Sean Taylor

By now, you’ve probably heard about the fatal shooting of Redskins’ safety, Sean Taylor. It’s obviously very tragic when someone dies in the prime of their life. Taylor was only 24, and he leaves behind his fiancé and an 18- month-old child.

Taylor was one of the premier safeties in the NFL and appeared headed towards a Hall of Fame-caliber career.

The angle I’d like to focus on is the coverage of this story by the mainstream media.

Taylor had a history of off the field trouble. He narrowly avoided the potential of over 40 years in prison after allegedly pulling a gun on a group of people a couple years back.

His trouble even spilt over onto the field. While nobody can debate his ability as a football player, his character was called into question when he spat in the face of Tampa Bay’s Michael Pittman during a playoff game. This gave a nationally televised crowd an opportunity to cast their own aspersions.

Friends and family claim that Taylor cleaned up his act when he became a father. I’m not here to say that those reports are erroneous, but it made the coverage of his passing an interesting topic to follow.

It’s certainly horrific if a random intruder broke into a house and shot a successful young man. However, doesn’t the perception of this crime change a bit if Taylor did something to bring this on?

It’s still terrible and wrong on the part of the killer, but it changes how we remember Sean Taylor. He didn’t deserve to die, but who knows what circumstance may have lead to that.
I don’t mean to speculate, but its human nature in this case. If you picked up the paper tomorrow morning and read that Brittany Spears was found dead, your first reaction might be that she had something to do with her own demise. At the same time, the possibility is open that it was a random event.

I could tell that ESPN had a difficult time figuring out how to handle this. They tried to walk that tight-rope between informing and speculating. I heard his past troubles mentioned, but not until a day or so into the coverage. Still, it was just that. It was “mentioned.” No speculation whatsoever took place (that I heard or saw at least).

I think it was handled well, but I’d like to hear what others have to say. So, if anyone is actually reading this, please take this opportunity to chime in.

Thank you, and hopefully the seriousness of this post won’t be needed again for a while.