Baltimore Sun’s Mike Preston Does His Best Jay Mariotti Impression

The Baltimore Sun is quite a mercurial little newspaper. You’re surprised when they actually get things balanced and right, because more often than not, they come up with stuff like a recent Mike Preston blog entry about how the Ravens shouldn’t overpay Ray Lewis. A sample:

Lewis had a good year last season compared to his previous two, but the Ravens should pay him for what he can still contribute, not for what he did in the past. Lewis should not be making the $6.5 million he will earn this season in 2009, and if the Ravens pay him that much, then the team is headed in the wrong direction.

If you’ve followed Preston’s dance of disdain with the Ravens over the last couple of seasons, you would know that he pretty much has no love for Brian Billick, and very little for a team that he says has been stalked by a “thug mentality” for years in his recent post. A couple of thoughts on his ridiculous assessments.

• Ray Lewis has as good a chance to be more productive into his late 30’s as Junior Seau, who was pretty good in his mid-30’s.
• Preston says that Lewis fostered ill will in the locker room with the special treatment he and other veterans received from Brian Billick. What makes him and other veteran players different from any other veterans on other teams throughout the NFL, who have paid the dues and built the franchise up? Michael Strahan ring a bell? And how is it the veterans’ fault that they accept preferential treatment? Should Preston have turned down the opportunity to be a columnist, despite working hard for 17 years to get there?
• Regarding a “thug mentality,” the Ravens have to be in the lowest percentile of team’s getting into trouble with the law and being aired out in the papers. Sure, Preston might be privy to some off the record info about player transgressions, but they certainly aren’t in Bengal territory when it comes to thugs.

Most people accept the general sports condition that a local columnist is always going to hate on the local team and mask it with the phrase “objective journalism.” Nobody is telling Mike Preston to be a homer, but at he can structure his arguments on more than what is apparent – a bias against the team.

Just more proof that news outlet blogging should be more than a grizzled reporter with a laptop and a license to hate.