My Billings Gazette

Our previous post, on the continuing soap opera that is Brett Favre, asked readers to weigh in on whether it qualified as news. I promised my own take Monday; I've strung it out a couple of more days (just like Favre).

My take: It's quasi-news. How's that for straddling the issue?

Here's the deal: If you're an NFL beat reporter, you're constantly on the phone, trying to drum up items that move the chains a little or, if you're good and/or lucky, turn into a big story. If you're an NFL reporter whose beat encompasses the Minnesota Vikings and their ongoing dalliance with Favre, you're calling his agent, Bus Cook, every day and hoping he answers the phone.

I know from my own experience that Cook answers his phone more often than many agents. But when it comes to Favre, he's a lot more selective. Dave Campbell, the Associated Press reporter who wrote the story in question, got Cook. He had to write something. That there's no news (that is, something we didn't know previously) in it is, sadly, sort of beside the point. Cook talked. Stories get written and dispersed.

But that doesn't mean this story is worth more than a smidge of newsprint or a small gaggle of pixels. It's not. If your publication is in Minnesota or Green Bay, maybe a little more than that. But not much more.

Because, as several commenters rightly noted, there's no there there.