By Jeff Moss
DetroitSportsRag@GMail.com
January 6, 2016
According to Crain’s Detroit reporter Bill Shea’s Twitter feed, Drew Sharp will be on the airwaves of Detroit Sports 105.1 this afternoon to apologize for plagiarizing the work of David Harns.
If Shea’s Tweet is accurate, it will be the first time that Sharp has appeared on his PM drive show with Matt Dery since the DSR broke the news of his thievery.
The DSR learned yesterday from multiple sources that the Freep has suspended Sharp pending the paper’s investigation of the troll columnist. We were also informed that the investigation revolves around another issue separate from the Harns theft — and his subsequent lying to his boss (sports editor Kevin Bull) regarding how Sharp learned of the Miranda McCoy backstory.
If Sharp does deliver this on-air mea culpa this afternoon, you probably should consider how Sharp has used his Freep column in the past to deal with liars and cheaters.
So here are a few examples unearthed by DSR contributor “Richie Tenenbaum” ……
There is also this takedown of Sharp’s sanctimonious baseball Hall of Fame opinions that was published on the Bless You Boys website.
Also, we found some hilarious Sharp Tweets condemning others’ wrongdoing.
So you can obviously add “hypocrite” to Sharp’s resume of “lying”and “stealing.”
I mean, just look at this quote from his Jim Tressel hit piece …
Tressel should have been immediately fired for breaking an important clause in his contract.”
Not to mention the parallels between Sharp’s situation with the Freep and his own USC/NCAA take.
So when you tune into 105.1 — most likely for the first time based on their ratings — just remember Sharp’s body of work condemning the same behavior he has displayed recently.
Or recall the time he wrote about a baseball game he didn’t watch. Or the time he used Wikipedia as a source for a column. Or how he used his AP ballot to troll Michigan State football fans.
Drew Sharp is a duplicitous piece of garbage and if you fall for his apology …. well … you’re an idiot.
You can’t troll people for three decades and expect any sympathy when you commit one of journalism’s biggest sins.
UPDATE at 2:26pm
The DSR has now learned from a source that the apology that is supposed to occur in 34 minutes is NOT Drew Sharp’s idea. In fact, he refused to do it at first.
The people at 105.1 — INCLUDING his partner, Matt Dery — INSISTED that any return to the WMGC airwaves include an apology. The source expects Sharp’s apology to be “mealy-mouthed.”
This should be good.
UPDATE at 3:03pm
Sharp didn’t show up.
And now, last night’s DSR Podcast featuring Society of Professional Journalists member and professor Rob South, who made a case that Sharp’s behavior is way worse than the Mitch Albom Cleaves/Richardson scandal from a decade ago …