By KEVIN BERTELS
Minneapolis Star Tribune

The newspaper's in bed. The sports desk is headed there.

Only 35 minutes of commute to go, 35 minutes to shake off the stress of fast reading and deadline meeting.

The radio will help.

Unless the radio makes it worse.

"... ESPN.com is reporting..."

Photo illustration A nightsider's worst nightmare? This might be fake news, but sports desks everywhere are on high alert.

It's either the modern scourge of the sports desk or the modern advantage. When anybody.com reports, we react. Or we wait for the wires to react. Or we wish on the way home that we had reacted — or that we had even been aware of the report.

Dot.com news services and their big brothers, cable news channels, have changed the way news is spread, and the change directs pressure squarely onto the night desk, adding a huge layer of responsibility to what used to be the editing of the wires.

It's part of modern journalism. Heck, it's modern society. Where there once was a need to be aware of what was being reported by local television, local radio and local newspapers, there is now a nation full of reporters. The news cycle is 24 hours, and the news comes in two types: stuff that matters and stuff that really matters. And it doesn't necessarily ever get picked up and verified by wire services.

Judging news from various sources isn't new. What's new is the regularity with which the problem is presented, night desk supervisors say.

"There's so much out there," said Paul Domeier of the Charlotte Observer. "And it' s only getting bigger."

Local news that's reported nationally presents one problem, but the more common issue comes when the news isn't local. "The New England Patriots have signed quarterback Tom Brady to a $60 million contract," ESPN reported on a recent Saturday night. That's very important news somewhere but fairly important everywhere.

The story pops up on ESPN.com. It appears in a crawl on ESPN TV. One of your editors spots it. Then the question: Clear out space for it?

That's an easy decision if the story has moved on the wire. It's much harder when it hasn't, and when it might not.  The Associated Press doesn't chase every report from every Web site. It's common for stories that are prominent on popular Web sites to never be reported by wire services. And it's uncommon for newspapers to rely solely on reports from Web sites.

"Our formal policy on this subject is pretty simple," said Kevin Whaley of the Indianapolis Star. "We won't run anything from the Internet unless it moves on our wire.

"Our desk often hears news on the radio on the way to work, then can't find it anywhere else when we get here. We also read stories on the Internet that sometimes don't move until late at night or not at all. It's definitely frustrating."

It's a typical lament, and not all newspapers make it that simple.

"If we see something on a Web site we feel comfortable reporting, we would just attribute it to that Web site," said Alan Gibbons of the Orange County Register. "Obviously, ESPN is going to hold more weight for us than Franksportsfans.net or anything like that."

Decisions of trust are easy when wires report and presumably verify Internet/cable/blogger news. In the absence of AP ... how can we help but recall that ESPN made a national apology in February for reporting mistakes? One story had the NHL season back on two days after the league announced it was canceled. Another, lasting five minutes in a crawl, had Shaquille O'Neal out for the season. That one came from a fake Web site. Who knows where the NHL report came from? Neither turned out to be true, or even close.

The trouble is, as it always has been, that everybody wants to be first with the news. These days everybody is a much larger group than it used to be.

"In talking to some of our editors, they're universally concerned about the rush to be first on the Web," said Bob Willis of the Rocky Mountain News. "Probably that means Web sites are posting stories that might not meet the same standards of verification we require."

When Web sites err by hurrying, they also can wipe out the error in a hurry.

"Like TV or radio sports reporting, Web news doesn't have the permanence of newspapers," Willis said. "If they're wrong, they can change their stories on the fly, in effect at least partially erasing their mistakes."

Domeier has a name for it.

"Great Disappearing News Breaks — 'Gee, I could have sworn I saw a story saying the Knicks trade had gone though, and now 15 minutes later it's gone!' Standards shake when deadline is NOW, DAMMIT, BEFORE OFFICER WORKERS GO HOME and when you don't have to send out a mandatory kill or write a retraction when you're wrong."

Credibility is at the root of the matter, for both sides. How can we judge the credibility of the report? And once we do, how will our readers judge it?  

"I see Web sites for recruiting that seem to have reporting as good as that of the newspapers that chase their breaks all day," Domeier said. " But if readers don't have in mind an accuracy rate for Rivals.com, their scoops aren't' t going to get the same recognition."

And remember, we've lost some of our readers already.

"I want to emphasize one thing: If not for the credibility drag that pervasive anonymous sourcing has done to our business, this wouldn't be one-tenth of the issue it is," Domeier said. "We're not balking at 'Larry Brown is leaving the Pistons, Detroit Free News Press.com reported.' We're balking at 'Larry Brown is leaving the Pistons, unnamed sources told Detroit Free News Press.com.' As long as we're guessing at another reporter's sourcing, we're sailing in the fog. "

Said Gibbons: "Newspapers have lost the trust of the public, and we're going to have to fight to get it back. We need to be aware that we have to distinguish ourselves from bloggers and other places readers might get what they consider news."

Domeier finds it tough to take some reports seriously because news that's treated as absolute on a Web site is treated as speculative by the same company on another outlet.

"I've seen ESPN.com pass on NBA 'insider' rumors that the NBA analysts on ESPN then trash as unlikely," he said. "Why should I believe a report that others in the same media corporation don't believe?"

Then there's the matter of even being in position to make a judgment. If nobody on the desk notices the Web report, there's no decision to be made. That's not a position anybody wants to be in, but who can afford the staff time?

"While we have someone monitoring the wire all night for breaking news, we don't have the resources to do that with Internet sites," Whaley said. "Even if we did, I'm not sure it's the best use of our time."

Domeier can speak to that.

"We used to have an ASE who took it upon himself, and he didn't get much else done," he said.

So, should we box up all these computers and TVs and send them back to Best Buy? Maybe go back to paper layouts, too? Nobody's saying that. It's just another adjustment to make.

"Web sites are a great tool, and it's hard to imagine not taking advantage of all the information that is out there," Willis said. "I wouldn't want to go back to the old days."

• • •

Kevin Bertels is the nightside sports editor for the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

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