Tampa Bay Times really can’t stop cheerleading for a new Rays stadium, can it?

Monday morning, and time for Bad Journalism Theater! Let’s get right to it with our first contestant, the Tampa Bay Times, “winner of 10 Pulitzer prizes”:

As the Tampa Bay Rays broaden their search for stadium sites, the 23 acres under the Tampa Park Apartments have emerged as a promising possibility. … But behind the scenes, the complex’s nonprofit owner is embroiled in a 2-year-old lawsuit it filed against the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. And HUD officials wonder whether the case has its roots in the property’s potential value to the Rays.

There’s nothing wrong with the reporting here — all of the above is accurate. But the framing is incredibly skewed: The Tampa Park Apartments site, which is controversial because it would require relocating 372 low-income families who currently live there and probably a historic school and a church as well, is suddenly portrayed as “promising,” with the one little snag being the fact that the site’s owner doesn’t want to pay her bills, or maybe she already paid them and HUD lost the money, depending on who you believe. (There’s a bunch of stuff about the eviction issues in the Times article, but they don’t start until the 23rd paragraph, and who has time to scroll that far down these days when there are new tweets to check out?)

Okay, that’s not all that terrible journalism, though it’s always worrisome when stadium plans enter the “how can we clear the remaining obstacles?” stage while skipping over the “is this a good idea?” stage. Let’s move on to contestant number two, which is — hey, look, it’s the Tampa Bay Times again! This time with a profile of the Rays vice president in charge of planning a new stadium, who has this to say about it:

Pressed for details, Lenz, the Rays senior vice president for strategy and development, mentions infusing Tampa Bay’s water and abundant sunshine into the bones of a new stadium, but she’s mum on specifics: capacity, upper decks or retractable roofs.

And … that’s it. Lenz apparently wouldn’t say anything about her stadium plans, and instead of the Times killing the story for having no actual news, we get 38 paragraphs about her “salt-of-the-earth genuineness and small-town Pennsylvania charm,” her “mix of toughness and likability,” and the time she got hit by a pitch while playing Little League and told her concerned mom to “get off the field.” Plus a photo of her standing on a baseball field while holding an adorable child.

This is the kind of puff piece that should be taught in journalism school as how not to waste valuable column inches, and would be a winner in today’s faceoff just on those grounds, but it has an ace in the hole as well: That phrase “infusing Tampa Bay’s water and abundant sunshine into the bones of a new stadium” should also be taught in journalism school as a way never ever to mix a metaphor. Unless Lenz secretly works for Weapon X, in which case never mind, it’s great.