Slow news cycle. Also, it’s a big deal for a few internet people. It’s not a big deal for everybody. Why are sports a big deal to some people? Just is, and the lens of the internet magnifies it.
It’s bizarre enough to be interesting for a few seconds and involves a highly prominent athlete who was probably going to be taken in the first round of the NFL draft. Also, the involvement of a major university adds some extra drama.
The weirdness factor makes it absolutely fascinating to me. I can’t imagine getting duped in anything like the same fashion nor having an entire university cover for me.
That does seem the most likely theory. Someone else posted that he kept the scam going even after Lennay’s “death”, pretending to be her sister and coaxing a fan of Manti’s out to a football game to meet the sister and then showing up in her place. So even after ditching the Lennay personality, he seemed to be looking for another mark.
So yea, this just being some weird hobby for Tuiasosopo that got out of hand when he targeted a minor celebrity seems pretty likely.
It’s weirder. After that Lennay came back to life and called Te’o on Dec. 6…she called in character. Tried to explain things and keep the relationship going. Naivete has to end somewhere, though.
The fact that the minor celebrity became a major celebrity (at least in the sports world) may well have been what caused it to get out of hand, if this theory is true.
You’re angry DataX didn’t give a full listing of all possible theories? Pretty much everyone in this thread has tossed out one or two guesses. I don’t think anyone is pretending to be giving a complete list of every conceivable scenario.
I said there was other options - but no not where his friend is involved. If he did do this without Manti’s ok - he sucks as a friend. Never said my theory was right - stop twisting my words.
I said I’m not sure - and it isn’t just me that thinks there are holes in his story.
I have no idea what happend - I explained my reasons - and agree there are other legitimate theories.
I really don’t give a crap if you think my theory is wrong, but I think you are twisting my words.
No, I’m angry that he/she is pretending that his/her conclusion is anything more than idle speculation and guessing. Calling this pet theory “logical” or “simple” is simply wrong, it’s just gossiping with no evidence whatsoever.
I do think Te’O embellished details of the relationship, though. Whether out of shame about being in love with someone he never met, or just being hyperbolic to pull at public heartstrings. I think he was actually pranked, but I don’t think he’s thoroughly innocent regarding the stories that spun out from the relationship. The hours and hours and hours on the phone, etc.
Yea, I don’t think there’s much question Manti was lying about something, whether he was just exaggerating his relationship (as college males are wont to do) or was in on the whole thing is hard to tell.
There’s plenty of evidence for DataX’s theory. Hardly conclusive, but just as far from “no evidence whatsoever”. And he’s hardly pretending that his theory is any more then what it is. You’re over-fixating on the word “logical” is silly, his full post stressed he was flipping back and forth between possible theories.
You’re freaking out over the word “gay”, not “logical”
As a member of the football team he’s a representative of Notre Dame. Even if he wasn’t originally in on the scam, he made no effort to stop any of the stories about the death of the girlfriend being reported by the media. Notre Dame should be concerned if he was involved in a public hoax as a high profile Notre Dame player.
I have no idea whether Manti Te’o is gay, gullible, or just very straaaaaange.
But I will ask at this point… isn’t there an old saying in the journalism biz, “If your mother says she loves you, check it out”?
Over the past few months, dozens of reporters have heard Teo’s tragic story and have reprinted it or rebroadcast it. Didn’t ANY of them make even the SLIGHTEST effort to make a few phone calls or surf the Web for a confirmation of his story?
I suppose the standards for an ordinary college football beat reporter are a little more lax than those for political reporters, but still… shouldn’t even sportswriters be more than stenographers? Shouldn’t SOMEBODY have done just a LITTLE research, rather than just transcribing a good, soap operatic story?
Pete Thamel at Sports Illustrated finally gets around to it. I do admire his honesty in how admits to missing red flags. His Story. Wish they would fact check the Te’o hoax stories.
I found this exchange on the subject to be hilarious:
“… although it’s difficult to understand how Manti Te’o could travel to Hawaii to visit his “girlfriend” without actually seeing her, unless he’s just a profoundly confused person. Going to Hawaii to see a girl and then merely texting with her (the whole time you’re there) is the equivalent of taking the Wonderlic Test and scoring a negative 36.”
I don’t disagree with any of that. I was commenting on the reason he didn’t inform the school immediately after the hoax was supposedly revealed to him: he was embarrassed and it didn’t affect the school. The explanation that Swarbrick offered (that he wanted to talk to his parents first) doesn’t bother me either. So I can accept that he was fooled by two people, one of whom he knew, and that he maintained the lie in public at least for a while out of embarrassment or self-promotion, or both. That said, tomorrow we could learn something else and it could start to look like he helped create this hoax.
Yes.
It does sound like people didn’t make much of an effort to find out more about her or get in touch when she was alive or verify the details after she died.
I think you’re operating with the benefit of a lot of hindsight here. There were suspicious elements, like the lack of an obituary, details about the car accident, or mentions of Kekua not in the context of dating Te’o. But none of those are proof positive that she was made up.
According to that SI interview, she was 22, graduated in 2011, after which she spent time working in multiple schools in New Zealand and traveling the world. Meanwhile, she simultaneously replaced her 50 year old father at his job as an executive at a construction company. All in the span of less than two years, many months of which she spent in the hospital dying from leukemia.
How did this reporter not follow up on the fact that this math can’t possibly add up?
Te’o didn’t say she traveled the world, and if I were interviewing a college student I might’ve assumed the New Zealand thing was an Alternative Spring Break kind of thing. The bit about taking over for her dad at a construction company after his tragic death is kind of an eye-roller.
SI’s Thamel explains himself on the Dan Patrick Show. Basically, he states he interviewed many people before he got to interview Te’o, and no one questioned, but reinforced, her existence. So her existence wasn’t in the reporting equation and the red flags just overlooked.
But really, how did I or anyone fall for this. It embarrasses me that I believed it because it’s absolutely preposterous in hindsight. I just didn’t think too much about it - feel good story, moving along. Can’t imagine how Te’o feels and I genuinely feel for him.
