During tonight's All-Star Game broadcast by TNT, analyst Reggie Miller relayed an interesting anecdote about LeBron James as studied by Michael Jordan. The story came from, of all places, Bleacher Report. Timothy Rapp, Reggie tells us, apparently got the scoop of the century for Bleacher Report. Michael Jordan breaking down the next Michael Jordan's game, what a story!
Of course, Bleacher Report did no such thing. Timothy Rapp just cut and pasted (and properly quoted) a portion of Wright Thompson's excellent piece on Jordan for ESPN The Magazine, published online earlier this week. Rapp, for his part, did nothing wrong and somewhat sheepishly tweeted out a link to Thompson's piece, urging followers to read it, after Miller essentially attributed Wright Thompson's work to a Bleacher Report featured columnist whose most recent column broke down this year's NBA All-Star Game shoes.
That's what really stinks the most about the whole thing. It's not that Bleacher Report is SEO-driven chum for the Google shark. And it's not even that TNT is now forcing Bleacher Report content on viewers. It's the misrepresentation of what Bleacher Report is. That, and Reggie Miller casually mentioning on TNT a Bleacher Report article he read—hey guys, even NBA stars like Reggie Miller read Bleacher Report!—is just a bit too much to swallow.
Update, 12:35 a.m.: Ernie Johnson apologized for the mis-attribution while on "Inside the NBA" on NBA TV.