I would appreciate as many journalistic opinions as possible here

[Matt Foley]

First off, I'm gonna let the cat out of the bag here and admit that I am not a journalist, I'm just a lowly grad student. I visit this board because it is the source of some of the funniest **** I have ever read in my entire life, and I thank all of you for that. Anyway, to get to the point, as some of you may or may not know, UCLA (my lovely alma mater) recently its 100th national championship as a school. I would think that this would be cause for celebration, but today an article appeared in the Orange County Register basically saying that UCLA's national championships don't mean anything. I was hoping that any of you with a little time on your hands might be able to read this and give me your journalistic opinion of it. Being a bruin alum, its pretty much impossible for me to look at this thing objectively, but it really seems like he is being a little too provocative with this article. So if any of have a little free time on your hands, I'd really appreciate your opinions. BTW, Orange County, CA is a major stronghold of USC fans, that may or may not play any part in this story, but I just that anyone reading this should know that. Thanks in advance.

http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/sports/columns/article_1696271.php

 

[heyabbott]

Dear OCR,

You are a ****tard.

Respectfully,

Newbie, SportsJournalists.com

 

[Ace]

To be honest, Mr. Foley, sounds like Mr. Miller was just trying to be provocative.

I assume it is an OPINION column and not an article. His opinion is that many of the titles UCLA won are in sports (like women's water polo) that few care about.

That is true.

I think the column is better than one praising UCLA for winning 100 titles in minor sports but, all in all, I'd probably have passed altogether and found another topic if I were on the clock.

 

[jgmacg]

His lede rhymes and he's wearing an Aloha shirt in his foto. That's as far as I got.

 

[spnited]

A stupid opinion, as far as I'm concerned.
One win over USC in football is worth more than 100 National championships? Idiotic.
And, of course, he conveniently forgot to mention UCLA basketball ... the greatest college dynasty of all time.

This is a columnist being contrary and coming across looking stupid or like a USC homer.

 

[Beef03]

In the grand scheme of things what does 100 national championships mean? what effect do they have outside of recruiting and giving alums a nice big chub? It means nothing, zippo, zilch. Regardless of the sport. Sure you can be proud of it, but who cares? it's like asking does it matter if the Yankees add another World Series trophy to their case? Sure the fans care, but beyond that it doesn't mean a whole lot.

 

[slappy4428]

I thought Lowly and Grad Student were redundant...

 

[outofplace]

Paging Cadet. Cadet, please come to the thread about a story disrespecting non-revenue athletics, thus including women's sports.

Definitely a slap in the face to anyone who gives a damn about any sport other than football. And that shirt is ridiculous.

 

[novelist_wannabe]

Journalistic opinions? Boy, are you barking up the wrong tree ... ;D

 

[Fenian_Bastard]

The Hawaiian didn;t bother me.
The rhyming lede did.
And the column was as full of **** as the Christmas goose.

 

[JR]

And the column was as full of **** as the Christmas goose.

You might want to take that over to the simile thread on the Journalism board, son.

 

[Cadet]

Wow, I got paged to a thread. Cool.

I agree with the glossing-over of UCLA's men's basketball dynasty, and find the football-centric viewpoint laughable.

That's right, laughable. I'm not mad, because this guy has clearly established himself as a dinosaur in the sports world. How many readers, how many football fans, how many USC fans, will read his column and realize how out of touch he is? Even if they agree with his fanboy assertions? (And I say this as a USC fan, BTW.)

This column is an example of what's quickly becoming archaic in sports sections.

I wonder if Miller also thinks the Olympics "don't count"? Because a university with as many national titles as UCLA is bound to have a few Olympians among its ranks. Even a student who is a diehard football fan would think it's pretty cool to sit next to an Olympian in his accounting class. Even if he doesn't follow water polo/golf/tennis/etc.

UCLA is correct in celebrating its winning tradition, an effect that can permeate an entire school. People like winners. They flock to winners. They like to brag about winners. Seeing others performing to their potential can induce a copy-cat effect, be it on the field or in the classroom or research lab. I don't care if it's the football team or the water polo team, it's good to have winners around.

I don't see this as a shot to women's athletics alone, because the disrespect was shown to all non-football sports. I'd be just as pissed if I were a men's volleyball player.

I have long believed certain sportswriters operate solely from a place of ego, wielding their pen of a sword in an effort to correct the on-field injustices heaped upon their youth playing days. They take a successful athlete or team and rip them apart in print, trying to inflict the same pain felt while sitting the bench for the middle school basketball team. Perhaps for Miller it was the middle school water polo team.

 

[Gold]

The LA Times ran a story on this on the front page, and that was merited. I thought it was a pretty good story and explained the reason for the large number of championships. It was appropriate because it is Los Angeles.

There are sports like volleyball and water polo where California is pretty much the dominant area, volleyball not so much any more but that was certainly the case from 1960 thru 2000. Stanford has probably been a better overall program in the last 15 years, and they have won the overall all-sports championships (I think that is called the Sears Cup) and Stanford might be the leader in colleges represented on Olympics teams.

The column was silly and petty.

 

[Twoback]

A stupid opinion, as far as I'm concerned.
One win over USC in football is worth more than 100 National championships? Idiotic.
And, of course, he conveniently forgot to mention UCLA basketball ... the greatest college dynasty of all time.

This is a columnist being contrary and coming across looking stupid or like a USC homer.

What he said.
(Good thing Whitlock didn't write this column or I'm sure me and Spnited would have disagreed again).

 

[Ike Broflovski]

Unless he was being sarcastic, which I didn't catch, Miller came off looking astonishingly stupid. He should have known better.

Most athletic departments I've seen in action like to split up the credit as much as possible, even if the football and basketball teams rake in almost all the money and the public accolades. The celebration was a way for UCLA to say that every team is important to the success of the program. Maybe that's not exactly true, but I'd think they'd want to keep the water-polo coach as happy as the football coach. It's kind of like those all-sports trophies.

 

[HandsomeHarley]

I show no bias: I hate UCLA and USC.

 

[jgmacg]

The Hawaiian didn;t bother me.
The rhyming lede did.
And the column was as full of **** as the Christmas goose.

This photo - at least in this case - is metaphorically accurate.

 

[Editude]

This was a not-good column by a not-good columnist. The dropoff from Whicker at the Register is Whitney-like. But they run a lot of cut-to-fit 6'' gamers in their daily tab.

 

[Starman]

 

[Bill Horton]

The Hawaiian didn;t bother me.
The rhyming lede did.
And the column was as full of **** as the Christmas goose.

OK now, at one point are we talking about with this Christmas goose?
Is it pre-Christmas, still being fattened for the kill, or THE ACTUAL Christmas goose, sitting on the table about to be sliced and diced?
The first one would be full of ****. The second would be full of ... I don't know ... cornbread or some other stuffing?
Just wondering.
And what does this have to do with UCLA?
I have no idea.