Changes in Sports Journalism

Gina Carrano
Mini-project No. 10

If I ruled the world, there are numerous changes I would make in the way sports and journalism intersect. The first and biggest one would be to eliminate biased fan commentary that often passes as journalism. In both print and broadcast media, there are many sports reporters that blindly root for their home team or favorite team rather than providing unbiased game commentary. This is particularly prevalent in baseball reporting. The Chicago White Sox’ TV broadcasters, for example, regularly refer to the White Sox as “the good guys” and the opposing team as “the bad guys” while calling games. That is one of the more extreme examples, but bias at all levels is present in reporting from media outfits of all types.

Broadcasters and writers often let their personal feelings about a team or a player get in the way of their reporting. New York Yankees commentator Michael Kay is a perfect example of this kind of bias. For unknown reasons, Kay seems to have a beef of some sort with Yankees pitcher Mike Mussina, so whenever The Moose pitches, the bias in Kay’s commentary is so extreme that it often renders the entire broadcast unlistenable. Bias like this even takes place on national networks like ESPN. Take baseball broadcaster Joe Morgan, for example. In my opinion, Morgan resents the Yankees because their late ‘90’s championship dynasty was longer and more impressive than that of the 1975 and ‘76 “Big Red Machine” World Series winning teams on which Morgan played. These resentments often compromise the accuracy and fairness of his game coverage. I have also noticed that Morgan seems to be unreasonably hard on some of baseball’s more controversial and outspoken managers, such as Ozzie Guillen, Tony LaRussa and Lou Piniella.

ESPN’s bias and preferential treatment extends to other sports, too—for instance, NFL commentator Michael Irvin. This former Cowboys player and current Cowboys apologist provided coverage of Tiki Barber’s retirement that was ridiculously one-sided and totally skewed against Tiki and the Giants. Because of this biased “journalism,” a casual fan watching ESPN would never even have heard Tiki’s side of the story as to why he was retiring.

I understand that most journalists have followed, and in many cases played the sport they cover for many years, so it’s only natural that they’d have slanted opinions or allegiances, but I don’t think these things have any place in journalism. This bias, or homerism as some call it, distorts game coverage and insults the reader or listener’s intelligence. I believe journalists should respect the sport they cover enough to just let it be what it is and allow the viewer to make his or her own decisions about what is happening, rather than deciding for the viewer that a certain call was correct, a certain play was dirty, and so on. If editors and producers demanded integrity and fairness in reporting, sports journalism would be better off for it.

The second thing I’d change is more specific—not only does it involve only one sport, baseball, but it involves only one player, Alex Rodriguez. Quite simply, I think sports journalists’ compulsions to report exhaustively on everything Alex says or does on and off the field have grown out of control. Both the New York media and ESPN are guilty of this, and at times throughout the past year or so, their constantly taking A-Rod’s moral inventory has reached levels of near-lunacy. If I had a dollar for every time Mike Vaccaro (in the NY Post) or John Kruk (on ESPN) let a really exciting aspect of a game go unmentioned so they could instead repeatedly harp on the fact that A-Rod struck out three times or left two men on base, I’d be rich.

This constant coverage of all things A-Rod is ridiculous because it’s the same thing over and over, and no one wants to hear it. That’s what’s most ironic about the whole thing—for the life of me, I cannot figure out whom, exactly, these stories are supposed to satisfy. Yankee fans don’t like them because most of the press he gets is negative and distracting, and Yankee haters don’t like them because while they might enjoy seeing A-Rod get bad publicity, they get sick of hearing about him all the time. I even get sick of hearing about him and I’m a fan of his, so I can’t even imagine how annoying it is for those who don’t like him. The media needs to tone its obsessive reporting on Alex down a notch, and if they spent some of their time reporting interesting stories on less well-known players instead, sports journalism would be better and more vibrant for it.

Speaking of the paltry amount of press coverage granted to players who are less well-known than the A-Rods, Pujolses and Bondses of the world brings me to the third and final change I’d make in the world of sports journalism. I would not only increase the level of media attention that less-known players get, but I’d also alter the types of stories that are most commonly covered by sports journalists.

First, I’d make sure the big-name players got a little less coverage and some of the more “underground” players got more. Sports reporters may think that fans only want to read about the big names, but how do they know unless they try? Until they actually print a story about someone like, say, Giants punter Jeff Feagles, how do they know that people would rather read yet another human interest feature detailing Eli and Peyton Manning’s family relationships?

There are many athletes who have backstories that are interesting, inspirational or both. St. Louis Cardinals shortstop David Eckstein is a perfect example of this. Eckstein fought—and beat—very serious health problems to get where he is today, and where he is today is a two-time World Series champion. His story is an inspiration to anyone who has ever been told they couldn’t be the best because they weren’t the biggest, strongest or fastest. I love watching him on the field, I revel in the heart and hustle he brings to any team he is on, and I’d love to learn more about his life off the field, but because he’s not as high-profile as a Derek Jeter or a Jose Reyes, he is hardly ever written about.

The same is true of the game-related issues that sports journalists choose to cover—they always go for the loudest, most high-profile storylines. I notice that in baseball, there are always way more stories about hitting than pitching and defense. I know that to the masses, reading about Ryan Howard hitting a mammoth game-tying home run will always be more exciting than reading about Jamie Moyer inducing an inning-ending double play. And I accept that, even though I might not agree. But just because most people care more about offense doesn’t mean there should be no room for stories about defense—how about an espn.com article about Omar Vizquel’s glove instead of an all-too-common one about Barry Bonds’ bat? Pitching and defense are important elements of what makes baseball the great game it is, and sports journalism would be much more exciting and diverse if there was equal coverage granted to all facets of the game.

So, there you have it—the three changes I’d make in the way the worlds of sports and journalism intersect. Sorry my rants were a bit lengthy, but once I get started on complaining about people like Joe Morgan, it is hard to stop.