1. Welcome to SportsJournalists.com, a friendly forum for discussing all things sports and journalism.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register for a free account to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Access to private conversations with other members.
    • Fewer ads.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Sports journalists are lazy

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by boundforboston, Sep 21, 2016.

  1. boundforboston

    boundforboston Well-Known Member

  2. Dick Whitman

    Dick Whitman Well-Known Member

    I barely felt like a journalist most days covering a beat, at least during the "access" parts of the beat. It's a choreographed cattle pull. I don't know why anyone wants to do it, especially in this day and age, when every play is shown from six different angles on television.

    I've said it a million times here: Sports journalists need to begin weaning themselves off the access teat. Buy a ticket.
     
    OscarMadison and FileNotFound like this.
  3. MisterCreosote

    MisterCreosote Well-Known Member

    It's not exclusive to sports journalists.

    By the way, is that written by our Matt Stephens?
     
    SFIND likes this.
  4. SFIND

    SFIND Well-Known Member

    Yes, can't forget political reporters. And that is @Matt Stephens.
     
  5. Ace

    Ace Well-Known Member

    I don't think what he describes is necessarily laziness. But they are too agreeable to whatever dictates the schools demand.

    If you insist on talking to a freshman when they are off limits, how is that going to turn out.

    If guess if you were banned from the press box and locker room and bought a ticket you could still call freshmen but are they going to want to talk?

    And I agree about all that cotton candy fluff we report and tweet, but you also don't want to be the one reporter ignoring it, either. Then you get the call from the web desk.

    One thing that schools really hate is open records requests, so if a school is more restrictive with access, the media should pepper them with records requests.
     
    murphyc, Alma and Tweener like this.
  6. KJIM

    KJIM Well-Known Member

    Posting a link with the solicitation of simply "Thoughts?" pretty much demonstrated the headline, at least to me.
     
    Last edited: Sep 21, 2016
    JordanA and Dick Whitman like this.
  7. LongTimeListener

    LongTimeListener Well-Known Member

    Mostly I'm with Whitman though in the "I don't know why anyone wants to do it" camp.

    But let's say a newspaper tried what this writer or his editor is advocating -- forgo access, get the "real story," etc. etc. Is there a market for that kind of beat coverage in college? I don't get the sense there is. College fans increasingly want to know less and less about off-field troubles. Some might be against rapes and cover-ups -- although a shockingly large percentage of fans seem quite OK with those -- but for almost everything else you're just pissing people off. And unlike with government or business reporting, there typically isn't a compelling public interest to getting the real scoop on injuries, academic trouble or even NCAA violations.

    However, I am interested to know more about the policy around needing permission to call professors and others on campus but not associated with the football program. Have the professors agreed to that policy? If a tenured professor hasn't agreed and a beat writer hasn't agreed, who cares what the football SID says?
     
    exmediahack likes this.
  8. JohnHammond

    JohnHammond Well-Known Member

    Matt is writing about a general policy that the media need to go through CSU's public relations office to contact a member of the faculty. It's silly, but the university can withhold access to administrators if the media contact reporters directly.
     
  9. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    No matter how limited face-to-face encounters with subjects are, they are still very useful for forming ideas and perceptions for stories.
     
    Matt Stephens likes this.
  10. jr/shotglass

    jr/shotglass Well-Known Member

    I tend to agree that there's a backlash with reporting minor infractions by athletes. The public is more apt to look upon such reporting as "picking on" jocks.
     
  11. Matt Stephens

    Matt Stephens Well-Known Member

    It is that jackass, and he just noticed two erroneous words in his own column. Dammit!
     
  12. steveu

    steveu Well-Known Member

    You're so fired. ;)
     
Draft saved Draft deleted

Share This Page