Wade Belak found dead

[Zee]

Michael Landsberg talks about his friend Wade Belak, and his own depression in this article.  Brought a tear to my eye.

http://tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=375694

 

[sampson]

Michael Landsberg talks about his friend Wade Belak, and his own depression in this article.  Brought a tear to my eye.

http://tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=375694

Same here.  The part about not getting the R back from Wade was hard to take. 

 

[Scot4bz]

Michael Landsberg talks about his friend Wade Belak, and his own depression in this article.  Brought a tear to my eye.

http://tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=375694

I now have a new level of respect for Landsberg after reading that. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Zee]

Michael Landsberg talks about his friend Wade Belak, and his own depression in this article.  Brought a tear to my eye.

http://tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=375694

I now have a new level of respect for Landsberg after reading that. Thanks for sharing.

Yeap, it just goes to show how silent depression can be.  I've watched Off The Record now and again for years and I had no idea Landsberg also suffers from depression.  If nothing else, just bringing this to public attention the way he has might help someone else suffering through the same things. 

 

[AlmosGirl]

Wow, that gave me chills reading that.  What a great article.  Sigh, I still find it hard to believe that he's gone.  RIP Wade.  We miss you.

 

[Bullfrog]

Good, emotional article by Landsberg.

 

[Kin]

Good article about this, focusing on an interview with Stu Grimson, by Chris Jones at Grantland

The Survivor

 

[GhostofPotvin29]

But Belak?s parents, while they said they have yet to hear a definitive account of Wade?s last hours, are rejecting the notion that he intentionally killed himself.

?For all intents and purposes, he did not do it on purpose. It was accidental,? said Lorraine. ?That?s a good way of putting it: Accidental. Because I know he wouldn?t have done that on purpose. Nothing makes any sense.?

Said Barry: ?Lorraine and I and the family are treating it as an accident. So be it. We knew him best . . . He had too much to live for.?

http://www.thestar.com/sports/hockey/article/1055610--feschuk-belak-s-family-trying-to-cope-with-tragic-accident?bn=1

 

[Guilt Trip]

But Belak?s parents, while they said they have yet to hear a definitive account of Wade?s last hours, are rejecting the notion that he intentionally killed himself.

?For all intents and purposes, he did not do it on purpose. It was accidental,? said Lorraine. ?That?s a good way of putting it: Accidental. Because I know he wouldn?t have done that on purpose. Nothing makes any sense.?

Said Barry: ?Lorraine and I and the family are treating it as an accident. So be it. We knew him best . . . He had too much to live for.?

http://www.thestar.com/sports/hockey/article/1055610--feschuk-belak-s-family-trying-to-cope-with-tragic-accident?bn=1

thanks for posting....enjoyed the read.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

But Belak?s parents, while they said they have yet to hear a definitive account of Wade?s last hours, are rejecting the notion that he intentionally killed himself.

?For all intents and purposes, he did not do it on purpose. It was accidental,? said Lorraine. ?That?s a good way of putting it: Accidental. Because I know he wouldn?t have done that on purpose. Nothing makes any sense.?

Said Barry: ?Lorraine and I and the family are treating it as an accident. So be it. We knew him best . . . He had too much to live for.?

http://www.thestar.com/sports/hockey/article/1055610--feschuk-belak-s-family-trying-to-cope-with-tragic-accident?bn=1

Landsberg's article kind of bugged me for this reason. I mean, it was very touching and it's great that he can speak so openly about his own struggles and his memories of Wade, but he's stating that Belak 100% committed suicide. The line about him choosing to leave his children particularly irked me.

 

[Tigger]

You'd think for a guy who was supposedly so 'close' to Wade that he would listen to what his family had to say and maybe even just be a bit patient with any conclusions.

 

[Kin]

Landsberg's article kind of bugged me for this reason. I mean, it was very touching and it's great that he can speak so openly about his own struggles and his memories of Wade, but he's stating that Belak 100% committed suicide. The line about him choosing to leave his children particularly irked me.

I don't know. This is from the Star article:

Police sources told the Star, among many news outlets, that the cause of the ex-NHLer?s death was suicide by hanging.

I understand why a family member would very much want to believe that he didn't commit suicide and why it would ease their own dealing with it to think of it as an accident but if police are telling people it was a suicide then I think that's pretty safe to say.

 

[Tigger]

The police aren't saying that officially so who knows what was said or how it was perceived. If it was suicide so be it but there does seem to be some discrepancy of opinion on that as of now.

 

[Kin]

The police aren't saying that officially so who knows what was said or how it was perceived.

The police don't make official statements like that regarding suicide but there's really no reason to doubt it if multiple media outlets are saying that's what they've been told. There's really no reason to invent that narrative from a media perspective as you could argue that it not being a suicide is a more sensational story.

If it was suicide so be it but there does seem to be some discrepancy of opinion on that as of now.

Not really. Or, at the very least, there isn't a discrepancy in terms of people having informed opinions. If you're waiting for the police to come out and report their findings you'll be waiting forever. As it is, I think it's far more pragmatic to go with the media member with sources who have a professional obligation to the truth that the people who are making their statements based on...what, exactly?

 

[Tigger]

I didn't say anyone invented anything, fwiw and if the police don't make official statements like that why are they telling the media anything in the first place?

Do I believe Stock or Landsberg? Who has a higher truthy-ness or has fulfilled their professional obligation to the 'truth' more? Pragmatism doesn't necessarily owe truth through a lense like that.

The coroners report is coming out in a few weeks and we'll see what that says.

 

[Kin]

I didn't say anyone invented anything, fwiw and if the police don't make official statements like that why are they telling the media anything in the first place?

Because in a massive organization like the police department official policy isn't necessarily adhered to diligently by every member of the organization. It's kind of the basis for any sort of investigative reporting.

Do I believe Stock or Landsberg?

It's not really a case of those two guys. It's whether or not you think that the multiple media outlets who've used police sources are lying or whether or not you think there's someone within the police department who is messing with those journalists for a laugh. Both strike me as being pretty unlikely and, so, when I compare it to a guy like Stock who isn't quoting anyone and is a journalist in the loosest possible terms or a family who, and I'm not minimizing the importance of this, have a real emotional need to believe something else then I think someone like Landsberg has a pretty good justification for going the way he did.

 

[Tigger]

I doubt the only two alternatives are 'lying' or 'having a laugh', there is room for perception otherwise. For all I know the police repeatedly confirmed Wade was found dead with a rope around his neck and the media ran with it as a suicide, which is understandable from their perspective but proves nothing.

As far as I'm concerned Landsberg was self serving and could have waited before passing judgement but that's me, for that matter Stock could have kept it to himself too.

Who did Landsberg quote? I must have missed it.

 

[Kin]

I doubt the only two alternatives are 'lying' or 'having a laugh', there is room for perception otherwise. For all I know the police repeatedly confirmed Wade was found dead with a rope around his neck and the media ran with it as a suicide, which is understandable from their perspective but proves nothing.

That's a pretty serious preach of their professional ethics that you're accusing them of. That's not quoting a source. That's making entirely independent conclusions and misquoting a source. That's hard to believe of one credible journalist but to assume that multiple journalists took that kind of non-conclusive statement and then mis-reported their sources as saying something different does not strike me as particularly realistic.

Modern journalists are going to be familiar with Michael Hutchence and David Carradine. Taking the information you're talking about and reporting it as something different would be a willful and deliberate act of bad journalism and, without anything supporting that accusation, I'm not inclined to take it seriously.

Who did Landsberg quote? I must have missed it.

I didn't say Landsberg quoted anyone. I said that multiple people have quoted police sources as saying it was a suicide and that's a legitimate reason for you or I, to say nothing of a guy like Landsberg who very well may know and speak to the people who are reporting that and even independently confirm it himself, to treat it as so.

 

[Tigger]

'Appears to be', 'Treated as', 'Can't say for sure until a post-mortem examination is done.' You're right that these unnamed sources are leaning towards an intentional suicide but it's not definitive yet by their own words so quoting them and defining it as such seems wrong to me yet there it is.

Stock didn't quote anyone, neither did Landsberg, ok, it still seems undefined to me at this point.

Attempting to understand the families view is dicey in that they could be looking for reasons but maybe Jennifer knows something we don't? 

 

[Kin]

'Appears to be', 'Treated as', 'Can't say for sure until a post-mortem examination is done.' You're right that these unnamed sources are leaning towards an intentional suicide but it's not definitive yet by their own words so quoting them and defining it as such seems wrong to me yet there it is.

You are inventing ambiguity here. This is what the Star article says:

Police sources told the Star, among many news outlets, that the cause of the ex-NHLer?s death was suicide by hanging.

Not "appears to be", not "treated as". Newspapers will choose their words very, very carefully in a case like this.  There's no "leaning" on the part of the source. Aside from your conjecture about some pretty blatant professional misconduct there's not a ton of wiggle room there.

Attempting to understand the families view is dicey in that they could be looking for reasons but maybe Jennifer knows something we don't?

I'm sure people who know Wade Belak well, like Michael Landsberg, know all sorts of things we don't. But at issue is whether or not a guy like Landsberg is wrong to take these sorts of quotes and put weight into them. I think it's pretty clear that he isn't.