One of the most enjoyable additions to ESPN’s staff in the past year was Ombudsman Le Anne Schreiber. She has another column up today discussing four issues that have arisen regarding ESPN stepping into their own limelight in the past few weeks.

If you haven’t been reading her column, you’re seriously missing out on some of the most cogent, fair and well-constructed criticism of ESPN and its practices. ESPN is a sprawling multi-headed giant whose coverage can be as inelegant as it is wide-reaching, but that also at times manages to fulfill its mandate as the Worldwide Leader.

In this particular column, however, I do have an issue with her not even remotely approaching the issue of Werder’s use of anonymous sourcing in his report on the T.O./Jason Witten feud. I discussed the issue in a post when the T.O. / Ed Werder issue first began, which you can read here if you’re so inclined.

When two players have an issue regarding their respective relationships with a third party, using an anonymous source to comment on how that third party thinks and feels, without giving the reader the chance to judge the validity of that information (because the source is anonymous) is irresponsible and bad journalism.

In my mind, T.O. went over the top calling Werder a liar, because he wasn’t purporting anything he didn’t believe to be true, but Owens certainly had cause to be upset with ESPN’s coverage. Werder didn’t deserve the firestorm that ensued, but to ignore the fact that he used anonymous sources (a hot button issue for journalists as it is) I think is ignoring a crucial part of the story that provides more context than simply the fact that Stephen A. Smith didn’t slam Owens in their interview.

Otherwise, her opinons are well-founded and right on the mark. She calls Chris Mortenson out for his failure to seek comment from the Raiders for his earlier report on the franchse nearly pulling a Seattle Supersonics-esque move and selling to a man who wanted to bring an NFL team to Los Angeles. She also discusses the Chris Carter “I’d put a bullet in T.O” comment and their hype of the college basketball / NBA announcing team switch.

While I agree that traditional journalists should stay out of the reflected light of their own coverage, when you’re as big and as pervasive as ESPN is, that your personalities are not going to develop a certain air of celebrity in their own right. Is it necessarily correct by traditional journalistic standards? perhaps not, but that doesn’t necessarily make it wrong all the time. Regardless, as Schreiber correctly points out, acknowledging and even feeding into that celebrity shouldn’t overshadow the real reason those personalities are there: to cover the game.

I think ESPN too often forgets that, which is often the source of frustration for its critics.