington with a chain saw in an apple orchard," said MFTV Anchorman Missile Smith. "I'll bet the closest he's ever gotten to a pig skin is the two strips of bacon that comes with a Denny's Grand Slam breakfast."

Divot's most egregious offense appears to be a series entitled, "A Left-Handed Boy Left Behind," which purported to courageously follow a young Honduran boy making the treacherous journey north to the United States to play Little League Baseball, meticulously documenting the boy's experience and providing a vivid portrayal of human brutality and compassion in a series that was part human drama, part powerful social commentary and, at the time, hailed as truly outstanding journalism. Unfortunately, the story was discovered to have been plagiarized from the 35th Annual RFK Journalism Grand Prize winners, Sonia Nazario and Don Bartletti of the Los Angeles Times.

"I don't pay attention to sports, so I don't know this stuff. I thought Wepner beat Ali. And that Dick Trickle won the Indianapolis 500. And that the Chicago Cubs really won the World Series last year," admitted Editor-In-Chief Boswell R. Piddle III. "And if Aruba, Cancun and Acapulco don't really have major league baseball spring training camps, there's $237,000 worth of expense reports that need explaining."

According to the last dispatch received late Sunday night from Divot, the Cleveland Browns beat the Arizona Cardinals in overtime, 42-16, to win Super Bowl XXXVIII.



©2004 MFTHPPPGT




www.mudcatfalls.com



Go to Sports Headlines