Don't close the curtain on the Del Biaggio drama

As the bankruptcy proceedings for Boots Del Biaggio continue, apparently some of his creditors want to keep the case closed from public access and scrutiny. The Tennessean today announced that they've launched a legal action to maintain visibility into the case, filing a brief in federal court. For hockey fans, this is important, as we've seen some pretty grizzly details come out already thanks to the reporting of Brad Shrade over the last several weeks.

Naturally, the parties directly involved in this case would prefer not to have their dirty laundry held up for view, but as the Tennessean argued, "the strong public interest here in access to the information about a case involving millions of taxpayer dollars outweighs the desire of the Committee and/or debtor to evade public scrutiny." In other words, given the Sommet Center lease renegotiation, which was in part dependent upon personal financial guarantees by the Predators ownership group, the people of Nashville have a clear and direct interest in this situation.

Kudos to Brad Shrade and the Tennessean for fully taking advantage of this opportunity to put the journalism back in "sports journalism" here.