Like Scoop. I wanna be like Scoop...

Saw this on the WWL.com yesterday... a chat with Scoop Jackson!!!
Cutting and pasting highlights -- you decide...

1st Grader (NYC Dawg!!!): Did you really say that a black male has a better chance of making it to the NBA than becoming a sportswriter, Scoop you should know that because of Affirmative Action that a black male can get a job as a sportswriter regardless of qualifications, company's have to have a certain amount of minority employees or they can be sued, right?

SportsNation scoop Jackson: There's "some" validity in that. But my pointy was that b/c of the "numbers" there is a better chance. There are 300 or so black basketball players, there are not 300 black sports writers in the 305 papers that the AP used in their study (or in the country). 30 teams, 300 players vs. 305 papers, 100 writers. You do the math. Who got a better shot?

Jamaal (Mt. Laurel, NJ): What's up with your boy Jason Whitlock? He dissed my Bengals on page 2 and also on PTI by saying that they wouldn't win 6 gmes this year and that Marvin Lewis has lost the team?? Please tell me that you don't believe that garbage as well?

SportsNation scoop Jackson: I've been sanctioned not to make any Jason Whitlock comments due to my employment status at the Worldwide Leader. They refrain against black-on-black crime.

Jeff (VA): You can't just look at the numbers in comparing black NBA'ers and writers. You have to look deeper, and like Whitlock said, there aren't a lot of blacks that want to write.

SportsNation scoop Jackson: i agree. But in making a point about "chances" of doing something i think my point is a valid one. disagreeable, but valid. my point is that (especially when talking to hs and college students) no one should be able to tell you that you can't do anything. Everyone tells kids that want to play sports professionally that they shouldn't look to sports because they're chances are "1-in-a-million" and i say, "you actually have a better chance at making the league than you do doing what i do. the numbers are in your favor." now keep in mind, we're just talking about basketball, we're not considering all of the other sports and putting those numbers up agains writers that cover all of those sports. I hear you when you say that not that many want to write, but my point is that, there are really more opporutinies for them to write and for whatever reason those opportunies aren't finding them.

Kmac (NH): you think descrimination with the 305 writer thing. Should the white kids think the same thing because 80% of the NBA is black?

SportsNation scoop Jackson: no. beacuse i think the NBA in this country is an anomoly. There aren't many Fortune 1000 companies or businesses that the workforce is 80% black. If that number were true across the board, then i'd say yes. but since it's not...

 

Kevin (MI): Not to pile on regarding the NBA/Sports Writer issue...but you should also consider what percentage of black kids who attempt to become professionals in each space. Numbers are meaningless without context (in this case, %)

SportsNation scoop Jackson: true, it's a much deeper situation. But still in order to make a point (right or wrong) the figures need to be used. like they say, the numbers might not tell the whole truth, but they don't lie.

Bryant (Tulsa OK): Hey Scoop, How did you get in to journalism? I really would love to write but don't know how to get started.

SportsNation scoop Jackson: by reading. for real. I read so much, especially magazines, that i began to rewrite the stories I was reading in my head. I'd read things that Ralph Wiley was writing in SI or Nelson George was writing in Billboard and pretend that that was my assignment. I did that for years, still do it. but only =now i realize that i can't outwrite Gary Smith for SI ofr Nancy Gibbs from Time. That's real.

Troy (Topeka,KS): Even with Bomar at QB I didn't see great things from Oklahoma this year. Where do you think that they will end up now?

SportsNation scoop Jackson: I acn't see them in the top 10 in December. But the BCS may get them in a bowl game, but not one for the troph.

Johnny Mo. (South Boston, MA): Straight up and down Scoop is racist. No doubt about it. Everything is black(good) and white(bad). I have been reading up on Scoop since back in the day at SLAM and the whole time the man is on the "Nation Movement" tip. C'mon, man. You ain't no gangster you don't know the streets like you claim you do. I talked to dudes who say they knew you growin' up and they don't back you. Let it be man, just let it be. If you really got a point then it's all good, but it's all gotta stop 'cause it just ain't called for. As for the sportswriting speech you gave, it's hard for anyone to get on(sports writing) without the proper education. In the NBA you don't even need to be able to sign your name on those huge checks to get 'em. So if us city kids get in touble it's very hard for us to turn around and get a gig writing. I know, I'm tryin'. And I got skills. Now if my game was Greg Oden tight, it wouldn't matter about what I did before. That's all man. It's no one's fault but those of us who messed up as to why it is hard for us to get on. I'm 26, tryin' to get on with it but it's hard. You ain't seen nothin like me, so it irritates me to see you try and write like you know it. Take your own advice and "Keep It Real". I'm from the bricks I know what it's like to have your boy dead in your hands. You ain't with that. Let it be man, let it be.

SportsNation scoop Jackson: On the real, if you knew or talked to cats that knew me comiung up or you talked to some of them dudes, then you really wouldnta wrote what you did. Never said i was gangsta, never said i was street. But trust me due, you don't KNOW me, or what i've been through. hard don't make you hard. Surviving does. And That's what I'd done against all odds. And if you knew me and knew my peoples you'ld know that. So before you start poppin' your gums about me and what you think i'm not, get your life right. stay the f outta mine.

 

I love it. I'm convinced that every single person in this country looked at Scoop's NBA/sportswriter odds and said "What the fuck is this clown talking about?"

 

I'm now convinced that U_G is Scoop Jackson.

 

Uh, Scoop, it's "figures lie and liars figure."

 

black-on-black crime?

wow.

 

You know, for all my differences with Whitlock's columns -- and there are many -- reading Scoop's ramblings (full disclosure: I rarely read Scoop's Page 2 column, only when someone on this board points out how ridiculous it is and I feel the need to see for myself) make me appreciate the Big Guy. As half-baked as some of his opinions are and as insufferably egotistical as he comes across, the man has writing talent. Scoop, he's got nothing.

How was that for a back-handed compliment? ;D

 

I wish he would talk about skin color more. There just isn't enough of it in what he writes.

 

I don't understand the point of this thread.


I mean, c'mon, what screams "big-time professional writer" louder than "So before you start poppin' your gums about me and what you think i'm not, get your life right. stay the f outta mine." ??

 

I like how he shifted the street slang into overdrive on that last response.

 

White people have names like Lenny and black people have names like Carl. [/homersimpson]