If you haven't been living under a rock, you've heard the Manti Te'o hoax story by now, and if you haven't, you can read about it down in the Quickies. Alex will have more on it later, I think, as well.

I just want to make one quick comment about this article by John Clay, which is about how the Big Blue Nation is apparently piling on Pete Thamel for writing a hagiographic piece on Te'o that failed to uncover the fact that his dead girlfriend was a hoax. John quotes from this piece by Josh Levin at Slate:

So why didn’t Thamel and his cohorts at ESPN and elsewhere figure out they were all on a Catfish-ing exhibition? Because they fell victim to confirmation bias. Even before his great 2012 season, Te’o’s golden-as-the-dome image had been cemented.

Confirmation bias is a pervasive problem in all the media these days, not just sports, and the commoditization of professional journalism has made it even more of a problem. But there is a deeper root to all this that I think both Clay and Levin maybe overlooked, and that is the feeling of embattlement suffered by many in the media due to the advent of social media.

Supposedly, it is the job of journalists to turn over the rocks and expose the creepy-crawlies to the light of day. Unfortunately, that sort of story comes with a price from the team or individual's supporters which is now totally real time and completely public. All bad news is bad for business, and it's hard to write negativity all the time.

So is it any surprise that they occasionally yearn for the opportunity to report good news, and fall into the confirmation bias trap? That's not excuse of course ... these are supposed to be professionals, and such a failure is an ethical breach of their duty of competency. So when we see articles all but canonizing a sports figure, it's always a good idea to wonder just how much effort went into looking under those rocks, both for reasons of confirmation bias and the desire to report something positive.

Tweet of the Morning:

DALYISM: "Shout praise and whisper criticism." Don't personalize your players publicly, it leaves scars.

— Brendan Suhr (@brendansuhr) January 17, 2013

Calipari used to live by this rule. This season? Not so sure ...

Your Quickies:

Kentucky football

• VIDEO: UK Football Coach Mark Stoops Excited About Partnership to Transform Campus // UKNow
  Stoops is making his presence felt, not just at UK but everywhere.

• EagleAction.com // Around the Midwest: Raiding Ohio

  One of the best moves Mark Stoops and his staff have pulled off since they arrived at Kentucky was opening recruiting the state of Ohio. Lexington is about an hour's drive from the Ohio border, and the state is anywhere from the fourth- to the sixth-highest talent-producing state in any given year.

  The writer goes on in amazement about how Joker Phillips & Co. all but ignored Ohio, and he did.

Kentucky basketball

• Calipari sometimes gets mad when Julius Mays is not shooting outside shots // vaughtsviews

  "My thing to him is when you drive, drive to pass. Don’t drive to score, you’re not big enough," Calipari said. "You’re not athletic enough. Shoot the 3, one dribble pull-up, or drive to pass."

  Good advice. There is only a certain range where Mays can get off clean looks - from 3, and from pump-fake step-ins just inside the arc.

• Congratulations to Marcus Camby, one of the greatest I've ever coached // CoachCal.com
  Coach Cal recalls Marcus Camby, and you can tell that they have an enduring relationship that was based on mutual respect and trust.

Other UK sports

• No. 5 UK Hoops Faces Mississippi State Thursday // UKAthletics.com

Links posts

• Wakeup Call: The stat on Louisville you won't believe // CBSSports.com
• John Clay's Big Blue Links // John Clay's Sidelines
• Tom Leach // Thursday Links

• The Morning Mix // Troy Machir, CollegeBasketballTalk

College football

• Manti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax
  I'm sure you've seen this by now. I really have no words, but if I were a pro football franchise, I'd want to know that this guy wasn't a part of the hoax. Then again, if he wasn't, that says something to, doesn't it?

• Mant'i Te'o's Fake, Dead Girlfriend Breaks the Internet // Outkick The Coverage
  Okay, read this at your own risk. Travis' attempts at analysis always make me feel like I need a shower, perhaps with bleach. Consider this:

  3. Is Te'o gay?

  As a gay muslim, I would happily welcome Te'o into the gay brotherhood.

  This is apparently a Clay Travis inside joke, but why do we have to go here? Speculating on his sexuality is really kind of cro-magnon in this age of political correctness. If he is gay, he could have covered it up a thousand ways, but this makes no sense in such a scenario. Yet Travis claims it does.

  Why is it de rigeur that when some manly man engages in a hoax relationship, it's always to cover up homosexuality? I'm just askin'. Sometimes a hoax is just a hoax.

College basketball

• Night Court: Are you kidding me with this buzzer-beater?? - CBSSports.com

  Welp, here's all you might've missed and all you need to know from a really good Wednesday night in college hoops. (We forgive you if you spent most of the night trying to figure out the crazy Manti Te'o story, which probably has six new layers by the time you're reading this.)

  Yeah, I guess. Forgive my relative disinterest in an Internet scam, I'm just not that invested in the Notre Dame or Manti Te'o mythos. Fortunately, most of this is about basketball.

• Morning Five: 01.17.13 Edition // Rush The Court
  Louisville fans printing, "We're #1 T-shirts?" RTC has a fun take on that.

• SEC: Arkansas holds off Auburn in double overtime // John Clay's Sidelines
  If you were thinking the game at Auburn would be an easy one, you might want to think again.

Other sports news

• Green Street // Kevin Garnett: Anthony Davis ‘makes me look like a midget’

  "That kid is long," the aging Celtics superstar said of the Hornets rookie. "He makes me look like a midget, man. I was nothing like him. He’s a freak of nature. This kid’s going to be really good. He’s going to be really good."

  High praise from a future Hall of Famer.

• John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, still waiting for some NBA success
  Good article about the two former Kentucky stars.