I have to say that I read your report with some skepticism. I saw on video what Vince Young said to reporters, and it really didn't seem to be a big deal. Jerome Solomon didn't report what Young said with the prima donna spin the way you discussed it, and I wonder if you are exaggerating with the Williams stuff too.
Or maybe you are just sensitive. If so, please do not take the following as something meant to be mean to you. I am saying this because I love sports pages, and want to feel like I can trust the content of the sports page because of the access that you guys have to the players and because I like to read the paper during breakfast.
The Houston Chronicle, as a whole, doesn't have a particularly good track record of being honest and fair about Williams because of the emotion surrounding the pick.
When he was chosen, the front page of the Chronicle had him listed with the worst draft busts of all time. You said the choice of Williams "smacked of stupidity" and was "dumb."
The Chronicle provided very little information about his background as a player other than that he was a physical specimen. Most basic biographical information I know about him I had to look up from other places.
Some of the columnists have said repeatedly that they feel like their job is to "make Mario mad" so that he plays better. But I suppose if he actually gets mad at you guys, that's not okay.
I believe for some, he unfairly becomes the whipping boy for all the failures of the Texans defense. It doesn't matter if ND Kalu took responsibility for a missed assignment with the big Fred Taylor run at the beginning of the game, because it is more convenient to slag Mario because he isn't Vince.
Here's some fun facts that most fans wouldn't know about Mario Williams if they just read the Chronicle:
Unlike what McClain's pretend conversation with the late great Joel Buchsbaum implied, Mario Williams wasn't just a combine wonder. He had a great college career with career and junior year stats comparable to Julius Pepper a guy who played in the same conference. (I'm not saying he is the same sort of player, but instead I'm just pointing this out that he wasn't just a combine guy. He came out as a true junior and not a redshirt junior like Peppers. And he did this despite having three different defensive coaches in three years, each of them wanting him to have different roles. Williams was his team's MVP his junior year).
Or how about this, if you only want to judge line play by just looking at whether a guy got a sack. Amobi Okoye and Mario Williams have a combined sack total higher than any other line tandem in the AFC.
I think there is some legitimate criticism that can be made of Williams' play this year, but rarely do I read that in the paper. I haven't seen much evidence for example that he plays with no "mo-ta" as McClain imagined Buchsbaum saying, but rather sometimes he plays hard but not smart. I think as he plays more, his football IQ will increase, but that's something that we will be able to judge through time.
What the legacy of Joel Buchsbaum means is that you can't trust newspaper guys to tell you the truth about players. Buchsbaum researched things himself and watched the games himself and made up his own mind about player. (Of course, he probably needed to get more of a life, but that is a different story).
I like the Chronicle coverage on some things, but I don't particularly trust it as it relates to Williams because of the emotion with that pick. I think a lot of the coverage from the moment he was signed has been unfair and de-humanizing and that I had to look up stuff my ownself just to get basic information about him.
Maybe you are completely correct that Williams has been out of line with local reporters and has no reason to be distrustful with them. But you can also see why at least some of us wonder if what we are reading about him is the truth or a shade of the truth or just an exaggeration.
