Adam Schefter Continues His Strong 2022 By Openly Admitting To Essentially Bribing Sources

July 12, 2022July 12, 2022 Austin

BREAKING, per sources, Adam Schefter has done did it again.

via The Washington Post

Adam Schefter recently agreed to being the subject of a profile piece by The Washington Post, probably in an attempt to recover from all the flack he’s received this year – and let’s just say, it didn’t really make him look that much better. Especially with little nuggets like this one in the article. Gifting your “sources” with tax write-off chocolate isn’t journalism. Nor is it reporting. This only furthers the point that Adam Schefter is nothing more than a walking press release for NFL teams and agents. He’s a megaphone with a large following on Twitter. One that he also brags about in the piece.

Asked if his sources would still want to break news with him if he were working for a gambling company, he answered, “Would my Twitter feed be coming with me?” He reached for one of his phones and pulled up a recent tweet of the image of the new Madden video game cover, showing that it garnered 8 million impressions. (His tweet announcing that Colin Kaepernick would have a workout with the Las Vegas Raiders received 9 million impressions.)
via The Washington Post

But he’s adamant in the piece that he’s not just a human megaphone, he’s a “hardworker.” Because he’s willing to work literally whenever, unlike Chris Mortensen who “set boundaries on his time,” like when he was asked to work on Christmas to do a live hit on ESPN and said no. The article states, “Schefter never does. “I’ve never set boundaries,” Schefter said. “That’s one of the reasons ESPN and I get along so well.””

Then he brightened, thinking of a moment from this year’s NFL draft. He was at his son’s graduation and supposed to be off, but the details of a huge trade between the Philadelphia Eagles and New Orleans Saints came trickling in.

“Congrats on graduating son, but the Eagles just traded a No. 16 overall pick, No. 19 overall pick and a 2022 sixth-round pick, so daddy’s gotta run.” I’m not sure who needs to hear this (clearly Adam does), but working without limits doesn’t make you a good reporter. Or even a reporter. Reporting does that. And with Schefter just making sure he has good relationships with people by sending them chocolates and touting his Twitter reach just makes him a billboard off the busiest highway. Except this billboard pays you to advertise on it.

Now you may not think sending Christmas gifts to your sources is that big of a deal, but as a dude who graduated* from a pretty profound journalism school (*-did barely enough to get a tassel), not to brag, it’s completely against journalism ethics. As a reporter (a real reporter), there’s supposed to be no transaction at all between reporter and subject. I was taught it’s as simple as if the subject you’re interviewing is making cookies and offers you one, you’re supposed to say no because it goes against the journalistic integrity of your project. Now is this always adhered to? Not at all. It’s broken frequently. One of many reasons why journalism continues to be pooped on. But even if you do break this code of journalism, you certainly shouldn’t brag about it. And certainly not to another journalism source doing a profile on you. Add this to the awful Dalvin Cook mishap, the Dwayne Haskins tweet, the Deshaun Watson defense, the admitting that he lets his subjects review his stories before publishing, etc. as yet another reason why Adam Schefter is so out of touch. But hey, how ’bout those tweet impressions, amirite?