By Justin Spiro
spirojus@GMail.com
January 22, 2016

There are very few things that shock me in this town anymore.

The Detroit Free Press gainfully employs an unrepentant plagiarist who shows up late to press conferences, falls asleep (literally) during a team’s media day, reports on events he did not witness, and uses Wikipedia as his primary source whenever David Harns is on vacation.

The co-host of the #1 rated sports show in the city is a borderline illiterate journalist with a fourth grader’s command of the language that is his currency.

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Openly anti-gay and misogynistic commentary is the norm at one radio station in town whose idea of good humor is referring to rape victims as “sluts”.

The bar is pretty low with the Detroit media. Although much is terrible, little is surprising.

Enter Gregg Krupa of The Detroit News.

Krupa is basically a backup beat writer covering the Detroit Red Wings. And his Twitter feed is appalling to anyone with respect for the field of journalism. The pom pom waving is the worst we have ever witnessed at the DSR. Keep in mind, this is a man making his living ostensibly as an objective purveyor of truth absent of bias and free of emotion.

OK, that is pretty bad. A tad excessive with the enthusiasm, but we can look past it.

Hmmmm. This seems worse. Krupa appears to be openly celebrating another team’s failure against the Red Wings. Oh well. I am a forgiving guy.

Wow! What an interesting and objective report of a news event! I wonder why Woodward and Bernstein did not use this method when they brought Nixon down. “Nixon authorized a break-in at Watergate, sources within his administration confirm this was an act of the devil.”

And who raised Gregg Krupa, anyway? Bobby Boucher’s mom? “That call is from the devil!”??? I wonder if Krupa grew up with a live-in pet mule named “Steve” and tackled his college professors for disagreeing with him.

I suppose we should expect a dead ringer for George R.R. Martin to have a way with words.  “Darren Helm scores, Wings up 2-1” just doesn’t have the same ring to it.

Let me interrupt this slapfest to provide the following anecdote. When I was a journalism student at Michigan State University, my professor invited Krupa to give a lecture on journalism ethics.

Seriously. This unabashed fanboy walked into a lecture hall and gave advice to young journalism students about ethical behavior. Wait, hold on a second ….

I. Mean. It is universally known that sports journalists aren’t supposed to cheer in the press box. This guy just doesn’t root, root, root for the home team, a JLA staff member probably has to clean up Krupa’s space after a game not unlike Times Square Peep Show booth janitorial staff.

As bad as bought-and-paid for team reporters like Tim Twentyman and Keith Langlois might be to our collective sensibilities, you couldn’t find ANYTHING like this collection of Tweets in their timeline.

Yep, a guy paid by Martha Ford to spew propaganda is more reserved than this fool.

Nice to know the experience in the seats at Joe Louis Arena is no different from the experience in the press box. Shoot!

Clever.

So glad you had fun! Like, this would be questionable behavior from Red Wing fan bloggers like George Malik or Kyle from “Winging It In Motown.” This guy is a paid JOURNALIST working for a major daily.

Yes! Go Wings!

In the mid-1800s, the legendary Joseph Pulitzer fell into a deep depression because he thought journalists were being too easy on their subjects.  I wonder if any journalists called Abraham Lincoln “baby” after the Emancipation Proclamation.

“Stroke that pen, baby! You issue that executive order demanding the emancipation of all in bondage, you sexy beast!”

Poor Pulitzer. Guy hit the bottle because he couldn’t take the softball journalists of his day. At least he has an award named after him. The best Krupa can hope for is Fan of the Month honors down at the JLA.

If journalism is not already dead, it certainly has a terminal illness.