Thursday, February 24, 2000
Channel 5 gets scoop on Strawberry
BY JOHN FAY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Dave Wagner has been on the job as the news anchor at WLWT (Channel 5) for only four months. Before that, he spent 12 years working at stations in Florida.
He did a lot of investigative stories in Florida, and his sources haven't forgotten him.
Tuesday morning, one of those sources called Wagner with a tip that New York Yankees star Darryl Strawberry had tested positive for cocaine.
Wagner was able to obtain a Florida Department of Corrections report on the violation. That gave him a major national scoop.
“Obviously, it's a bigger story in Tampa and New York, or even Los Angeles, where he played before,” Wagner said. “But he's one of the stars of baseball. It's not the most important story in Cincinnati, but sports are sports, and people are interested.”
WLWT got a great deal of national play out of the story, which was the story of the day in sports. Every outlet that ran the story had to credit Channel 5.
The station tied the Strawberry story to Pete Rose's situation to give it local relevance. Strawberry had been suspended twice previously for drug-related offenses.
“You have Rose being denied eligibility (for gambling),” Wagner said, “and others are given chance after chance.”
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