You gotta love the media. (And, for those without a sarcasm detector, yes, that was sarcastic.)

The following tidbit showed up today on Yahoo Sports regarding the whole Wade Phillips thinks New England’s Super Bowls are tainted thing:

Later in the week, Sports Illustrated’s Peter King reported on HBO’s weekly show “Inside the NFL” that first-year Dallas coach Wade Phillips said New England’s three Super Bowl championships this decade were tainted following revelations of Pats coach Bill Belichick’s role in the videotaping scandal.

As expected, defensive guru Phillips immediately went on the offensive and dismissed the charge, telling the Cowboys’ web site:

“Well, the writer evidently got it wrong,” Phillips said. “The only thing he had right in there was I did have a conversation with him. I’m sure he misconstrued what I said. It was certainly his agenda. He went on and on about this was a Watergate thing. It was his feelings on it and I guess for some reason he felt like I agreed with him, which I absolutely do not.”

The well-respected King issued a statement through HBO that he stands behind his story - with the backing of the network.

Note the use of “well-respected” next to King’s name. Now, this is supposed to be journalism, right? It’s supposed to be about truth, right? My question is: Just where’s this evidence that Peter King is well respected?

I’ll say this: The media, in general, is not very well respected. After all, what have they done to garner any respect? Give us 24/7 coverage of Paris Hilton going to jail? Wow, great news, next up Celebrity Doesn’t Pick Up Dog Poop After Walking Poodle, right?

And, as the media goes, the sports media is towards the bottom. Not happy with just focusing on minor stories and blowing them out of proportion, they’ll go all the way to making up stories. What do you think your average ‘quarterback controversy’ is? It’s the media not having anything better to write about.

It goes further, because when you look at the sports media Sports Illustrated is towards the bottom. They are known for trying to twist words around just to get a story.

And Peter King? He’s the same one that came out with the whole “Diamond among trash” quote from Emmitt Smith. You know, the quote that Emmitt says was taken completely out of context and twisted to mean something entirely different.

You know: the well-respected Emmitt Smith.

But, like I said, you gotta love the media. As soon as someone questions the media’s integrity, suddenly the person in question is ‘well-respected’. I guess there’s some sort of weird blue line that members of the media aren’t allowed to cross.