NEW YORK, NY – Rick Reilly has met some criticism over his latest piece!
Rick Reilly is one of ESPN’s most accomplished columnist. He recently traveled to Pamplona to attend the Running of the Bulls. He did a profile of the event on his “Riled Up” section of ESPN. He also decided to step up to the plate and participate in the event.
By watching the profile, one could tell that Reilly was like a little kid in a candy store. He was filled with anxiousness and nervousness – justifiable so considering he could be trampled by a massive bull. One rival writer, however, feels as though the way Reilly went about everything was incredibly careless.
Charles Robinson, a senior writer at Yahoo!, has run with the bull four times. That is certainly solid experience when it comes to the event and Robinson was disgusted with Reilly’s performance. He was enraged with Reilly swatting bulls with a newspaper, all in the name of writing a column.
Robinson unleashed a verbal tirade on his Twitter page directed towards Reilly. “He endangered other runners,” Robinson tweeted. “He’s why people die,” he added. Robinson went so far as to call the ESPN columnist a “jackass,” “ass,” “idiot,” “moron” and a practitioner of “piss poor journalism.”
Reilly has stepped on more than one set of toes in his days as a journalist. There’s a Web site calling for the columnist’s job.
One of Reilly’s goals at Pamplona was to successfully swat a bull with a newspaper. If he had done his research, he would of realized that swatting a bull isn’t done for sheer entertainment. The purpose of the newspaper is to draw the bulls’ attention from them with necessary. By doing this, Reilly was bringing the bulls towards innocent people and potentially endangering their lives. It seems as though Reilly’s attempt at journalism may have burst into flames this time.
Swatting the bull is a criminal act, and if he had been caught, justice would have been delivered right in the street. He put us all at a greater risk by distracting the bull. The whole idea is to run with the herd, and not to call attention to one's self. Instead, Rick showed himself to be a coward, but worse, ignorant of the traditions. It makes me wonder what else on ESPN is wrongly reported.
If the midnight cowboy swats the bull is it still a criminal act?