Deadspin did go to Te'o, his father, and his agent with the story, all of which had no comment, apparently.
A little yes. If I'm being honest, I should have waited for Te'o to at least say something, even if Deadspin did give him a chance, and he declined.
Quite frankly, it was no one's business. While Te'o may never have requested his privacy during the whole grandmother/girlfriend media explosion thing, he also never asked for it either. He's a 21 year old kid who was humiliated. I don't blame the father and agent for not wanting to talk about it until Te'o was ready to do so.
I still don't know if I buy into him completely, though. Yes, I know, he's just a kid, but you really have to be the most trusting kid in the world to fall for half of what he did.
Naive, yes. But naivete doesn't mean complicity. And naivete still makes far more sense than the idea he was in on it.
Te'o has had plenty of time to meet with his agent and publicist, and the last few days have been Te'o's spin on the story. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle of Deadspin and Te'o, and even that doesn't look too great
I don't remember everything in the Deadspin article anymore, but it seems as if more and more their suggestion Te'o was in on it seems false and nothing more than a sorry excuse for "journalism". Te'o has provided proof of tweets from the hoaxer apologizing, friends and family have all come out and provided other information which validates Te'o's story, Notre Dame did an independent investigation which led the AD to support Te'o (who is no longer a player at the university), Jeremy Schaap, who talked with Te'o and saw various evidence, believes him and today the woman whose pictures were used said Tuiasosopo told her he was responsible.
And at the end of the day, whose business was it? I've yet to hear a reasonable explanation for why Te'o not talking about an embarrassing personal situation from which he never benefited financially is evidence he was in on it. Why did Deadspin feel the need to drag this kid's name through the mud? It was simply a way to make money off a college kid who was the victim of a very cruel and public prank, without any regard for the truth. They were going to make their money, regardless of the information they could find. And, like I've said before, it wouldn't surprise me one bit if Deadspin only thought to investigate this after a source told them Notre Dame began their own investigation.
It could still come out that Te'o was and is lying. But right now, almost all of the evidence which has come out since the original article supports the idea that Te'o was simply an innocent, and foolish, victim. But Deadspin didn't care about any of that, all they cared was publishing a story, regardless of how it could hurt someone.
As I said, homophobic slur aside, the letter was pretty accurate.
