Feel-Good Fail

March 20, 2009 7:58 AM

Ken Mink became a national feel-good story late last year when, at age 73, he joined the basketball team of Roane State Community College in Tennessee. At the end of an early season game, with his team up big, Ken was subbed in and managed to draw a foul and make two free throws. Fame followed. But is this feel-good story really all its cracked up to be?
posted by Mountain Goatse (27 comments total)

They walk out of the gym together, back to the house filled with reminders of their travels, and it occurs to me they might be the most suited couple I've ever met. They are perfect for each other. He likes to see the world as a grand drama, and she likes to encourage him. He loves to tell his stories, and she loves to hear them.

Classic narcissist. The hilarious ending to the whole epic saga is that he got kicked off the team for not going to Spanish class. That means he got kicked off his high school team, his first college team, and now his second college team.

Moral of the story: even old people can be douchebags. Especially the smug and righteous ones.
posted by billysumday at 8:19 AM on March 20

Also, great find. Thanks for posting the article.
posted by billysumday at 8:19 AM on March 20

Oh Lord, this is such an epic takedown. An epic takedown of an incredibly old man.

There are other things. One magazine he supposedly wrote for doesn't seem to exist, two more don't remember him. Could be their mistake; both make sure to say that. There are explanations aplenty but no way to miss the smoke filling up the rooms of Ken Mink's past. There's something almost everywhere you look. As the judge in his divorce wrote about both Mink and his ex: "This case involved altered checks, falsified or highly exaggerated business résumés, possible tampering with military service records and the existence of a 'phantom' appraiser who appeared out of nowhere, conducted an appraisal for one of the parties and cannot be located any place on earth at this time."

He was fired as editor of one newspaper in Kentucky, sources there say, because he allegedly forged two letters to the editor -- to himself -- in defense of a controversial column he'd written.

"Anything he touches turns bizarre," a former employee says.
posted by billysumday at 8:24 AM on March 20

..the Laurel he got from the Columbia Journalism Review for outstanding journalism ethics (true)

That's a little scary. Also, why wasn't the writer of this story in the White House press corps for the last 20 years? We've just gotten a more truthful, nuanced look at Ken Mink (whom I'd never heard of until just now) than we've got any health care, Iraq, religion-in-politics and gay marriage combined.
posted by DU at 8:28 AM on March 20 [4 favorites]

This really is a well-designed page. One single page article, nice photos, fairly good column width, nice graphics, a discrete GUI, and semantic markup - ESPN has managed to get most things right.
posted by Foci for Analysis at 8:47 AM on March 20 [2 favorites]

To continue your digression, Foci, ESPN has gotten things right for a long time. REST services and quality markup make page scraping baseball stats easy. As much as I find their cult of personality sportscasting irritating, I have to say they're my go-to for web content.
posted by Fezboy! at 8:59 AM on March 20

That last link is great reporting, and I thank you for bringing it to our attention. Sure, you can say it's much ado about nothing, Ken Mink is a tiny flea on a dog yapping at the caravan of history, but that kind of careful, thoughtful analysis is worthwhile no matter the "importance" of the subject, because every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main, and I've learned a little more about humanity from this article. It takes class to be able to write like this:

The real Ken Mink is coming into clearer focus -- a man who seems to take as gospel the story he has chosen to tell about his life. As I look deeper, I find not so much outright falsifications -- although there are a few of those -- but, rather, a man living on the extreme edge of the truth. I suspect Ken isn't trying to change the way other people view him -- this is the way he views himself. In a résumé that seems to be from the late 1980s, he lists himself as a graduate of Lees College and of Arkansas State University. Neither is true. The past that was taken from him? Somewhere along the line, Ken Mink took it back.

Of course, that kind of class and thoughtfulness is rare; this kind of crap is much more common:

Moral of the story: even old people can be douchebags. Especially the smug and righteous ones.

If you think that's the "moral," you haven't read the story very carefully and/or don't understand what "moral" means.

An epic takedown of an incredibly old man.

If you think that was a "takedown," you haven't read the story very carefully and/or don't understand what "takedown" means. Also, 73 is not "incredibly old," dumbass.
posted by languagehat at 9:02 AM on March 20 [3 favorites]

I think that revealing what a judge in Mink's divorce proceeding said about his tendency to lie and obfuscate the truth, and alerting the world to the fact that his daughters don't trust him and won't speak to him, is indeed pretty harsh. Maybe not the ultimate in takedowns, but this is very much turning the idea of publicity against Mink in a way that one could consider "takedownish." And I was joking about 73 being incredibly old. Put on your language hat, languagehat - it was hyperbole!

I agree that perhaps I should amend what I wrote as the moral of the story. It should read instead: "Don't take at face value the gauzy, indulgent crap on the Today Show as gospel truth. Most people are not saints, including this guy, who actually isn't even that well-liked by his teammates or his coach."

And I still think he's a d-bag.
posted by billysumday at 9:09 AM on March 20

Pretty decent gams for 73.
posted by ethnomethodologist at 9:11 AM on March 20

Pretty decent gams for 73.

Pretty decent everything for 73, to be honest. Guy is in shape, I'll give him that.
posted by billysumday at 9:16 AM on March 20

That was fascinating, though I can't help but wish it had been on a more important subject. Still, exposing the semi-fraudulent nature of media sensations probably isn't the worst use of journalist resources.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:21 AM on March 20

Pretty decent everything for 73, to be honest. Guy is in shape, I'll give him that.

That's one of the great points of the article, actually. The guy is "living on the extreme edge of the truth" and seems like kind of a self-centered dbag, as noted. On the other hand, he actually is out there every day (or was until recently) and he really could do a lot of the moves. One wonders what he could have made of himself, had he not caused himself so many problems and blamed others for it.
posted by DU at 9:28 AM on March 20

And I was joking about 73 being incredibly old. Put on your language hat, languagehat - it was hyperbole!

*roots around, digs up language hat, blows off dust*

Oh, hyperbole! Damn, I've got to wear this thing more often. OK, I withdraw the "dumbass."
posted by languagehat at 9:29 AM on March 20

"The myths created by our modern fame machine just reflect the myths we create about ourselves."

This guy might be kind of a d-bag, but the article was awesome. Regardless of whether you find him admirable or even likable, it's hard to deny that Ken Mink has done a strangely cool job of projecting his own carefully crafted notion of self into the awareness of thousands of people. Wright Thompson then gives him a hand or, rather, a huge shove by crafting a more objective analysis of Mink's self, boiled down and put on display.
posted by solipsophistocracy at 9:33 AM on March 20

Thanks for posting - that was a fascinating story. I find it interesting how the myth around him was deconstructed. It's definitely painful to read at times, but I think the author tries as much as possible to be balanced.
posted by a womble is an active kind of sloth at 9:36 AM on March 20

Does it actually explain what this 'prank' they keep referring to was? They mention shaving cream in the coach's shoe, a greased up desk, him running around school with dynamite, and a traffic ticket on the highway. I'm utterly confused, although it sounds like one hell of a prank.
posted by mannequito at 9:37 AM on March 20

Yeah, I had to read that dynamite thing a few times. That must be metaphorical, because otherwise he'd hardly need to contact the school to find the truth out about this prank. Wouldn't the police be called in if a student were waving dynamite around?
posted by DU at 9:44 AM on March 20

The reporter seems to me to be a little like Ken himself.

Think about it. One of the central points of the article was that maybe he wasn't kicked out of school because of the prank. He builds up this whole personality description of Ken based on this possibility. He keeps bringing up evidence that it didn't happen and how Ken's whole life was like this--making up stories to play the victim.

Then, in the end, he presents a bunch of evidence that it did happen: verified documentation and someone who remembers the whole thing.

Presumably the reporter knew all this when he started writing his article. So, basically, the reporter was lying to us through the whole article to make a point, then fixed his lie at the end.
posted by eye of newt at 9:55 AM on March 20

I'd love to hear that rap of his.
posted by Dr-Baa at 10:15 AM on March 20

So, basically, the reporter was lying to us through the whole article to make a point, then fixed his lie at the end.

Or, perhaps the reporter chose a narrative structure that moves the reader through the author's experience unraveling the layers of the story that time, memory, and human ego have obscured.
posted by LooseFilter at 10:37 AM on March 20 [3 favorites]

eye of newt - the article starts with this:After watching and reading about the legend of Ken Mink again and again, and after getting inside of it myself for months, it should make sense to me. I should know who he is. Only it doesn't and I don't. The author states from the beginning that the truth behind this all is hazy.
posted by filthy light thief at 10:43 AM on March 20 [1 favorite]

Poseur and Prima donna with capital P's.

Interesting read.
posted by ericb at 11:23 AM on March 20

I bet that "Sully" Sullenberger guy farts a lot and has probably lied before.
posted by basicchannel at 11:25 AM on March 20

It's a curious thing, the past and continuing excellence of sport journalism. Why is there so much quality investigative reporting and writing about something that is, essentially, ephemeral and trivial?

Interesting bit of writing, though I do wander just how well even the best of us can stand up to such intense scrutiny.
posted by jonnyseveral at 1:03 PM on March 20

I do wander just how well even the best of us can stand up to such intense scrutiny.

Well, that's part of the point, isn't it? If you have that thought, you're reading the article well; if you don't, you can have a reaction like "even old people can be douchebags." (And, if you are particularly oblivious, add: "Especially the smug and righteous ones." See that mirror over there? Use it!)
posted by languagehat at 1:44 PM on March 20

Languagehat - exactly. And I wonder again (only with the right spelling this time) why it is that someone writing about a minor sporting incident is able to produce such a nuanced and thought-provoking investigation of a life, whilst those writing about politics (say) seem only capable of hagiography or character-assassination based on the shallowest of surface readings.

How often does one get to read the same level of rigour applied to a business figure?
posted by jonnyseveral at 1:57 PM on March 20

jonnyseveral - Wright Thompson spent months on this one story, "watching and reading about the legend of Ken Mink again and again." In-depth stories dredging up impressive personal history takes time. If you're working on breaking a story, you probably don't have time to give much a second read, otherwise someone else might publish the story first. The result is that instead of a well-written summary of someone's past actions, we're stuck with quick snippets of HARD HITTING NEWS and BLEEDING EDGE DETAILS that leave out the bigger picture.
posted by filthy light thief at 2:52 PM on March 20 [1 favorite]