OT- Today's Manti Te'O thread; Katie Couric
I'm bothered by what I've seen so far in the form of teasers for tonight's Katie Couric interview with Manti Te'O, and the early media responses thereto.
Check your local listings for airtimes in your area:
http://www.katiecouric.com/promo/
It seems like we are into the phase of the story where everyone is judging and psychoanalyzing Te'O. In the interview, he looks totally adorable. Like a man-killing Samoan/Hawaiian teddy bear. Beautiful hair and makeup. Metrosexual sweater and cream-colored slacks on cream-colored upholstery. Comfy chairs; set decoration borrowed from Oprah. Check, check, triple check. Straight outta Compton? Not this time.
So what this seems to be turning into is a national debate about social media, and the pressures of college football, and a story with enough weird sex/non-sex to fascinate a nation of 300 million tv viewers. All things that I couldn't care less about. At least not as told by Katie Couric and Manti Te'O.
What seems to be getting lost in all of this -- and I suspect it is by design -- is Notre Dame's role in pushing the PR angle of the original story. Manti Te'O will get drafted, and he'll sign an NFL contract, and he'll go on to have a good, bad or indifferent NFl career. And I won't care.
What I want to know, is when do we find out how Notre Dame's publicity machine played this to try to win a Heisman for Te'O? Deadspin broke this story; I hope that Deadspin (or a similar blog) breaks the Notre Dame side of this story.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:11 PM ^
he's a liar. fantastic. his lie was what? that he didn't immediately confess that he was duped when asked about his non-existent-girlfriend before the bowl game? becaue, i surely would have been waiting for the opportunity to tell the world that i was a giant sucker. moreover, i'm pretty sure that i'd want to avoid the mediafest that would be sure to follow if i disclosed that three days before the bowl game.
or the lie that he exagerrated his relationship with a girl that he believed was dying from cancer and who he believed was drawing strength from their relationship. i can't imagine a more horrifice "disgrace to football fans".
te'o is a naive sucker. but, his lies were pecadillos. they were the sorts of lies that it would be stranger not to tell than to tell. the strange part was that he fell for it. but, he did. and, i have no idea what any of us are entitled to know the first thing about that...
te'o may be an impressive dupe, but he's a pretty lame liar.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:25 PM ^
"that he didn't immediately confess that he was duped when asked about his non-existent-girlfriend before the bowl game?"
Imagine how long you'd wait if dude really knew it was a dude. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
"Damn, dude, thats a dude, dude!"
January 24th, 2013 at 3:07 PM ^
January 24th, 2013 at 12:55 PM ^
whenever he answers a questions his eyes go away from KC and move down and to the side. Not a sign of high veracity...
January 24th, 2013 at 1:20 PM ^
What if there was a cake there? Would it be a sign of his high voracity?
January 24th, 2013 at 1:42 PM ^
Or a hot imaginary girlfriend! Now that he knows he doesn't have to grieve for a dead girlfriend he's on the rebound!
January 24th, 2013 at 1:00 PM ^
Say what you will, but I would still give Katie Couric a shot at the champ.
/That's kid-speak for have the S with her.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:03 PM ^
have S with her kid-speak to begin with?
January 24th, 2013 at 7:16 PM ^
The mere fact that you call making love "Pop-pop" tells me that you're not ready.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:05 PM ^
how is notre dame plausibly culpable if they didn't create the hoax in concert with te'o? given that it appears that te'o didn't create the hoax, what is their responsibility? nd's hype machine surely played this up, but that's not morally problematic, because they believed it was true. do you think that the michigan/ohio/alabama hype machine would have behaved differently? they were wrong, as it turns out, but that doesn't meant that there was anything remotely under-handed here. what were they supposed to do, investigate it themselves? they had no reason to doubt that it was true.
one of the many aspects of this story that i find absurd is that the social media/blog/24 hour newscycle universe forces people to prove their innocence. te'o has had to prove that he didn't pull the hoax, when there was never any evidence that he did in the first place. now, notre dame has to prove that they didn't do something under-handed when there is literally no evidence of that assertion? more ridiculously, under no account did anything criminal happen here. just something really weird in the personal life of a college linebacker.
i don't think that opposing fan bases think about this subject particularly fairly. imagine that a michigan player was similarly duped (it apparently happened to a handful of nfl players as well). i highly doubt the judgements would be so fast or furious. instead, i imagine there would be outrage that some relatively small exagerrations/lies from the admittedly weird private life of a college football player were used to drag them through the muck, humiliate them and force them to apologize. this is particularly problematic given that those lies were or no consequence and in the context of salacious accusations that were completely unsupported by evidence and have turned out to be mostly false. (i.e. that te'o created the hoax)
January 24th, 2013 at 1:19 PM ^
Why are you assuming Teo wasn't in on the hoax...because he said so with big sad eyes?
ND and their AD could have just supported Manti, but not taken a position on the "hoax." Instead, they hold a press conference, say they independently investigated and Manti was only a victim. Now it turns out the investigation was beyond lame and Manti didn't know the voice was his close friend acting like a girl?
ND thought they could go with the cover-up and this would all go away, just like the rapes and their thorough "investigations."
January 24th, 2013 at 1:28 PM ^
1. the assumption of innocence. weirdly, if this were a legal matter these assertions of guilt would seem problematic. given that this is a much smaller thing, its somehow acceptable to assume that he's guilty...
2. hours of telephone records
3. text messages shown to schapp
4. flowers purchased
5. the similar duping of the arizona cardinals fullback about the same girl
6. the reported apology to te'o from the dude that supposedly did this
7. if there was a smoking gun that it would have come out by now. the absence of such a smoking gun increase the odds of a duping.
8. the absence of any evidence whatsoever that he did know
9. he denies it. there is nobody on the other side calling him out on that.
10. the plausible alternative hypothesis that he's just a naive, nice sucker who grew up in an incredibly sheltered, incredibly religious universe in a tiny tight-knit community on an island and who has spent the last 4 years on a similar tight-knit and very small island in northern indiana.
so, there is some evidence that he was not in on it and literally none that he was. why do you assume that he was in on it? what would he have to do to prove himself to you? isn't it profoundly unfair that he has to prove his innocence?
January 24th, 2013 at 1:42 PM ^
I agree there was a relationship, but probably with his boyfriend.
1. He's innocent...it's not illegal to be gay
2. The calls are real, just to his boyfriend
3. The texts are real, just to his boyfriend or for the cover-up (Lennay)
4. He sent his guy flowers
5. I thought the fullback met the girl in person? How?
6. Boyfriend sends a cover-up apology, big deal.
7. The smoke detector is blaring.
8. Evidence? Why not release the real phone records instead of a summary?
9. He denies it....well, golly, you got me there.
10. He not drooling in the corner, hard to believe he's this dumb.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:45 PM ^
ok. fine by me. i suspect you're wrong. i know that you have no evidence whatsoever to support your position. feel free to assume the worse of a person on the basis of no evidence whatsoever. that's a lovely standard to apply.
you mocked everything that you couldn't disprove and didn't answer the question about standard of evidence. well done, indeed.
January 24th, 2013 at 4:34 PM ^
January 24th, 2013 at 1:48 PM ^
He lied about meeting this girl (in person) after a game against Stanford, even going so far as to describe her physically and did not correct it when that account was printed in the newspaper.
Unless he has some hallucination creating mental illness or was on psychoactive drugs, he made up a story to further this bullshit long before the "hoax" was exposed.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:03 PM ^
He never said that they met in 2009 after the Stanford game, that was a fabrication by the Tuiasasopo crew.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:08 PM ^
The 2009 Stanford stuff is reported to have come from the Te'o family.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:45 PM ^
I just marked that comment overrated. It felt good on numerous levels.
January 24th, 2013 at 4:07 PM ^
That account was in the South Bend Tribune. Who do you think their source was?
January 25th, 2013 at 1:53 PM ^
Doubtful. The gay hypothesis and the storyline of 'Lennay' dying doesn't align very well.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:53 PM ^
Mike Florio, founder of profootballtalk.com and a lawyer, has written a lot on Te'o and one of his points was that in court once you prove someone has lied about one thing it becomes alot easier to believe they lied about other stuff. I've lost count of how many lies Te'o has told.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:05 PM ^
Said it before, will say it again (but not on this blog because that's redundant):
Ronaiah Tuiasosopo is/was/will be Manti Te'o's boyfirend. Lennay Kekua was a beard.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:15 PM ^
January 24th, 2013 at 1:54 PM ^
He found Captain Winkie!
January 24th, 2013 at 2:18 PM ^
January 24th, 2013 at 1:25 PM ^
They only part I disagree with is the "will be" boyfriend. There has to be some serious strain on that relationship now. They will be so famous, they will get a name just like Bennifer, TomKat and Brangelina. Hmm, let see: Ro-Ti? ManSopo? Tuia-Te'o?
January 24th, 2013 at 1:48 PM ^
Please ManSopo...
January 25th, 2013 at 1:05 AM ^
If they're Ro-Ti they can endorse a Big Ten original!
January 24th, 2013 at 1:09 PM ^
Your parents taught you to always be there for someone when they need help. That's why you never tried to see your girlfriend even though tragic things kept happening to her over and over.
Every time he talks, he seems like he's half asleep. Either he really is the dumbest person on the planet or he's the best actor in the world, playing the dumb angle to perfection to get out of all the lies he told for so long that drove his hype.
I've been watching and laughing at this story since day one but I don't know if I even want to watch this interview. All the focus is going to be turned into a PSA announcement to show the public how to avoid being victims of an invisible online love interest, when in reality, you won't fall victim to it as long as you have an IQ of over 70.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:11 PM ^
The puzzle pieces are finally starting to fit. If the person he was talking to for all those hours was his buddy, it makes sense that they would only allow Schaap to view a summary of his phone call records and just the area code. If they released the full number, it would probably just be his buddy's regular and Manti would have known who it was for sure.
I have a hard time believing his good friend could fool him with a fake female voice for hours and hours.
Just come out of the closet, Manti. You already will be treated differently in the lockerroom after this drama.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:13 PM ^
Manti Te'o Joins Notre Dame's Long Tradition Of Bullshit: http://deadspin.com/manti-te.o/
January 24th, 2013 at 1:15 PM ^
I hope at the end of her interview she closes with... "Thank you for your time today Manti; now I want to be perfectly clear that just because we sat down and talked today... we are NOT dating!"
Not Buying what you are Selling!!!! If he's that dumb, he shouldn't be able to even pass a basket weaving class.
I can see the NFL combine questions now... "So, Manti... the TE tells you he's not going to run a route, and stay in and block... do you believe him????"
Go Blue, glad we're not trying to defend this Kid... who I am now pissed about actually feeling sorry for in the past!
January 24th, 2013 at 1:26 PM ^
I PULL MY GIRLFRIENDS FROM THE AIR SOMETIMES SAYIN A-YO I'M MANTI TE'O
January 24th, 2013 at 1:28 PM ^
I'm no conspiracy theorist whatsoever, but in the voicemails Katie Couric just released today...there's not one mention of "Manti," "Notre Dame," "Football," etc.
These are very generic audio messages.
As anyone who has seen the "Catfish" movie can attest to, it's not hard to manufacture these.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:50 PM ^
She says "I miss you" a couple times, which, how can you miss someone you HAVE NEVER MET IN YOUR ENTIRE LIFE! I think to "miss" a person you have to have been in the same room at least once.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:14 PM ^
January 24th, 2013 at 1:32 PM ^
At this point, I'm still on the side that believes that Te'O was hoaxed. Most of the people I talk to about it seem to say "How can he 'date' someone for so long and not even see her? Does he even know what skype is? He never saw pictures of her? How can he fall for a man's voice on the phone?"
Well yeah, maybe for YOU this whole thing sounds absolutely ridiculous and absurd and something that YOU would never fall for. It sounds pretty absurd to me as well. Not many people I know would fall for something like this. But I don't know anything about Manti Te'O's personal life. I don't know what he was raised to believe, what his morals are, what he thinks is right and what he thinks is "dating". It seems like a lot of people think that the reason this all had to happen was because Te'O had some master plan behind it. Maybe he was a 22 year old who did not make wise decisions? Funny how some people can be different and not do something that you may have otherwise done.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:36 PM ^
What percentage of the college-aged male population would fall for this?
1%? That might be a bit too generous. I'd say closer to 0.5%. Now what are the odds that the one person that this "hoaxer" goes after is in this 0.5%?
Seems pretty unlikely.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:42 PM ^
a bunch of eagles apparently fell for a similar thing. the fullback from the cardinals swore that the very same girl that he believed that the very same girl that te'o fell for was real...even after being told that she wasn't.
its easy to call people idiots in retrospect.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:46 PM ^
Actually it was the Redskins, and they didn't fall for it, they caught onto the scheme once the "catfish" didn't show up to in-person meetings.
I mean I'm sure people like Tuiasosopo try this scheme all the time, but most people would realize it's a farce when the culprit keeps cancelling in-person meetings. Most people would realize it's a farce when the culprit's skype "doesn't work." Most people would realize it's a farce by googling the "character's" name.
It's pretty implausible to defend somebody that believes such a person could exist.
January 24th, 2013 at 3:18 PM ^
the reason that it wasn't inplausbile at the time is because the reality was more increcible than the fiction that te'o believed — who would have believed that somebody who knows you well enough to be able to push your buttons would create a fake online identify, endlessly fake phone calls, send you fake pictures, have fake scriptual exchanges etc.
you have to determine which is more incredible: that somebody would create an entirely fake person, in great detail, just to mess with you or that a person who you've never physically met is real. you have to decide which of these improbabilities is less improbable...and only through the retrospectoscope is that obvious.
furthermore, a huge proportion of our society belives in the literal truth of the bible — improbability is not a good guide to whether people might hold a belief or not.
January 24th, 2013 at 1:56 PM ^
He can be both the victim of a hoax and someone who lied about what was happening, though.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:06 PM ^
Te'o is the one who described the meeting that never happened after the Stanford game. Te'o is the one who described this girl as the "love of his life" without ever actually having been in the same room as her, nor has he explained how that could have been possible solely based on some texts/tweets/calls, nor has he explained how this charade could have carried on for three years. Te'o is the one who didn't even consider visiting the "love of his life" at any moment as she got into fictitious car accidents and battled fictitious cancer and was fictitiously kidnapped by fictitious drug dealers.
This stuff sounds like a much bigger hoax than some dude on the internet pretending to be a pretty lady.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:13 PM ^
He really believed there was a girl out there but also added to the fiction himself out of some combination of shame and a desire for attention and sympathy. Specifically, he lied for attention and sympathy on the weekend of the Heisman ceremony...I believe, arguably, in the worst of both worlds for him: he appears to be both a liar and a dullard.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:20 PM ^
Even assuming Te'o sincerely believed he was in an important relationship with some chick he never met or saw, his actions/statements are nutty and inconsistent. Either he turned some online chatting into "true love" for media attention or he genuinely fell in love with an empty internet profile but couldn't be bothered to make any effort to contact this special person (nor did he even consider it, if he's to be believed) as she suffered through a series of improbable awful events. Throw in the lying to and/or by his family about the relationship's backstory and you get a lot of shit that doesn't add up.
I find it pretty hard to digest that Te'o is just the one unlucky bastard who lied/embellished about an internet girlfriend who he did sincerely think was real and in a legitimate relationship with him, only to later find out she actually didn't exist at all.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:24 PM ^
My theory involves him being both a contemptibly lazy boyfriend and a singularly notable dunce, so it very much might be wrong.
January 24th, 2013 at 2:43 PM ^
January 24th, 2013 at 1:48 PM ^
Notre Dame: where a Catfish story garners more press/investigation than a rape-suicide story and a possible manslaughter story. They play the houlier than thou shtick more than any entity I've ever seen and it couldn't be further than the truth.
Fuck Notre Dame.