Cheering on press row?

Southwest Conference basketball tournament at Reunion Arena in Dallas. A dead conference in a dead arena. Christ I need another beer.

 

Sirs, Madames,

Gord Miller and Pierre Maguire high-fiving Canadian players coming off the ice at the world jrs.

I'm a patriot and a hockey fan but help me ...

YHS, etc

 

Happens all the time at high school basketball games -- mostly with the clock guys or with the people keeping book (this is especially prevalent when the coach has the bright idea of having a student keep book for them). It's difficult not to turn to the person and tell them to shut up and do their job.

 

If you did, you have more tact than I would have in that situation.

 

I do not excuse any member of the media from cheering on press row, nor do I excuse wearing team gear. Both are extremely unprofessional.

However, I do understand the small-town mentality. At a small paper you get to know the kids because you're at every game, talking to them at practice or after games. You usually see them in more than one sport. The families are your neighbors, your coworkers, your church congregation. The kids really do become more than just agate.

Kids who hug me, I hug back. Kids who get hurt, I offer words of encouragement. When they lose a big game, I don't stick a recorder in their face and ask them how it felt to blow it.

Maybe it would be different if I worked at a big metro and covered 50 high schools. Maybe this is just me.

 

all of us "get to know" the athletes we cover

doesn't mean we root for 'em

or hug them, for crissakes

 

Cincinnati radio analyst Chuck Machock got booted from an NCAA tournament game a few years back, along with his buddy Bob Huggins for arguing with an official. It might have been in New Mexico, although I can't say for sure and I'm too lazy to look it up.

 

Let's not forget there are media covering college teams for media bigger than Podunk Press who pretty much keep themselves in check on press row, but let it loose whoopin' it up back in the press room.

Prime example---some of those who covered Kentucky Wildcats during 2006 SEC Tournament in Nashville. True story. I know Tubby Smith is under pressure in Lexington, and I guess some of the scribes feel it as well.

 

Look up the origins of BBWA. Believe you'll find it was started to keep the Broadway friends of Charles Stoneham, owner of the New York baseball Giants, out of the press box. It was us or them, baby.

 

Perhaps the hugging is different because I look more like a mom than a creepy male sportswriter. And I don't initiate, but I also don't pull away from the kids like they have the plague.

 

This one isn't exactly media, but way to set an example: Former UCLA Chancellor Charles Young gave the choke sign to referees at the Pac-10 Tournament when it was at ASU in (guessing) 1989. He was sitting in the third row, center court, and he stood up to do it.
And here's the reverse scenario. I was in the press room at the Syracuse Carrier Dome when Syracuse was playing a first-round NCAA game against Richmond in some other city. Syracuse media cheered in the press room ... when Syracuse lost.

 

Ya know what? Cheering because a team you cover loses is just as bad. I've had coaches (and I guess, teams) that I've absolutely hated, but I've never rooted against them. Who cares if they win or lose. And even if I did, doing it in the press room in front of colleagues is lame. I'm not sure why some writers don't get this...