ESPN Reported the Dolphins Had Fired OC Chan Gailey Because They Got Duped By a Fake Adam Schefter Account

Reports of Chan Gailey's firing were greatly exaggerated, it appears.

I guess you can score this one for the Twitter trolls, as one fake Adam Schefter account tricked even the real Schefter's own employer into reporting that the Dolphins had fired offensive coordinator Chan Gailey. But, uh ... they hadn't.

How does this happen at a place like ESPN? The Twitter account's handle was apparently @TuaNeedsHelp. I guess an editor or two over at the Worldwide Leader also needs help, because one tweet from that account leading to ESPN incorrectly publishing a story that an NFL coach had been fired is certainly not a great look.

Don't some people over there have the actual Adam Schefter's phone number? Nobody thought to give him a ring to make sure that was something he actually reported? And if it really was Schefter who reported it, ESPN would have already been "first" to report that — which is something literally no person outside of media cares about at all — so there shouldn't have been some gigantic rush to put up a story on the website without making sure everything was correct first.

I honestly think we're getting to the point now, though, that every media out let needs to have at least one "Social Media Fake News Fact Checker" position. There are people out there whose entire goals are to have something like this happen, as is inherently evident here. So hire one person whose only job is to make sure no stories are being run based off tweets from @TuaNeedsHelp posing as Adam Schefter.