What should a good old-fashioned fist fight involve? Anyone out there in BUGland?

That’s right …. those things at the bottom of your hands. Fists they’re called. FISTS!

And a good old-fashioned fist fight is what the promos Channel 9 News Brisbane’s 6pm bulletin on Monday night sensationally promised during Tipping Point about the looming lead yarn about a set-to between Broncos captain Adam Reynolds and his deputy Pat Carrigan.

But such a fist fight appeared to be off the agenda with co-anchor Andrew Lofthouse’s opening gambit: “Tonight, two of the Broncos’ biggest stars caught up in a wild brawl; only Nine has the full video”. Memo: Lofthouse: if that was a wild brawl, all of the MGH compilers are multi-Walkley award winners!

And as the top yarn for the night unfolded, Melissa Downes promised to show viewers the entire damning footage of the “scuffle” between the Broncos captain and his deputy in a Fortitude Valley park after a fan day at the team’s home ground.

And what did we all see? Those two overpaid, over-praised, overly pissed clowns pushing and shoving each other and wrestling to the ground, flopped on by other Broncos that one of our Media Glass House compilers reminded him of a gay dry-rooting pile-on not that he’s ever been involved in one.

By the bulletin’s sports bulletin 40 minutes later, the event had become a “drunken tussle”.

Still, did anyone get caught up with this outrageous hyperbole and unprofessionalism displayed by whoever wrote the promo? Well, yes, young reporter Bailey Kenzie.

In his main piece, Bailey describes what the two men were up to as “mucking around” and “wrestling”. ” “At times they appeared playful [all the Broncos players involved] piling on top of each other.”

But then Bailey claims it was a tackle by Reynolds “that turned it from fun to fists“.

The Media Glass House invites Kenzie to show us the part of the video where Reynolds and Carrigan hoe into each other with fists of anger. If not, we strongly advise he stops listening to the pre-bulletin promos being written by a beat-up publicist at Nine News or toddles off to Specsavers.

POSTSCRIPT: The MGH has raised before this habit of Channel 9 News of overhyping their promos with gross exaggerations that do nothing more than damage their brand for a strong, professional news service.

And how long did we have to wait for another example of this from Nine News? Answer: the promos for last night’s 6pm bulletin where this news touter who should stick to promoting reality TV shows “that stopped the world in its tracks” declared we’d be seeing home invaders with knives at a homeowner’s throat!

Our MGH compilers turned to one another last night and one declared: “You can have my left nut if that’s in fact what is shown!”

It wasn’t.

So the simple message: Nine News: stop damaging your brand with blatant bullshit beatup promos like this. Not to mention the words used in the bulletin itself. Wild brawl. Led to fists. Stuff like that.

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