Midwest Sports Fans

Midwest Sports Fans (MSF) is a weblog, which was launched by Jerod Morris in August 2008. The site primarily focuses on professional and college teams and athletes relevant to the Midwest.

It receives approximately 600,000 pageviews each month, ^[1] and is a part of the Yardbarker network, ^[2] which links daily pieces to Fox Sports homepage ^[3]

Authors and Content

Jerod Morris is the managing editor and AJ Kaufman serves as co-editor. ^[4] The author list for Midwest Sports Fans has included sports anchors Scott Reister (KNDU-TV in Kennewick, Washington state) and Candice Crawford (KOMU-TV in Columbia, Missouri). Reister wrote a regular column called "The Anchor’s Desk", ^[5] while Crawford regularly contributed her article, "From the Sideline.". ^[6] Other writers include "KVB", Kurt Allen, Jon Washburn, Tyler Juranovich, Devon Alexandre, and Drew Lange. MSF also has a podcast.

Controversy

In a post titled "The Curious Case of Raúl Ibañez: Steroid Speculation Perhaps Unfair, but Great Start in 2009 Raising Eyebrows", ^[7] Morris outlined a variety of possible statistical explanations for the impressive beginning Raúl Ibañez got off to in 2009, his first year with the Philadelphia Phillies. In the post, Morris argues that because of Major League Baseball's recent history with performance-enhancing drug (PED) use, it is reasonable to speculate and impossible to rule out that Ibañez's performance could have been steroid-enhanced. In the post, Morris stated that he was withholding judgment on the issue, ^[8] and later clarified that he did not believe Ibañez was using steroids, only that such speculation is warranted for any Major League Baseball player. ^{[9] [10]}

The post on Midwest Sports Fans created a controversy when it was mentioned by John Gonzalez ^[11] in a Philadelphia Inquirer article titled "A cheap shot at Ibanez". ^[12] Morris claimed that Gonzalez had mischaracterized the post. ^{[13] [14]} Once informed of the Philadelphia Inquirer article by Gonzalez that discussed the post by Morris, Raúl Ibañez criticized the post saying he considered it "pathetic" and "cowardly" and vowing that he would go to any measure to prove that he is clean. ^[15]

On the same day that Ibañez's comments became public, Morris, Gonzalez, and Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports appeared on the ESPN show "Outside the Lines", hosted by Steve Bunin. ^[16]

References

1. "Midwest Sports Fans Quantcast Profile".
2. "MSF on YardBarker".
3. "Midwest Sports Fans branded link in the left sidebar".
4. "Ari Kaufman becomes first co-editor of Midwest Sports Fans".
5. "Scott Reister - Author of "The Anchor's Desk"".
6. "Candice Crawford - From the Sideline". Archived from the original on 2009-02-25. Retrieved 2009-02-13.
7. "The Curious Case of Raúl Ibañez: Steroid Speculation Perhaps Unfair, but Great Start in 2009 Raising Eyebrows".
8. "MSF says they are "withholding judgment" regarding Ibanez steroid use".
9. "Amending the Previously Incomplete Research of the Ibanez Post".
10. "Final Thoughts (for now) on the Raúl Ibañez Story Debated Yesterday".
11. "John Gonzalez". Philadelphia Inquirer.
12. Gonzalez, John (June 9, 2009). "A cheap shot at Ibanez". Philadelphia Inquirer.
13. "Hugging Harold National Blog defends MSF".
14. "Raúl Ibañez debacle: Blame the Philly Inquirer, not blogger Jerod Morris".
15. "Raúl Ibañez's statement in the "Philadelphia Inquirer."".
16. "Fox Sports, "Outside the Lines"".