That came as news to the NFL, which went on Twitter to dispute the report.
Greg Aiello, the spokesman for the league, posted this on Twitter Thursday evening: "Despite what ESPN says, commish has made no decisions on MVick." Other NFL employees then re-tweeted Aiello's tweet.
ESPN's Chris Mortensen had previously tweeted that a three-hour meeting between Goodell and Vick would lead to a conditional reinstatement and a four-game suspension after training camp if Vick could sign with a team. But when Mortensen saw the NFL PR staff's tweets, he responded, "Despite what anyone says, ESPN did not report a decision has been made, based on what I just read on dot.com."
But then Mortensen went to ESPN.com and tweeted again: "I take that back. After this 12-hr drive, I just read the espn.com story and the lead is erroneous. Guess I can't get to bed yet."After that tweet, ESPN changed its report, and the story that's currently posted at ESPN.com says only that "Goodell may be close to reaching a decision" and that a reinstatement "could also include a four-game suspension."
So two days after sitting on a story about a star quarterback that everyone else was reporting, ESPN rushed into a story about a star quarterback without getting all its facts straight. As Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk noted, ESPN has had a very bad week.
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