If only the Eagles showed the same fight as their beat writers

FROM KEITH GROLLER

A lot of Eagles fans were disappointed that their favorite team came out and laid an emotional egg in their home opener against the Giants on Sunday.

The football team could have used the same fire as two of the beat writers covering the team -- Les Bowen of the Phiadelphia Daily News and Jeff McLane of the Philadelphia Inquirer.

They evidently got into a nasty exchange via Twitter, bickering about Michael Vick's playing status, and it escalated into a verbal, and then -- at least according to some -- physical confrontation at the Eagles training facility.

The surprise is not that this happened.

It's actually a surprise that it doesn't happen more often considering that the media members often have the same large egos as the athletes they cover. In this business, you need an ego to survive or else you'll get beaten into the ground mentally. It is not an arena for those lacking confidence in themselves and there are more than a few reporters, especially in the big cities, who are certain the world revolves around them.

And remember, too, everybody is competitive with each other on the same beats and protective of their own material and accuracy.

In this case, perhaps the biggest surprise is that Howard Eskin was only involved in reporting the incident (via, what else, Twitter) and not involved in the actual incident himself.

The Eagles players got wind of what happened between Bowen and McLane and Asante Samuel had fun in the Eagles locker room. He was trying to play the role of Don King and setting up a fight between Bowen and McLane. You can hear him in the background calling "Jeff and Less to the podium" as Vick was being interviewed by the standard herd of reporters that evidently included Bowen and McLane.

Credit them for jumping right back into the assignment at hand.

Samuel's antics lightened the mood in this case and hopefully reminded everyone of the silliness of the situation. Here's a link to the Vick interview:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-f3j7K0Wz8&feature=player_embedded

http://blogs.mcall.com/groller/