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FOX Had No Reason to Report on Edinson Volquez's Father Last Night

There is no reason FOX should have reported on Edinson Volquez's father last night, and one very good reason why they didn't.

Last night as Edinson Volquez was warming up in the bullpen before his start in Game 1 of the World Series, we all learned that his father Daniel passed away earlier in the day. What remains unclear, even 15 hours later, is whether Volquez knew at the time. Our post on the story last night has three updates because the story kept changing, and yet somehow—on a night when FOX literally delayed the World Series because of a power failure—people are mad at FOX for not immediately reporting the news that we all already knew.

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ESPN and the Associated Press reported that a family member got word to Volquez before the game. FOX and the Kansas City Royals say that Volquez's wife requested he not be informed of the situation before or during the game. She wanted him to be able to pitch without it on his mind, apparently. We still don't know whether Volquez knew his father was ill, or if his health had been failing for some time, or if this came out of the blue.

According to the Royals, when Volquez was lifted from the game, GM Dayton Moore arranged for his wife and family to meet him in the clubhouse, where they apparently told him the news. He left before the game ended—so no one has spoken to him yet—but Jeremy Guthrie said he spoke to him before he left and he "could tell he was devastated." I keep saying "apparently" because we still don't know for sure when or how he found out, or the context of his father's health in general. Still, some people—journalists, mostly—think FOX should have reported the news immediately.

Yes, Joe Buck, that evil social media passing around news that valorous FOX booth won't touch. Like you know, the AP https://t.co/uIhYUYvqCm
— Greg Wyshynski (@wyshynski) October 28, 2015

FOX said the main reason it did not report the news was because the broadcast was generally available in the clubhouse and if Volquez did not know, they did not want to risk him learning the news through them.

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The argument being offered against FOX was, and is, that this is news, and that journalists have an obligation to report newsworthy events. I suppose that's true. Since I already knew that Volquez's father was dead, FOX no longer had that obligation to me, but maybe for other people—who were not on Twitter or Facebook, or were not communicating with friends who were on Twitter and Facebook—that obligation still stands. I can't imagine many average sports fans, who watch from outside the deafening confines of the sports media echo chamber, particularly care when they hear about the death of a stranger. But that's the argument.

I don't know Edinson Volquez. I have no personal attachment to him other than he is an athlete that I watch on television. I felt bad for him last night, I really did. It was such a strange thing watching it, but I wasn't devastated. I was sorry for him, in the same way you feel bad for a neighbor whose parent died. You really mean it when you say "How awful," but then you go about your day. It's not callous to put it that way, it's human. We are sympathetic, but there is a personal hierarchy to how we deal with tragedy.

So, to those saying FOX has a duty to report on a news story, I wonder why you feel that way. This is not a mass shooting, or some other kind of major event that may also impact public safety, or provide another example of a growing trend of national importance. This is a story that impacted one man who for all the world appeared not to have known that his father died while pitching in a World Series game. At the very least, multiple large news organizations had differing accounts of the story. Weirdly enough, pitching in front of tens of thousands of people in Kansas City and millions more around the world, Volquez was perfectly insulated from that information. There was no way he could have found out—no phones, no reporters, no other random conversation to overhear—except from FOX's broadcast.

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Part of the reason people are upset, obviously, is that people like to get upset. It makes them feel like they are doing something, that they are real, and not just passively consuming whatever information passes before their eyes. The media members declaiming and pronouncing on FOX's decision believe they're taking a principled stand, which is the sort of thing that makes people feel better about themselves. They are also justifying a profession (our profession).

We report on tragedy every single day. Should we not cover crime? https://t.co/fCa4lEs6tf
— Jemele Hill (@jemelehill) October 28, 2015

If you are a journalist angry about FOX not informing the world that a person exactly no one gave a single thought to before last night passed away, I can only assume it's because you want to feel like a real reporter. This provides an opportunity to separate yourself from the bad doers of journalism like FOX, and also to romanticize your paycheck. The death of Daniel Volquez was an important news story to the World Series insofar as Volquez was dealing with a personal tragedy while pitching in an important game. That all changes if Edinson Volquez does not know his father is dead. Then he's just a dude doing his job as he normally would. Then it becomes a story about us.

Not a single person would have benefited from FOX reporting it during the game—you have learned that a stranger is dead, great—but one person could have been devastated. And the only justification for risking that is something to the tune of "well, it's news and it's out there, it's stupid not to address it." There is a difference between finding the truth and reporting it and informing the public about important local, national, and global matters. To that extent, sure, journalism can be important and even noble work. Passing along what is essentially a wire-service news item about the death of a private person is not that. Especially when a question as fundamental as "does his son know?" appears unanswered.

We often hear stories about how an athlete found out he was cut from the team because he heard a report on SportsCenter, or that he found out he was traded on Twitter. It feels gross, because that person—any person, every person—deserved to hear that kind of news in a humane way. During one of his early at bats, FOX retold the story of Wilmer Flores crying on the field because he found out he was going to be traded from the only team he's known since he was 16 years old. That was a horrible scene, and he was only going to Milwaukee, which is in fact a pretty nice place. Edinson Volquez could have found out that his father died in the same exact way. I don't blame FOX one bit for making sure it didn't happen.