It’s really distressing to me that Syracuse.com continues to post stories featuring Dave Portnoy (”Best pizza in Central NY? Barstool’s Dave Portnoy reveals his Syracuse, Utica rankings,” Aug. 19, 2022). Giving this individual any attention for so-called pizza expertise is a slap in the face to the brave women that came out to stand against him.
Simple online research reveals the type of misogynistic behavior that he and his sports media group perpetuate. Dedicating the last bit of a gigantic pizza review article to almost nonchalantly state “Oh yeah, this guy was also accused of some sexual misconduct” really hits home the problem women have in these situations. It’s just completely normalized. “Yep, these things happen … oh well … how did Varsity Pizza do in his review?”
Portnoy is free to suffer no consequences for his actions, not even the minor inconvenience of having Syracuse.com ignore him. Well, actually Syracuse.com had no problem ignoring him when his sexual assault allegations came to light. No articles written about that, but we get four articles in the past few weeks about his thoughts on pizza. You can and should do better when it comes to this.
Sometimes it is hard figuring out how we operate socially in Syracuse, but this pizza article focusing on Dave Portnoy’s goofy opinions on local pizza really threw me. I guess the fact that Portnoy helped out local lacrosse icon Joe Rainone allows him some latitude, but not much.
What happened to our collective spinal column when we provide a silly little man like Portnoy publicity in regard to judging pizza locally? I mean, seriously? This clown goes to local establishments wearing his Syracuse University hoop garb, takes a bite of a slice of pizza and gives us a rating? SpongeBob SquarePants could judge pizza better and probably is better qualified.
There are a multitude of fantastic pizza restaurants in the Syracuse area. Specifically, Twin Trees is a legendary shop that is talked about in places as far as Florida and California. To summarily blow them off by judging their product based on a reheated slice is ludicrous. Then, assigning a numerical point grade (6.2) is the capper. Are you serious?
At least he held Utica in high regard. I don’t trust anything he says, but hey, he gave them high ratings.
Finally, this guy is a mall pizza junkie. He loves New York City knockoff thin crust pizza. The next time the Post-Standard wants to critique pizza, maybe they should collect a qualified local group of connoisseurs who understand the culture and history of our wonderful local pizza.
