"bad in the room" And Other Sports Writer Silliness

Chappy at Oil On Whyte takes on the "bad in the room" canard in reference to Alexander Semin and tangentially takes down most of the Edmonton MSM sportswriters at the same time:

"He’s got a bad attitude. He’s lazy, his play shows that he thinks he’s entitled, he doesn’t do what he’s asked. He’s last on the ice in the morning, and he’s first off. His teammates don’t even like him. He’s bad in the room"

As Oilers fans, we’ve heard this story countless times. There are a few problems with these sorts of stories, let’s see if I can hit them all.

• "bad in the room" style stories reek of high school lunch periods. (OMG DID YOU HEAR WHAT PLAYER X SAID TODAY?)
• rarely, if ever, are these stories proven to be true
• Not all of these stories are created by members of media – some are created by fans who have hate for a certain player. This isn’t to say that media is exempt, because they certainly aren’t.
• a "bad in the room" charge leads to other non-quantifiable jingoistic terms like "no heart", "isn’t clutch", "no jam/crust", and so on. None of it makes any good sense, and rarely does anyone seem to be particularly bothered by that fact.

Perhaps because I’m an Oilers fan, I’m somewhat immune when I see a "bad in the room" charge among the fan base. When I see it among other teams, it looks ridiculous.

It's an excellent look at the laziness of sports writers and broadcasters that strikes close to home due to Ales Hemsky's treatment by Edmonton sports writers over the last few years. Check it out.