Peyton Manning: The Anatomy of A Hit Piece

In the last few days, we have seen an amazing example of a “journalistic” hit piece. This comes in the form of a false story about Peyton Manning which was pimped so hard by ProFootballTalk that I honestly hope Manning sues the site and NBC, its owner.

The story began with a report by Al Jazeera based on undercover reporting by scandal-ridden British hurdler Liam Collins. The story was that Peyton Manning secretly used human growth hormone (HGH), a banned substance, while he was a patient at the Guyer Institute in 2011. Charles Sly claimed to be on the team that treated Manning, claimed to have personal knowledge of Manning coming to the institute after hours to receive shots of HGH, and claimed that the Institute then sent HGH to Manning’s wife in Florida.

The story is false. Indeed, it was quickly discovered that while Sly was an unpaid intern at the Guyer Institute for three months, that wasn’t until two years after Manning ended his treatment there. So he couldn’t have seen anything. What’s more, Sly recanted his story the moment he realized he had been taped making it. In interviews, Sly has admitted that he made this story up because he thought Collins had contacts in English Premier League soccer and he used Manning’s name (among others) to impress Collins with his ability to get banned drugs to athletes.

Enter Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com.

I’ve talked about Florio before. He’s a lousy lawyer from West Virginia who used his contacts with certain agents to build a rumor site that NBC bought. Many of his stories are so steeped in paranoia that it’s easy to see him hidden in a bunker holding a gun toward the door as he types out his typo-ridden crap. He’s also a Tom Brady apologist and a Peyton Manning hater for whatever reason. This is important because Florio is a man who spent months parsing every statement made against Brady and attacking his accusers, yet you are about to see something very different here.

Florio’s first article on the issue came late on the 26th. It was rather benign. It noted the allegation in detail. It noted that Manning completely denied the allegations, as did Manning’s agent, and it suggested that if the allegations are untrue, then Manning could possibly sue Al Jazeera for defamation. It does, however, suggest that since the NFL wasn’t testing for HGH yet in 2011, “players were essentially on the honor system.”

The following morning, Florio gets rolling when he notes that Peyton Manning hired Ari Fleischer to help refute the story. At this point, the tone changes dramatically. First, Florio scoffs at the idea that Manning needed to hire Fleischer and suggests he should have been satisfied just issuing a denial. He essentially suggests that hiring a PR guy, which he notes that many athletes do, is suspicious.

Then he digs in deep. In the same article, he points out that Manning issued his denial to Chris Mortensen of ESPN. Florio attacks Mortensen’s credibility as someone “who has a long relationship with the Manning family.” He then says, “Patriots fans will appreciate — or not — the irony of Mortensen’s early involvement in the life cycle of this specific story.” This is an attack on Mortensen’s reporting on deflategate, which Florio spent months attacking. The suggestion is that Mortensen is a bad reporter who will shade the truth to help Manning or hurt Brady. Keep in mind though, Manning is simply giving a statement. There is no reporting here, so Mortensen’s credibility is not relevant.

Then Florio says that while Manning says he’s not worried about the story, Manning is worried enough to comment and to hire Fleischer. In other words, Florio suggests that the fact Manning is responding is evidence that something about the story must be true.

Florio then parses Manning’s statement to attack Manning’s wife and he suggests that Manning’s statement is “odd” and that “some” are interpreting it as Manning leaving the door open to blame his wife (no one has said this, by the way). He then notes that it’s “noteworthy” that Manning’s wife hasn’t commented. And he plays this game of suggesting the fact that Manning attacks parts of the claim in greater detail than others means that Manning’s defense is... well, it’s up to you what that means wink wink.

He finished with the truly unfair assessment that “With so many statements and reports and developments emerging in a fairly short time frame, it’s fair to wonder what the next statement, report, or development will be.” This suggests that the facts are fluid and evolving and going both ways. However, except for the initial statement, which Florio admits here was recanted, every statement is a consistent flat out denial.

A few hours later, the Broncos issue a statement backing Manning. PFT reports this and concludes with this: “The allegation in the report is that Manning used HGH while he was battling neck injuries near the end of his tenure with the Colts, not during his time with the Broncos. The Colts have not commented.” In others, Team Florio dismisses this because only what the Colts say will matter... just wait.

An hour later, Mike Ditka dismisses the report by saying Al Jazeera is not credible. PFT dismisses Ditka’s claim as an opinion held “among conservatives” and then boosts Al Jazeera by saying they have won awards for their reporting. So has Chris Mortensen, by the way, but PFT never mentioned that during any of their attacks on him.

About an hour later, Florio writes an article in which he says that Manning needs to see how Roger Clemens responded to PED allegations and pimps his own (self-published) book on the matter. Keep in mind that Florio typically dismisses the credibility of anyone with even the slightest economic interest, like anyone pimping a book.

An hour after the Broncos issued their statement, which Florio dismissed by claiming that only a statement from the Colts would matter, the Colts issue a statement. They unequivocally backed Manning. Florio responds by wondering why the Colts would even respond to this... “Peyton Manning hasn’t played in a game for the Colts for nearly five years. But because Manning reportedly used HGH while still with the Colts in 2011, the Colts apparently felt compelled to respond.” Gee, I guess that’s why the Colts said something. Notice the rope-a-dope here. First, Florio dismisses any response except one from the Colts, but when the Colts issue a response he suggests there is something odd about the Colts bothering to respond. Think about this. This shell game makes it impossible for Manning to defend himself because Florio attacks anyone who tries.

Florio ends this story with this snide and suggestive little turd: “For a story that has been recanted by the only person who told it, a lot of people are making statements about it.” In other words, he’s suggesting that the fact that people are denying the story is proof that the story is true. He then goes even further into advocacy and says the fact that the story has been recanted doesn’t mean it’s not true. Think about that: evidence of untruth is proof of truth and responding to an untruth is proof that it’s really true. Welcome to paranoid conspiracy land.

And it doesn’t stop there. At the same time as the Colts’ statement, the Guyer Institute issued a statement saying that it’s not true, that they’re shocked someone would violate Mrs. Manning’s medical confidences, and that this guy wasn’t employed there at a time when he could have witnessed what he claimed to witness. Enter Florio. Florio attacks the statement as “clunky and confused,” even though the statement is a clear complete denial.

He then plays another shell game by saying that it’s impossible to both be untrue what Sly has said and yet violate a medical confidence. Basically, he says that if it’s not true, then it doesn’t violate a confidence. Ergo, it must be true. This is both splitting hairs far beyond what is reasonable and utterly false logic. Medical privacy extends to the fact of treatment no matter what was or was not done. In other words, just saying she was a patient is a violation as is suggesting a treatment. But Florio is trying to claim Sly’s statement can only be a violation if what he said was true. That’s simply false. And pretending that Guyer is trying to play fast and loose with his statement is paranoia, not wisdom or insight.

Florio also dismisses the fact of Sly not working there. He says that even though Sly didn’t work there at the right time, he could have heard something from other employees. So Sly is just passing on rumors now? Then why did Sly’s recanted statement involved Sly seeing this himself and doing it himself? Florio ignores that.

Florio then says, “as the statements pile up regarding the Peyton Manning report, Ashley Manning’s silence becomes even more conspicuous.” First, note idea that “the statements pile up” is meant to suggest that there is a genuine conflict. There isn’t. Every single statement, including one by the initial accuser, entirely refutes the report. Yet, Florio wants to leave the impression that there are competing statements. Even worse, notice that Florio is now moving the ball again and demanding a statement from Manning’s wife. Every time a statement is issued, Florio dismisses the person making it and demands one from someone else. Then, after they make a statement, he uses that statement as evidence that they are worried about the truth. This is gotcha. Worse yet, he is suggesting that to satisfy him, Ashley Manning needs to violate her own right to medical confidence even though Peyton has denied everything.

He then finishes this report with the asinine suggestion that we will never know “the full, objective, and unvarnished truth.” Bull. The truth is clear and believing the recanted report is an exercise in willful self-deception.

Later that night, Manning was asked if he will sue and he said he probably will. Florio jumps on this. First he notes that Manning is unlikely to win because of the high standard (remember that he suggested suing earlier?). Then he cautions Manning that this will open up his private life. Then he gets incredible. He says that if Manning had said nothing, then this story would have died. You have to read this to believe it:

If Manning had said nothing about the allegations, how many mainstream news outlets would have ignored it? I can’t speak for anyone else, but I decided not to mention it until Manning issued a statement denying it.

This is from a man who jumped on this story and kept demanding statements from person after person, claiming that the lack of a statements was evidence of its truth.

Today, he wrote another article in which he said this story only has legs because of Manning “strongly, repeatedly disputing it.” Get this: “If the goal was to get no one to write about the story, the approach shouldn’t have been to issue statements. It should have been to pick up the phone and call every reporter with any degree of influence or credibility and persuade them to leave it alone.” And the bullsh*t gets even deeper:

Frankly, PFT wouldn’t have even written a story about it if the response had been “no comment” from Manning, Manning’s representative, the Broncos, the Colts, or the NFL.

That’s total crap and Florio knows it. Florio was going to do his best to prove this story true no matter how much truth he needed to twist and how paranoid he needed to get.

As for pulling strings to kill the story, this story hit the rumor sites before any reputable reporter even knew about it. It was spreading everywhere. How exactly does Manning stop a TMZ or a Mike Florio from spreading it as the absolute truth? And what do you think paranoid Florio would have said if he’d learned that Manning was trying to talk people out of printing this?

This is the kind of hit-piece journalism that has become the norm. Unethical, paranoid incompetents have taken over the media and they are using false logic and deception to blur reality and spewing conspiracy as fact. This is true in sports as it has become in politics. Honestly, our media needs too be purged. It needs a real code of ethics and serious training in logic, recognizing bias and the fundamentals of journalism. And guys like Florio, need to be ejected by places like NBC.

I hope Manning sues him.

Update: That "reputable" news source Al Jazeera is now claiming they never made any allegations against Manning. They claim they only talked about his career, his treatment and then said that his wife got HGH. That's such obvious bull that it's going to blow up on them.