WE JUST LOOK AT SPORTS DIFFERENTLY

[SportsDiva72]

Because the Sports Diva has way too much time on her hands, I thought about a question that one of the journalists asked me.
I was asked if I thought female reporters weren't as tough on female athletes as their male counterparts, especially when it came to criticism of their play.
I wondered.
Are we female reporters really that soft or does it seem that way?
Don't we criticize Kelsey Plumb or Aja Wilson as much as we do Kyrie Irving and Jayson Tatum?
Or maybe that's just a big Boston Celtics fan like me who loses her rabbit ass mind and starts cursing at the TV when the Celtics try all those three point shots and MISS!
Seriously though, do we just give them the benefit of the doubt because they're women or in some cases they aren't given the same coverage as male athletes or even paid the same.
Whatever the case , I don't think we aren't any less critical of female athletes than male sports writers.
We just look at sports a little differently.

 

[dixiehack]

Honestly, criticism is a glutted market right now. I’m not saying I want shiny happy everything but informed analysis telling my why something happened stands out in a sea of takes.

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

No one covers women’s sports as critically as they do men’s sports.

 

[Here me roar]

No one covers women's sports as critically as they do men's sports.

Who cares? Women's sports are still working to be as mainstream as men's. They're much closer than they were even a decade ago. But look back at the Golden age of sports writing in the '30s and the '40s and the '50s. Was there that much criticism? Or was there a lot of winking and nodding and turning your heads at guys who were drunk all the time or f****** everything that walked past them or whatever?

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

Who cares? Wasn't the entire premise of your post asking if female reporters are too soft on women athletes?

 

[Here me roar]

Who cares? Wasn't the entire premise of your post asking if female reporters are too soft on women athletes?

Someone asked that question somewhere, but it wasn't me.

 

[SportsDiva72]

Someone asked that question somewhere, but it wasn't me.

No it was Dan Oregon. And as to who cares, someone does or they wouldn't have asked me that question.

 

[DanOregon]

Yeah, I asked it. I think its a legit question. Earlier this year Chiney Ogumike said the following after apologizing for calling out racist fans in Indiana which was unfounded after an investigation.
" Hey everybody, I'm sure you've seen the WNBA statement on the investigation and I want to address this with the same energy I did the first time, cause if you really know me, I always try my absolute best to uplift the WNBA, to celebrate the amazing players, the coaches, and of course, the fans, that is something that is at the core of everything that I do. But if you know me, you know I'm not afraid to say I can do better," said Ogwumike, who began her WNBA career with the Sun in 2014.
First, I give her a ton of credit for actually admitting she was wrong and apologizing. But second, I don't think a male sportswriter/journalist would ever apologize for anything OR say they "do their best to uplift" whatever sport or team they are covering. I was interested in Diva's thoughts on it, that's all.

 

[gingerbread]

This conversation came up in my college sports journalism class the other week.

Here's what I told the students: When I was a sports columnist in NYC, there were three females in the city who had that job -- me, Selena, Johnette. The WNBA was in its infancy and the NY Liberty desperately wanted newspaper coverage. Each week, someone from the team would call or write begging us -- shaming us -- to cover their games. The Liberty officials reasoned that we had an obligation to cover them BECAUSE we were female. I can't speak for my peers, but I know that turned me off, and while I did write a handful of columns on the Liberty, we never covered them the way we would any other professional team. We'd have a game story but rarely a sidebar. I'm thankful one of my awesome male columnists loved writing off-beat stuff, and gladly jumped on the Liberty band rather than having to pen a fifth column about the Yankees that week.

Fast forward 20 something years: The Phoenix Mercury, a team that credentials mainstream media plus bloggers and assorted other sites, literally told reporters this month that they not only could not ask a player about her injury, they could not even look at the player's thumb or whatever it was. And the media mostly acquiesced. I don't know if it's because a lot of the reporters covering the team are young and just grateful to be credentialed, or because they don't know better.

As I told my students, the New England Patriots did (and do) stuff like this all the time, but I guarantee you the reporters who cover the team not only would laugh at such ridiculous edicts from the team, they absolutely would stare at, say, Tom Brady's thumb. A story like that would be fodder for days. With the Mercury, crickets.

 

[gingerbread]

Yeah, I asked it. I think its a legit question. Earlier this year Chiney Ogumike said the following after apologizing for calling out racist fans in Indiana which was unfounded after an investigation.
" Hey everybody, I'm sure you've seen the WNBA statement on the investigation and I want to address this with the same energy I did the first time, cause if you really know me, I always try my absolute best to uplift the WNBA, to celebrate the amazing players, the coaches, and of course, the fans, that is something that is at the core of everything that I do. But if you know me, you know I'm not afraid to say I can do better," said Ogwumike, who began her WNBA career with the Sun in 2014.
First, I give her a ton of credit for actually admitting she was wrong and apologizing. But second, I don't think a male sportswriter/journalist would ever apologize for anything OR say they "do their best to uplift" whatever sport or team they are covering. I was interested in Diva's thoughts on it, that's all.

Saw that, too, and had the same reaction. For ages female sports journalists were expected to praise female athletes and the teams because, hey, FINALLY, women were being recognized for being amazing athletes. I know I sure wrote tens of thousands of words doing exactly that, without offering much criticism.

While the coverage is much more objective these days, female athletes still aren't covered the same as their male peers.

 

[SportsDiva72]

This conversation came up in my college sports journalism class the other week.

Here's what I told the students: When I was a sports columnist in NYC, there were three females in the city who had that job -- me, Selena, Johnette. The WNBA was in its infancy and the NY Liberty desperately wanted newspaper coverage. Each week, someone from the team would call or write begging us -- shaming us -- to cover their games. The Liberty officials reasoned that we had an obligation to cover them BECAUSE we were female. I can't speak for my peers, but I know that turned me off, and while I did write a handful of columns on the Liberty, we never covered them the way we would any other professional team. We'd have a game story but rarely a sidebar. I'm thankful one of my awesome male columnists loved writing off-beat stuff, and gladly jumped on the Liberty band rather than having to pen a fifth column about the Yankees that week.

Fast forward 20 something years: The Phoenix Mercury, a team that credentials mainstream media plus bloggers and assorted other sites, literally told reporters this month that they not only could not ask a player about her injury, they could not even look at the player's thumb or whatever it was. And the media mostly acquiesced. I don't know if it's because a lot of the reporters covering the team are young and just grateful to be credentialed, or because they don't know better.

As I told my students, the New England Patriots did (and do) stuff like this all the time, but I guarantee you the reporters who cover the team not only would laugh at such ridiculous edicts from the team, they absolutely would stare at, say, Tom Brady's thumb. A story like that would be fodder for days. With the Mercury, crickets.

I understand what you mean. 19 years ago when I was a freelancer in Los Angeles, I covered the Los Angeles Kings hockey team. They media directors told me to do my interviews during the practices which were in the afternoon but not after their games, even though I had a press pass and could sit in "press row" and have meals in the dining room with the players, I could only ask "game related questions", which meant all those baby mama stories and who was sleeping with their teammates wife was out of the question. I was even told to not interview one of the Russian players that I wanted to interview because "he doesn't speak much English". Now being the smart ass new York City gal that I am, my question to the media director was, "ok so he doesn't speak English but why did he tell me that it was the rapper DMX who sang Party Up and not the rapper Ludicrous?"(one of the other Russian players who spoke better English than me told me that his teamate's favorite rapper just happened to be Ludicrous).
I guess I look at this female athlete vs male athletes coverage just a little differently because I cover hockey mostly.

 

[DanOregon]

I guess it should be noted that is is refreshing to see male journo types taking the WNBA players side in the current contract negotiations. Not sure that counts as "uplifting" women athletes, but too often journos of all stripes seemed to take the posture that athletes should just be grateful to get paid anything to play. But I do think it is a good sign for the league that fans are expecting more robust and discerning coverage of the league.