GIVING CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE

"You realize you just walked up to the biggest bully on the playground and slapped him in the face and made him thank you for it, right?"

That sentence came from a friend of mine last night after he saw tweets between myself and Greedy Pinstripes on a story that we reported on back on February 5th.  The story was about Clay Rapada, a great ballplayer and a friend and it was news back on February 5th... CLAY RAPADA SIGNS WITH THE GIANTS!

No one picked it up...no one.  That's because BYB isn't part of the "cool kids", and that's OK. We still broke news, and you, our faithful readers knew that. Many of you even congratulated Clay on Twitter when it happened.  For me personally, I was thrilled for Clay. I've always been a fan. I just realized that I'm rambling now and I know you probably have no idea what I'm talking about.  Well... here it goes:

Last night on MLBTradeRumors, a report ran crediting Matt Eddy of Baseball America for the same story BYB reported a week earlier. They wrote:

"The Giants have signed lefty specialist Clay Rapada to a minor league contract, reports Baseball America’s Matt Eddy (via Twitter)"

While the sentence was accurate, it was puzzling to me.  It was also puzzling to Greedy Pinstripes too who quickly replied:

@MattEddyBA kudos to Eddy for getting the Rapada news out first according to @mlbtraderumors #rollseyes @BleednYankeeBlu had it first.
— Greedy Pinstripes (@GreedyStripes) February 14, 2015

My phone buzzed, a read it and smiled.  Greedy Pinstripes had our back.  We sent MLBTR our article immediately.  That was followed with alittle ball busting.  And yes, while not earth shattering, news breaking and "huge"... we still had that story.  Jeff Todd then replied swiftly...

@BleednYankeeBlu @GreedyStripes I had already updated the site, actually. We always research and give proper credit the best we can.
— Jeff Todd (@JA_Todd) February 14, 2015

Checking MLBTR again... I noticed a change:

"The Giants have signed lefty specialist Clay Rapada to a minor league contract, reports Baseball America’s Matt Eddy (via Twitter). Yankees blogger Robert Casey first reported the news recently on Twitter. "

I smiled again. They did the right thing.

What's this all about? Well, it's not about bullying. It's about respect, not just for baseball writers "in the know". It's about respect for all of us.  It makes no difference if the big time sites think we're small and don't read us or believe we have it right.  It's about checking the source to make sure we are or aren't, and if we are... credit needs to go to the right person.

Sure Matt Eddy had the story, but we did too... 1 week earlier.  Sometimes looking through wires takes too long and so, I went to the actual source the get that story.  That's why fighting for it was important to me yesterday.  Bleeding Yankee Blue got it.  My readers knew that, but you know what really made me smile? The fact that a fellow blogger in Greedy Pinstripes could come to our defense, a group of guys we're technically competing against, well... it's nice to see.

I'm not a bully. We just wanted to make sure the story was reported correctly and hats off to MLBTR.  Jeff Todd is a class act and I appreciate the correction.  As far as Matt Eddy of Baseball America goes... he was doing his job. He didn't do anything wrong. And he sure as hell doesn't go on the pages of BYB.
He thought he had it first and hey, no problem... I get it.  He just didn't, and MLBTR corrected the record.

In end we all came together and I appreciate that... I just wanted to let you all know. Even Bleeding Yankee Blue gets it first. Unfortunately... sometimes we need to fight for it.

I take Greedy Pinstripes in my corner any day of the week.

Thank you Jeff Todd for correcting the record.




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