Sports journalism
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Sports Journalism is a form of journalism that reports on sports topics and events.
Sports journalism has grown in importance as professional and amateur sports have grown in wealth, power and influence as well. Within some newspapers at times, the sports department has been mockingly called the toy department, because sports journalists concern themselves with games rather than 'serious' topics covered by their colleagues on the news desk.
Sports journalism still may not be considered the most important product of a news media organization, but it is an essential product, and the sports journalism industry includes organizations devoted entirely to sports reporting — newspapers such as L'Equipe in France, La Gazetta dello Sport in Italy, and the now defunct Sporting Life in Britain, magazines such as Sports Illustrated and the Sporting News, all-sports talk radio stations, and sports television networks like ESPN — as well as many other news media that devote personnel and resources to covering sport.
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[edit] Sports journalists' access
Sports teams are not always very accommodating to journalists: in America, while they allow reporters into locker rooms for interviews and some extra information, sports teams provide extensive information support, even if reporting it is unfavorable to them, elsewhere in the world, particularly in the coverage of soccer, the journalist's role is barely tolerated by the clubs and players.
Sports journalists are like any other reporters, and they must find the story rather than simply relying on information given to them by the sports team, institution or coaching staff. Sports journalists must verify facts given to them by the teams and organizations they are covering, and this can become quite sticky just like a news reporter trying to verify information given to them by a political candidate for office. Often, coaches, players or sports organization management rescind sports journalists' access credentials in retaliation for printing accurate yet disparaging information about a team, player, coach or coaches, or organization.
Access for sports journalists is usually easier for professional and intercollegiate sports such as football, hockey, basketball, baseball and soccer. Access for sports journalists covering lower tier programs such as prep or high school sports is usually more difficult to go by. Most teams rely on secrecy and do not like information being reported in the paper or in other media. Also, high school coaches are also teachers, for the most part, and just don't have time to deal with reporters. Sports journalists face many obstacles in covering a given sport or team, just like news reporters face a multitude of obstacles on their respective beats.
[edit] Socio-political significance
Major League Baseball still gives many print journalists a special role in its baseball games: They are named official scorers and can make judgment calls about certain aspects of the score that do not affect the final disposition of the game.
Sports stories often transcend the games themselves and take on socio-political significance; Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in baseball is an example of this. Modern controversies regarding the compensation of top athletes, the use of anabolic steroids and other, banned performance-enhancing drugs, and the cost to local and national governments to build sports venues and related infrastructure, especially for the Olympic Games, show that sports still can intrude on to the news pages.
Sportswriters face much more deadline pressure than most other reporters, because sporting events tend to occur late in the day and closer to the deadlines many organizations must observe. Yet they are expected to use the same tools as news journalists, and to uphold the same professional and ethical standards. They often must be very careful about showing any bias for or against any home-town team. Sports journalists usually must also gather and use voluminous performance statistics for teams and individual athletes in most sports.
Many of the most talented and respected print journalists have been sportswriters. (See List of sports writers.)
[edit] Sports journalism in Europe
The tradition of sports reporting attracting some of the finest writers in journalism can be traced to the coverage of sport in Victorian England, where several modern sports - such as soccer, cricket, athletics and rugby - were first organized and codified into something resembling what we would recognize today.
Cricket, somewhat like baseball in the United States, because of its esteemed place in society, has regularly attracted the most elegant of writers. The Manchester Guardian, in the first half of the 20th Century, employed Neville Cardus as its cricket correspondent as well as its music critic. Cardus was later knighted for his services to journalism. One of his successors, John Arlott, who became a worldwide favorite because of his radio commentaries on the BBC, and was also known for his poetry.
The first London Olympic Games in 1908 attracted such widespread public interest that many newspapers assigned their very best-known writers to the event. The Daily Mail even had Sir Arthur Conan Doyle at the White City Stadium to cover the finish of the first ever 26-mile, 385-yard Marathon.
Such was the drama of that race, in which Dorando Pietri collapsed within sight of the finishing line when leading, that Conan Doyle led a public subscription campaign to see the gallant Italian, having been denied the gold medal through his disqualification, awarded a special silver cup, which was presented by Queen Alexandra. And the public imagination was so well caught by the event that annual races in Boston, Ma, and London, and at future Olympics, were henceforward staged over exactly the same, 26-mile, 385-yard distance, the official length of the event worldwide to this day.
The London race, called the Polytechnic Marathon and originally staged over the 1908 Olympic route from outside the royal residence at Windsor Castle to White City, was first sponsored by the Sporting Life, which in those Edwardian times was a daily newspaper which sought to cover all sporting events, rather than just a betting paper for horse racing and greyhounds that it became in the years after the Second World War.
In France, L'Auto, the predecessor of L'Equipe, had already played an equally influential part in the sporting fabric of society when it announced in 1903 that it would stage an annual bicycle race around the country. The Tour de France was born, and sports journalism's role in its foundation is still reflected today in the leading rider wearing a yellow jersey - the color of the paper on which L'Auto was published (in Italy, the Giro d'Italia established a similar tradition, with the leading rider wearing a jersey the same pink color as the sponsoring newspaper, La Gazetta).
[edit] Sports stars in the press box
After the Second World War, the sports sections of British national daily and Sunday newspapers continued to expand, to the point where many papers now have separate standalone sports sections; some Sunday tabloids even have sections, additional to the sports pages, devoted solely to the previous day's football reports. In some respects, this has replaced the earlier practice of many regional newspapers which - until overtaken by the pace of electronic media - would produce special results editions rushed out on Saturday evenings.
Some newspapers, such as the The Sunday Times, with 1924 Olympic 100m champion Harold Abrahams, or the London Evening News using former England cricket captain Sir Leonard Hutton, began to adopt the policy of hiring former sports stars to pen columns, which were often ghost written. Some such ghosted columns, however, did little to further the reputation of sports journalism, which is increasingly becoming the subject of academic scrutiny of its standards.
But sportswriting in Britain has continued to attract some of the finest journalistic talents. The Daily Mirror's Peter Wilson, Hugh McIlvanney, first at The Observer and lately at the Sunday Times, Ian Wooldridge of the Daily Mail and soccer writer Brian Glanville, best known at the Sunday Times, became household names over the course of the past 50 years through their trenchent reporting of often earth-shattering events that have transcended the back pages and been reported on the front pages: the Massacre at the Munich Olympics in 1972; Muhammad Ali's fight career, including his 1974 title bout against George Foreman; the Heysel Stadium disaster; and the career highs and lows of the likes of George Best and Lester Piggott and other high profile stars.
The 1950s and 1960s saw a rapid growth in sports coverage, both in print and on broadcast media. It also saw the development of specialist sports news and photographic agencies. For example, photographer Tony Duffy founded the picture agency AllSport in south London shortly after the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, and, through some outstanding photography (such as Duffy's iconic image of the American long jumper Bob Beamon flying through the air towards his outstanding world record at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics) and the astute marketing of its images, saw the business grow into a multi-million pound, worldwide concern that ultimately would be bought and re-named Getty Images.
McIlvanney and Wooldridge, who died in March 2007, aged 75, both enjoyed careers that saw them frequently work in television. During his career, Wooldridge indeed became so famous that, like the sports stars he reported upon, he hired the services of IMG, the agency founded by the American businessman, Mark McCormack, to manage his affairs. And Glanville wrote several books, including novels, as well as scripting the memorable official film to the 1966 World Cup soccer tournament staged in England.
[edit] Sports journalism organizations
Most countries have their own national association of sports writers and journalists. Many sports also have their own clubs and associations for specialists. These organizations tend not to operate as trades unions, but do attempt to maintain the standard of press provision at sports venues, oversee fair accreditation procedures, and to celebrate high standards of sports journalism.
The International Sports Press Association, AIPS, was founded in 1924 during the Olympic Games in Paris, at the headquarters of the Sporting Club de France, by Frantz Reichel, the press chief of the Paris Games, and the Belgian, Victor Boin.
The first statutes of AIPS mentioned these objectives:
to enhance the cooperation between its member associations in defending sport and the professional interest of their members.
to strengthen the friendship, solidarity and common interests between sports journalists of all countries.
to assure the best possible working conditions for the members.
AIPS operates through a system of continental sub-associations and national associations, and liaises closely with some of the world's biggest sports federations, including the International Olympic Committee, FIFA, soccer's world governing body and the IAAF, the international track and field body.
In Britain, the Sports Journalists' Association stages two prestigious awards events, an annual Sports Awards ceremony which each December recognises outstanding performances by British sportsmen and women during the previous year, and the British Sports Journalism Awards, the industry's "Oscars", sponsored by UK Sport and presented each March.
Founded as the Sports Writers' Association in 1948, following a merger with the Professional Sports Photographers' Association the organization changed its title to the more inclusive SJA in 2002.
The SJA represents the British sports media on the British Olympic Association's press advisory committee and acts as a consultant to organisers of major events who need guidance on media requirements as well as seeking to represent its members' interests in a range of activities.
[edit] External links
- Between the Lines: Humorous and Informative Critiques of Sports Journalism
- Sports Journalists Association of Great Britain website: Largest national organisation of its type in the world, site carries news on sport, journalism and sports journalism
- Journal of Sports Media blog hosted by University of Mississippi journalism school
- British Council article on the state of sports journalism in the UK
- An Interview with NYT Sportswriter Ira Berkow
