Don't blame media for Brandon Miller's security at March Madness for Alabama basketball | Goodbread

BIRMINGHAM − I've got a complicated relationship with my own industry.

After 30 years in the media business, it's let me down a few times. Let itself down more than a few times. It's prone to letting its guard down, too, leaving itself open to jabs it often deserves. It does not serve the public as well as it used to, but that's another column.

Suffice to say, perfect it ain't.

But I'll put gloves on for the business, at least, in this regard: media coverage of the controversy storming around Alabama basketball star Brandon Miller isn't the reason he had to be escorted around Legacy Arena by armed security this week. And the stance that it is only serves to fuel the sort of craven scum that would send anonymous threats to Miller or anyone else.

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UA coach Nate Oats revealed Wednesday that Miller was being guarded because of anonymous threats emailed to his best player, threats no doubt related to his connection to the tragic January shooting death of Jamea Harris in the area of the Tuscaloosa Strip.

Twice Thursday, I overheard fans suggest media coverage was to blame as I traversed Legacy Arena before the Crimson Tide's handy, 96-75 dispatching of Texas A&M-Corpus Christi to advance to the NCAA Tournament's second round. The same sentiment has flooded social media spaces over the last 24 hours, as well. Miller, remarkably enough, was held scoreless in the rout and logged only 19 minutes, sitting out much of the second half. A man with a gun was tasked with making sure he was safe in doing so.

There's only one word for nameless nobodies who send threats from behind a keyboard: cowards. And there are only two words needed to explain why media coverage isn't to blame for them: personal accountability.

That's not to defend every media word that's been written or said about Miller in the aftermath of Harris' awful death. I've read a lot of it, of course − definitely not all − and don't doubt that some of it's been misplaced or lacking in context or accuracy. I won't try to throw a blanket of credibility over every corner of the industry when not every corner is deserving of it. But I can stand by all that's appeared under my name, and stand against the idea that it was the media's index finger that pushed the send button on an email threat.

Blame the sender, 100%.

If personal accountability is more than just a punchline, then lay fault where it belongs: at the feet of the culprit. That goes for anyone else involved with Harris' death, too. Accountability for Miller's connection to the shooting, even in the absence of criminal charges, is a legitimate debate. Plenty of questions about the case remain, the answers to which could put a finer point on that debate. But nobody threatening Miller has the right to call for his accountability while anonymously hiding to avoid their own. Blaming media for their cravenness allows them to hide even more. Cowards don't need instigation or motivation to be cowardly, but they damned sure love it when someone or something else gets blamed for their actions.

Holding them less at fault merely gives them cover they don't deserve.

Media is an easy target, and admittedly, it too often makes itself so. I can't argue with the contention that its evolvement over time, at least in certain respects, looks more like devolvement. For all its flaws, however, there's at least a name on every story.

Keyboard cowards can't say the same.

With any luck, law enforcement will track them down and make them answer for whatever threats came Miller's way. Their arrests won't be anyone's fault but their own.

Reach Chase Goodbread at cgoodbread@gannett.com. Follow on Twitter @chasegoodbread.