Editorial

WaPo’s Dave Portnoy Hit Piece Is Out And Just As Ridiculous As We All Expected

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Screenshot/Twitter/@stoolpresidente

Robert McGreevy Contributor
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The Washington Post’s highly anticipated hit piece on Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy is finally here, and it’s a doozy.

Portnoy notably caught wind of the piece and confronted one of its two writers, Emily Heil, in a 11-minute recorded phone call which has now been seen by over 40 million people on Twitter. Despite Heil assuring Dave she hadn’t made up her mind about him, the Friday article is laden with the exact nonsense Portnoy repeatedly challenged her on in the first place. (RELATED: ‘You Know You’re Being A Jerk’: Dave Portnoy Blasts ‘Garbage’ Media After Phone Call For Alleged Hit Piece)

The piece begins with a story from a participant of Portnoy’s upcoming One Bite Pizza Festival, Maggie DeMarco Mieles of Di Fara Pizza, who they say was “rattled” by incoming comments about Portnoy. Most pizza owners, however, seem unaware of the accusations until a reporter sticks a microphone in their face or makes them aware via e-mail, as NJ.com’s Jeremy Schneider makes clear in the piece.

“It’s also about local pizzerias who may not know Portnoy’s history, only his successful pizza review videos, and link themselves to such a person without knowing the whole story,” he told WaPo. Chef J. Kenji Lopez-Alt concurred, saying recently that Portnoy had “put together this list of pizzerias who are either not aware of his history…or know but don’t care,” WaPo wrote. Both Lopez-Alt and Schneider had recently publicly criticized Portnoy and the restaurants participating in his event. Portnoy called Schneider “a loser nobody” after he wrote a Wednesday opinion article calling Portnoy a “misogynist bully.”

“It’s not even the outright lies he told about me in his article. It’s not the fact he has taken virtually everything I’ve said or done wildly out of context,” Portnoy said in response. “That he just quotes the same tired articles from the same people who hate my guts.”

Portnoy also called Lopez-Alt “a left-wing lunatic piece of shit” during a pizza review after the chef reportedly told his Instagram followers not to support the pizza fest. Lopez-Alt responded to the video in the Post’s article, saying, “Dave’s opinion of me means as much to me as his opinions on pizza.”

The piece does mention that a positive review from Portnoy can transform a business. But then they say a negative review can have an impact too, citing Portnoy’s infamous shouting match with the owner of Somerville’s Dragon Pizza Charlie Redd. They fail to mention that Portnoy trashed Dragon Pizza after Redd came out and started cursing at him.

The article then lists off all the reasons we’re not supposed to like Dave. He apparently “joked” about rape 13 years ago. He said “#nohomo” on Twitter in 2016. Throw him in the gulag! The authors also reference a Business Insider piece, which Portnoy sued the company over.

“It’s surreal we live in a country where activist reporters can openly get caught lying and admitting they are creating a false narrative to generate engagement and controversy AND still publish the article,” Portnoy tweeted on Friday in response to the article.

It’s all the same people with made up jobs, like a random man who was credited in the article as “the conscience of the food and restaurant industries,” trying to stretch the same grievances into cancelable offenses. It does beg the question, what is the goal here? To wipe Portnoy off the face of the earth, undo the almost $50 million in gains he’s made for small businesses? To destroy his company and leave hundreds of employees out of work?

The sad truth is Portnoy will get them clicks. And a negative article will stir the pot and bring in more ad money. Which is fine. But if that’s your business model, your liberal reporters have to cede the high ground. They cannot continue to pretend to fight for good, and claim “democracy dies in darkness.”