Really, Chicago Tribune? Chris Pronger in an ice dancing skirt? (With Update)
Jun 9, 2010, 10:45 AM EDT
In the tradition of the finest British tabloids, or your 12-year-old nephew, here’s the cover of a Chicago Tribune pullout on the NHL finals. We know that Chicago hates the Flyers’ Chris Pronger, for all the puck-stealing and stuff. The big question is, who is the female figure skater who provided the bottom half of this Photoshop? And what Tribune employee got the assignment of painstakingly applying Magic Extractor to an ice dancer’s lower parts?
Apparently, Tribune readers are not very happy with it (see comments section).
Nor is Olympic hockey medalist Angela Ruggiero, who called out the Tribune editor responsible for the photo. And now the editor, Mike Kellams, has apologized. (But it was the half-assed, “If anyone was offended …” kind).
“I’d like to see that editor out on skates. I’ll take them one-on-one on the ice any day,” three-time Olympic medalist Angela Ruggiero told The Associated Press. “They obviously have never seen women’s hockey and are living in the dark ages.”
Ruggiero found out about the poster via Twitter and expressed disappointment and anger that such demeaning portrayals of women and hockey are still being made.
“For her and others who took offense, I apologize. No qualifiers, I’m sorry,” Chicago Tribune sports editor Mike Kellams said in an e-mail. “We were just having a little fun with a guy who has come to personify all that has gotten under the collective skin of Blackhawks fans. Pronger is talented that way. And we were trying to connect to that emotion in a fun way.
“I grew up in Indiana and came to hockey as an adult. Ruggiero vs. me on the rink would be no contest. I know that from what she and her team did at the Vancouver Olympics.”
Anyway, Alex Rodriguez is intrigued with this hybrid skating man-lady, and would like a copy to place next to the centaur portrait above his bed.
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Chicago Tribune: Fetishists? [The 700 Level]
Today’s poster: Flyers’ Chris Pronger (really) [Chicago Tribune]
Flyers star posterized as ‘Chrissy Pronger’ by Chicago Tribune [Sports Illustrated]
