In media protest, Reid clams up on Bradley injury

BETHLEHEM, Pa. - Those of us who occasionally tell Andy Reid how to do his job can't get too upset when the coach tries to tell us how to do ours. So it would be disingenuous to react with outrage after Reid turned the media tent on the Lehigh practice fields into his own personal woodshed yesterday afternoon.

It would be almost as disingenuous as Reid's own fake ire about the way reporters chased news of linebacker Stewart Bradley's injury. The whole episode was, after all, Reid's own fault.

Follow along.

Bradley left Sunday's Fright Night practice at Lincoln Financial Field after a noncontact injury to his knee. There was no indication that the injury was serious. Bradley didn't writhe on the field or leave on one of those little carts. The early word was that he would get an MRI exam the next morning.

The first report that Bradley would miss the season with a torn ACL came from Howard Eskin, who called in to WIP-AM (610) with the news. That report was quickly picked up by national Web sites such as profootballtalk.com, which prompted other media outlets to seek confirmation.

We journalists have a technical name for this: We call it 2009. Perhaps Reid still has that 1999 calendar hanging on the wall of his office - right over the computer with the dial-up AOL connection.

After the Eagles' only practice of the day, Reid stepped into the tent to address reporters. As always, he began with injuries. This time, though, he announced that he would not discuss them. As a punishment for reporters calling Bradley and his agent rather than waiting for official word from the mountaintop, Reid wouldn't tell us about Bradley or Ellis Hobbs or any other boo-boos sustained by his players.

No doubt the coach felt he was sticking it to the lowly wretches who cover his team. Really, he came off as childish and petty.

The initial report, after all, came from Reid's carefully cultivated media rep. If Reid didn't tell Eskin directly, he certainly has encouraged a climate in which Eagles personnel view the WIP host as separate from the rest of the media. I'm not knocking Eskin, either. However he got the story, it was accurate and he was correct in reporting it as quickly as he could.

The point is, Reid created this situation. It's his own fault if he got tripped up this time.