DENVER ― Root, root, root for the home team. If they don’t win, it’s a shame pretend you’re in someone else’s home...
It’s baseball season in the Mile High City. To honor the occasion, the Denver Post produced what it called an “ultimate visitors guide” for fans attending the Colorado Rockies’ home opener Friday.
The otherwise solid rundown of Coors Field’s amenities contained just one tiny error: The newspaper used a photo of Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia.
It’s a great picture. So great that readers could easily see “Phillies” above the scoreboard in the team’s iconic swooping cursive. The absence of the Rocky Mountains behind the stadium was also a pretty clear tell.
The Phillies were quick to call out the error:
The Denver Post owned up to what it labeled a “production error” and tweeted an apology. It also published a good-natured mea culpa a few hours later, asking fans to submit photos of Coors Field for a chance to win tickets to a game.
“With your help,” the paper joked, “we might finally know what Coors Field looks like.”
Embarrassing as the error is, it’s easy to see how it might happen.
The hedge fund that owns the paper, Alden Global Capital, has systematically whittled away at the staff. Although the Post has reportedly turned profits as high as $25 million in recent years, Alden Capital has taken a “strip-mining” approach to management, cutting dozens of journalists who would otherwise catch mistakes before sending the paper to print. The paper was forced to cut one-third of its remaining staff just last month.
Copy editors were among the first casualties, and Alden has taken cash from the paper to help cover its losses elsewhere ― like on risky $100 million bets buying sovereign Greek debt.