Warriors PR is Bizarre, Desperate

Public opinion is so against the front office in Oakland that their PR folks are now clumsily leaving annoymous comments on blogs dedicated to the Warriors: “Warriors executive director of public relations Raymond Ridder acknowledged tonight that he was the author of an anonymous comment posted this afternoon to the WarriorsWorld.net fan site that defended Warriors management. In the comment, signed as ‘Flunkster Dude,’ Ridder wrote that he appreciated that afternoon’s season-ticket-holder conference call, conducted by GM Larry Riley, team president Robert Rowell and broadcaster Bob Fitzgerald. ‘I actually enjoyed the call and appreciate their honesty,’ the Flunkster Dude wrote. As PR director, Ridder was heavily involved in setting up the call, in large part to stem the tide of recent negative publicity about the Warriors’ front-office decisions and the shedding of former executive VP Chris Mullin. After the afternoon posting, there was an immediate uproar on the WW.net site when the site managers revealed that they had traced the comment’s IP address to the Warriors offices.”