Sports Communication: What Are We Headed For?

As The Sports Nut, I have noticed incredible changes in sport communication in the quarter century that I have watched(and been sickly obsessed with) sport.  Sports used to be an entity that we were only subjected to if we opened up the sports page or scouted out a game to watch on TV or listen to on the radio.  Now, us sports fans are thankfully able to have our very own sports worlds as a major component of our lives. 

It has been noted that my life is geared towards sports.  In fact, I am watching Illinois State and Southern Illinois on the Comcast Center Channel as they play in the first round of the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament.  As I am doing that, I am keeping close tabs on my ipod touch next to me as to what is going on in the other college games around the country.  In this way, I am able to flip to them during every commercial or for the ends of every close game.  I am also following the battle of Florida(Orlando vs. Miami in the NBA) on my iPad's live game stats and will start flipping to it more as it gets to later in the game.  Just another day in the life of the Sportsnut!  Yet this represents something far greater.  It stands for what us sports fans are able to do when it comes to following sports.  I am sitting here able to watch and follow all of these games and will watch recaps of them later on Sportscenter and read summaries on ESPN.com.  And other people who obsess over sport and have the same lack of balance in their lives are able to do the exact same thing!

Sports are all around us no matter where we go.  We can watch games on 100 different channels, we can check scores or watch games on our blackberries, we can order sports packages on satellite or even order NBA League Pass Mobile on our iPods and IPads(I have it on both and it is amazing).  We can read about our favorite sports, teams, and players in dozens of magazines. We can get text updates on phones or watch every game of the NCAA tournament on our computers when our bosses are not looking...that is if we do not just take 2 personal days and go to a combined 12 first and second round tournament games bouncing back and forth between 2 sites during those first 4 days of  the tournament like one person I know...me (wait, why am I single again???)

Red Sox Nation, are you tired of reading about Alex Rodriguez? You no longer have to.  Just read about your teams.

There are new concepts cropping up, such as NFL Redzone and ESPN Goal Line.  These channels air all day on Sunday and Saturday, respectively, and bounce back and forth between all of the live games.  Therefore the viewer is spoon fed every key play live without having to pick up a remote.  We can purchase game tickets on our phones and will soon be able to have a bar code scanned from our phones in place of having to have any form of ticket on us.  ESPN.com has also created separate websites(ie. ESPN Dallas or ESPN New York) for fans so that they can still get all of the national articles on their teams, but without having to filter through ESPN.com itself.

Pretty impressive how far sport communication has come and how much sport is around us, huh?  And most of this has just happened in the past 25 years.  It would be naive to think that there not will not be many more significant jumps in sport communication over the next 25.

Any sports fans used to seeing their TVs look like this?

I think that sports will be much more accessible to us when we are on the go.  Sure we have satellite radio in our cars, radio, live game stats and some live games to watch on our phones.  However, I think we will soon start to see where every sports network broadcasts all of their programming to the point where we can watch all of it on our phones.  We already have nfl redzone, NBA league pass mobile, and college mobile sports, etc. on our phones, so we are clearly headed in the direction where EVERYTHING sport wise will be available on our phones.

I also foresee many more sponsorships as sport communication becomes more and more lucrative.  We are beginning to see previews for NBA games and movies intertwined in the same commercials!  This will be a lot more prevalent going forward and we will probably experience sponsorship commercials tied into game previews much in the way that movies are beginning to. 

Journalism coverage of sport will be all that more extensive.  There will be more interviews, and juicier details/more stories about the lives of athletes. 

TV viewing will be more enhanced as fans will be able to select interviews or clips right off of the TV screen.  There will be much more interaction with players as chat rooms, social networks, etc. become more prevalent.

These are just a few of the things that I think we can safely say we will see in the next few years, but I am sure that there will be many more innovations in the world of sport communication that we are not now aware are even possible.  As the Sports Nut, I am more than a little excited at what is in store for us fans.  Heck, players might even come out of our TVs and into our living rooms.  Oh wait, turn on ESPN3D...they already are.

Baltimore Maryland: In Desparate Need of a Skatepark!

Baltimore's only current skatepark, located in Carroll Park

Baltimore, Maryland needs another skatepark.  Currently, the city has one 10,000 square foot park to accommodate roughly 30,000 skaters in the city.  Many of the other smaller cities in Maryland have adequate skateparks, but the state's biggest city is lagging behind.  This is why Baltimore Maryland is a very deserving candidate for the Tony Hawk Grant.



 The group that would be most suited to apply for the Tony Hawk Grant would be a group called the Skatepark of Baltimore.  It is a group of over 100 volunteers who are rallying around the need to build a large skating park in Baltimore.  As there are skaters, community activists, and skateboard enthusiasts in the group, the Skatepark of Baltimore is well qualified to submit the grant for the Tony Hawk Grant.

Aside from having about 30,000 skaters, Baltimore is a city with a lot of youths growing up in poverty who would benefit from another skating park.  The median household income in the city of Baltimore is slightly over $30,000.  There are also a large number of at risk youths Baltimore who could use another place to go to do something fun and sociable instead of being put in potentially violent or troublesome situations.

Proposed location for a new skatepark

Currently, the only skating park in Baltimore is located in Carroll Park and is 10,000 sq feet.  The Skatepark of Baltimore is proposing to open a skatepark in Roosevelt Park in Hamden.  The best location for this would be at the intersection of W 36th and Falls Rd.  The new proposed park would be about 5.2 miles from the existing skating park at Carroll Park.  Therefore it would still be in the heart of the city, but would be spread out enough so that there would be a park in relatively close proximity to most of the cities skaters.

The new park would be 11,000 sq feet and should contain a combination of the following: half pipes, quarter pipes, handrails, vertical ramps, pyramids, banked ramps, full pipes, pools, bowls, snake runs, and stairsets.

Meeting a Deadline in Sports Journalism

This past Wednesday I attended the Cleveland Cavaliers vs. Houston Rockets game at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Oh.  I subsequently wrote a blog on the game and enjoyed the process.  It made me think about how I have read 10s of thousands of recaps on sports games but have never wrote one.  Doing so made me appreciate the process behind all of the recaps I read.

While I had no problem meeting the 11:00 pm deadline, there were some challenges.  The first was that I really had to be be observant of EVERYTHING.  I had to watch the action on the floor, but I also had to constantly check my blackberry for stats, make notes of key plays, and make a point to pay very close attention to injuries.  There were not any injuries during the game, but had there been I would have had to have made sure to check up on the latest injury statuses.  And amidst all of these challenges, I had to ignore the goings on in the arena.  NBA franchises make a point to entertain fans so that they will come back which makes for a lot to block out.

I also had to do my homework going into the game.  I could not just show up at the game 10 minutes before tip with my Nachos and 15 dollar soda.  I had to read up on each team to get background on the players, recent results, and any injuries.  I really had to know what to look for before any of the action even began!
The last problem facing a sports journalist with an early deadline such as I had is competition with online sources.  I was unable to include any quotes in my recap.  Had there been more time, I would have been able to hear press conference quotes.  Fortunately for me, there were not any stoppages in play or overtime.  If either or both of those occurred, I would have had a much harder time meeting my deadline as I would have been afforded less than an hour between the end of the game and my deadline.  Online sources can always add quotes to recaps or hold off putting recaps up until they are ready.  For a journalist for a newspaper, what is in by that deadline is what is printed because the papers have to be delivered so soon after.


I think that this experience gave me a much better perspective as to what sports journalists are facing.  And being the sports nut that I am, there are a lot of articles to be read that will now be appreciated much more by myself!

Cavaliers Begin Second Half With Loss To Rockets.

The Cavaliers first game after the all star break had a very similar theme.  It was a theme that the Cavs came to know all too well during the first half of the season.  Once again, the Cavs saw a winnable game slip from their grasp as they lost 124-119 to the Houston Rockets Wednesday night at Quicken Loans Arena.

The Cavaliers(10-47), who have been playing without injured Andersen Verajao since December, were also without Mo Williams and Daniel Gibson.  Williams was a late scratch due to a sprained ankle while Gibson was kept out to "deal with personal things", said Cavs head coach Byron Scott.  The Cavs got 26 points from Antawn Jamison and 20 points to go with 12 assists from Ramon Sessions.  The Cavs came out strong, showing no rust from the six day layoff.  The wine and gold led by as many as 11 in the 2nd quarter and took a 65-61 halftime lead, but were unable to make it stand up.

Scoring was not the problem for the Cavaliers as they topped 100 points for the 7th time in 9 games.  Defense, however, was an issue.  The 1-2 punch of Kevin Martin and Chase Buddinger was what did the Cavaliers in.  Martin scored 30 points and the second year Buddinger came off the bench to score a career high 30 points as well.  The Cavs especially had problems with Martin and Buddinger down the stretch as the two combined to score Houston's final 24 points of the game.

The Cavs, who were outscored 30-23 in the 3rd quarter, were able to tie the game at 107 with 5:34 in the game.  From there though Buddinger hit 2 runners and martin added 2 layups and Houston (28-31) pushed the lead out to 115-107 and never looked back.

Chuck Hayes pulled down 17 rebounds for a Rockets team that outrebounded the Cavs 57-37.  Hayes 13 offensive rebounds set a Quicken Loans Arena record.

The Cavs, who were looking to build off of a stunning victory over the 2 time defending champion Los Angeles Lakers heading into the break, got 21 points from Manny Harris. Houston won for the second time in as many nights following a 108-100 victory in Detroit Tuesday night. 

This could be the last time that we saw the two teams in their current forms with Thursday's trade deadline looming.  Shane Battier and Courtney Lee are players whose names have been bandied about in several trade discussions over the past several weeks.  Meanwhile, the Cavaliers aim to unload salary and get younger so they are hoping that the noon deadline tomorrow sees them able to land young players and draft picks.

The Rockets were without Yao Ming, Jared Jeffries, and Terrence Williams.

Houston also beat the Cavaliers December 11th in Houston.  The Cavaliers have now lost 38 out of their last 41 games.

Kevin Martin, pictured above, and Chase Buddinger combined to score 60 points on Wednesday night

Houston travels home to host the Nets, fresh off of the acquisition off Derron Williams today, on Saturday night at the Toyota Center.  The Cavs remain home to play Camelo Anthony and the new look Knicks on Friday.

The 2011 NBA All Star Game

Date:   February 20, 2011
Release Date: Immediate

Contact:  Media Information - Joe Schneeberger - email: osunationaltitle@yahoo.com

Subject:  The 2011 NBA All Star Game in Los Angeles

The 2011 NBA All Star Game at Staples Center tonight has many subplots this year because of recent player movements and player storylines.

The NBA's greatest stars will lace them up in the first all star game since "the summer of lebron".

Amar'e Stoudemire is just one of several superstars representing a new team in the 2011 All Star Game

NBA stars Lebron James, Chris Bosh, Amar'e Stoudemire will all be representing new teams in tonight's game.  After what was the most turbulent free agent offseason in league history, James and Bosh ended up in South Beach while Amar'e Stoudemire traded in his Suns jersey to head to the bright lights of New York City. James and Bosh enter the games as villains and will have added pressure on them to play well.  James, in particular, can start winning fans back with a strong performance.
Carmelo Anthony of the Denver Nuggests - at least for the next few hours - is the center of a lot of media attention given the trade rumors that have swirled around him all season long.  He has fielded questions all weekend about a possible move to the Knicks or Nets before this week's trade deadline.  He enters this all star game in a western conference uniform perhaps for the final time.

Kobe Bryant, who will be playing in front of his home crowd on Sunday, is looking for a 4th all star mvp trophy

Kobe Bryant, a 3 time all star MVP, is one short of tying Bob Petit's record of 4.

The game will also feature newcomers Russell Westbrook, Blake Griffin, and Kevin Love looking to make a splash in their first all star games.  Griffin ends a 13 year drought since a rookie (Tim Duncan in 1998) last appeared in the game.

The game is scheduled to start at 8:30 pm tonight, Sunday, February 20, 2011. It will air on TNT

Pop star Rihanna will perform during halftime.

Questions?  Email Joe Schneeberger at osunationaltitle@yahoo.com

Fundraising and Recruiting in Sports: Parralel Worlds?

In order to win you need talent.  To get that talent you have to recruit it.  This is no great secret among college programs as this has always been the case.  What is also very important is having the necessary funds to run a program.  Without these funds, a program cannot be successful.  For this reason, the majority of coaches and athletic departments must fundraise.  And interestingly enough, the practices used in raising funds are quite often similar to the ones used in recruiting.

In both recruiting and in fundraising, coaches must be able to successfully identify prospects.  With recruiting, the coaches attempt to identify the players who have talent and who can help their teams.  In the way of fundraising, coaches try to find donors who have the means to help their programs.  This ability on the part of coaches to recognize prospects goes a long way in determining the success of their programs...in recruiting AND in fundraising.

Persistence is a key to any successful recruitment of a player.  It is not often that a player is going to sign away 4 years of his life to a coach the first time the two come into contact.  It normally takes many phone calls, letters, in person visits, and a level of comfort to get a player to commit to a program.  The same holds true with fundraising.  A potential donor is not just going to write a check when when first contacted.  A donor must feel comfortable with the coach and the idea of where the money will be going.

Recruiting and Fundraising are both areas where the end goal is a commitment.  In recruiting a coach is looking for a verbal, and subsequently, a written commitment.  Fundraising is an arena where the coach wants to secure a verbal commitment from a donor followed by the donation itself.
I can draw comparisons between my experience with fundraising and the process during which I was recruited by colleges for basketball. I work in the field of school fundraising.  In fact, my dad and I worked for QSP, which is one of the companies advertised in the article.  My dad was able to earn National Sales Rep of the Year for QSP in 2005, while I was working full-time with him to help him in his accounts and selling new programs.  My dad and I then incorporated in 2005, which enabled us to offer new products in addition to the QSP ones that we were already using.  What these new products have allowed for us to do is work with a number of high school teams.  Through these sales, I have been able to observe what a profound effect a coach can have on a team's fundraiser.  When a coach persists in motivating players, letting them know how they will benefit from the funds, and acts enthusiastic about the fundraiser, this usually translates into very successful sales.  When a coach treats a fundraiser as though it is a necessary evil, the sale usually flops  because the players will not rally around something that the coach does not rally around.

When I was being recruited for basketball during my senior year of high school, my final list of schools I was considering consisted of those where the coach was enthusiastic about the process.  The programs that I gravitated towards were all ones where the coaches persisted in calling me a lot, showed up at my games to watch me play, and made me feel as though my coming to those schools was very important to them and that i could help those programs a lot.

In all of my experiences, it is the coaches who show the most passion for both recruiting and fundraising that are successful.  If a coach is able to do this, the skills will transfer...as they are very much the same!

Kobe Bryant: Superstars Sell

Ever since the 1980s and the trend of companies to hire famous athletes to endorse their products and services, we have seen the correlation that a player's on field performance can have on fans willingness to buy products endorsed by that athlete.  I grew up during the 'Be Like Mike Era' as I prefer to call it and was witness to the pull that athletes began to have on consumers.  I always had to have the products endorsed by my favorite NBA players because, after all, it would make me be like them!  This was evidenced by a visit that my family once took to Payless Shoes back in the late 80s.  My parents were about to buy me shoes and my dad suggested this ugly pair of blue suede high tops that cost $1.  My disgust was written all over my face until my dad fibbed a bit and told me that they were the same shoes that Larry Bird wears.  At that point I had to have them!  And a few months later I got that same pair of shoes again!  Never mind that they were the ugliest shoes I'd ever seen because I thought I was being like my hero Larry Bird!  Well the Be Like Mike or Be Like Larry(except not really) Eras gave way to the Be Like Tiger, Lebron, and Kobe eras of today.  The willingness of consumers to buy products promoted by star athletes is stronger then ever.  I mention Kobe Bryant because Kobe provides the strongest example of how this rings true.

Kobe's image was damaged after the 2004 rape allegations

In the early 2000s, Kobe Bryant was an endorsement juggernaut.  He had lucrative deals with Nike, Coca-Cola, McDonald's, and Upper Deck.  Every youngster seemed to idolize Kobe.  Kobe represented everything  they wanted to be.  He was young(he came into the league at age 17), he was cool, and his style of play was flashy.  This all took a sudden turn though.


In 2004, Kobe Bryant was charged with sexual assault.  This had stemmed from accusations of a young lady that Kobe had forced her to have sex with her in a Colorado hotel room.  All of a sudden, this young star who could do no wrong become someone who did something very wrong.  Kobe was now an adultering rapist in the eyes of the public and to the companies he was endorsing.  McDonald's terminated his contract and Coca-Cola let his contract expire in 2005.

Coke let Kobe's Sprite contract expire in 2005, but has since signed him again

Over the next few years, Kobe began work on repairing his image.  He said and did the right things.  He appeared apologetic and always seemed to have his family visible after games.  He also continued to play tremendous basketball.

Flash forward to 2011.  Kobe Bryant is widely cheered both at home and on the road.  Chants of 'Kobe' and 'MVP' are often rained down upon him.  His jersey is the number 1 selling jersey in the league and he made over $24 million in endorsements alone in 2010.  Even Coke re-signed him in 2008 sighting the fact that a marriage between a superstar player and superstar company made perfect sense.  Most recently, Bryant signed a big deal with Turkish Airlines as his endorsements are becoming more global.


So how did Kobe Bryant pull this off? Did it have to do with the fact that was contrite in the public eye?  Possibly, although his crime was so horrible that it is hard to believe that anyone would ever mistake him for citizen of the year.  It is more likely that Kobe's play on the court turned his image back around.  He scores 81 points in a game.  He won his 4th and 5th championships.  And in a what have you done for me lately society, this is good enough for Kobe Bryant to again be cool.  Many ignore Kobe's past transgression as if it never happened.  They are too busy buying his products and trying to be like Kobe to care.  Taking notes Tiger?

The Olympic Games: Future Media Challenges

The Olympic Games is the most widely covered and televised sporting event that we have in the world.  In the year 2000, for example, it was aired in over 220 different countries and territories! This was made possible by an ever expanding use of technology.  However, it is this same technology that threatens the very popularity of the Olympic Games!  This becomes none more evident than when we look at the challenges posed to the upcoming 2012 games in London in light of the current media and global sports climate.

While the Olympics coverage has spread to more and more areas of the globe, so too has the coverage of many other sports.  Through much of the 20th century, the Olympics was the only real sporting event that would have been considered global by much of the world's population.  This is now no longer the case.  We are witnessing the ever-increasing popularity of the Super Bowl, World Cup, Golf Majors, Tennis Majors, the World Basketball Championships, etc.  So the uniqueness of the Olympics as a global spectacle is no longer what it once was.  This increase in the number of global sporting events has also perhaps diminished the importance of some of the Olympic sports as many world titles are also hashed out in these other global sporting events.

Another challenge the Olympics face is that of a shrinking world.  The Olympics have always been looked at as an event that brought the world together.  Yet now, through communication, we are able to easily interact with people all over the globe. Transatlantic flights are hourly afterthoughts now. In addition, there is such an emphasis put on diversity in much of the world nowadays, that a growing number of people have become very familiar with many other cultures and countries.  In this way, the aura of the Olympics has decreased because there is less differentiation in cultures.  And with as much political dissent (and the coverage of it) that occurs in this day and age, it can be argued that there is not the same strong identity with one's country for some people that there was 30 or 40 years ago. 

The Olympics have also been watered down by the media outlets covering them.  Because of the incredibly large licensing fees that are in place in order for media outlets to cover the games, there is a lot of pressure on those same outlets to recoup the money spent on those fees.  So many networks are now steering towards entertaining their given audiences.  Tape delays and melodrama have become so commonplace that the live, in the moment, feelings of competition is gone.  Many fans, myself being one of them, prefer to follow the events via live game stats to try and recapture the heat of the moment competitive feeling.  There is no escaping the results in today's world of communication so the results of an event that is being aired 15 hours after it has taken place are spoiled, and anti-climatic.  With the growing costs of covering the Olympics, many networks are covering more and more of the Olympics from the confines of their own studios.  SO not only has the live feel of much of the Olympics been compromised, but so too has the solid Olympic feel of them as much of the coverage is from studios that are thousands of miles from  the events that are being covered.

World Cup Soccer is just one of many global sporting events wth which the Olympics must compete with

The last real challenge facing the 2012 games and those going forward is the practicality.  There is so much  media, fanfare, traffic, cost, etc. associated with the Olympics that there are a limited number of countries that can even consider hosting the Games.  And hosting the games is still a logistical nightmare for those countries that can do it.

When considering all of the above factors, the Olympics  and those covering it have a lot to overcome in order to remain even nearly as globally relevant as they have been.  They have to be able to convey to the people that the Olympics are still the superior global sporting event when compared the all aforementioned ones.  They must walk that fine line of entertaining without losing the competitive flair of the games and do so within the confines of their cost perimeters. in a shrinking world, they have to put more of an emphasis on diplomacy.  As much of the cultural and rivalries among  nations have diminished, the networks have to somehow paint a picture of a friendly yet fierce competitive atmosphere.  And it may sound simple, but with the almost unimaginable logistical challenges facing London and future Olympic cities, they must do everything they can in the way of  prepare.  The Olympics and its associated media outlets certainly have their work cut out for them.  And when the opening ceremonies commence in just 17 short months, it will be interesting to see if all of those involved are up to the challenge!

Information Technology Making Sports Easier

Just as is the case with any other company or component of society, sports organizations at all levels and the companies associated with them are always upgrading their technology.  This trend is in order to maximize success both on the field or in the area of revenue. Some aspects within sports organizations that have been heavily benefited by technology are:

Ticketing

The bar code reading of tickets has long since been in play.  Also, fans have been able to buy tickets online it seems since the advent of the Internet.  However, a few months ago, Stubhub and iPhone made it possible to buy and print out tickets using your iPhone and a mobile ticket device.  In the near future, fans will able to buy tickets on their iPhones and simply have the bar codes scanned off of their phones! Incredible!

Fans can print tickets using an iphone and a mobile ticket device

Donors

Technology allows for collegiate programs to ask for and receive donations online.  The other thing that technology does is it allows for universities to ask for money from boosters.  Consequently, universities are able to show off their technology, thus showing potential donors what exactly it is their money would be going towards.

Recruiting and Compliance

Technology aids programs, athletes, and fans alike.  For programs, it allows them to discover athletes a lot more easily now that they can follow high school players online and watch online highlights.  For athletes, it allows for them to be discovered more easily.  They can upload videos of themselves online so college coaches can see them play.  Fans can follow recruits and the recruiting of their favorite teams with sites such as ESPN.com and rivals.com.  For example, I  was able to closely follow national signing day last week on my blackberry while at work.

Technology aids in compliance in that it saves the NCAA a lot of money because it allows for them to be much more efficient in both monitoring and internal controls.  


Video Analysis

coaches can watch films of potential recruits on the internet

Technology has aided in video analysis as much as it has aided in any other facet of sports.  Instead of writing down scouting reports or using the old black and white still frame printouts, sports teams are able to generate videos and high quality color pictures of opponents, their games, or of each play.  And they can do this from these things from their own film rooms. Football teams can generate images of formations within seconds of a play being completed.  In today's Super Bowl, fans will see Ben Roethlisberger and Aaron Rodgers on the sidelines in between their respective series studying vivid color images of defensive formations.

HR Training and Scheduling

Organizations can train HR trainees efficiently and effectively from a conference room and computer programs both via technology.


Teams can upload its future schedules online within seconds of it being determined.  Teams, players, and fans alike can see who any team has played or is playing with the click of a finger.  I can, AND DO, look up who my beloved Ohio State Buckeyes are playing in the year 2014!

Technology has improved sports for teams, programs and fans alike.  So many advancements have been made, thus affecting on the field play, recruiting, and fans ability to watch games.  And given how far we have come technologically over the past couple of decades, there is no reason to think that sports will not be that much more enhanced over the next 20 years and beyond!

The Dallas Morning News and The Liverpool Post: Comparison

Super  Bowl XLV tackles Big D

This blog takes a look at the similarities and differences in the sports coverage of two English speaking newspaper websites: The Dallas Morning News and The Liverpool Post (England). 





Both websites are very simple to navigate and to understand.  Everything is spelled out and both have a lot of pictures.  The similarities stop there, however, as the content covered is much different.  The Dallas Morning News(TDMN) focuses heavily on the Super Bowl that will be taking over the city this entire upcoming week.  There are breakdowns of the game, articles on prior Super Bowls,  suggestions as how to get last minute tickets, and tips to navigate the heavier than usual traffic that is to be expected.  There is even a countdown to the SB ticker on the front page of the sports section.  TDMN also has coverage from last night's Mavericks and Stars games, an article on TCU's football recruiting, an update on the off season moves of the Texas Rangers, and a poll that shows that Cowboy fans are still in favor of owner Jerry Jones.  By and large, TDMN focuses on the four major North American sports of football, hockey, baseball, and basketball.  Its links are to the Cowboys, Mavericks, Rangers, Stars, high schools, colleges, and the Super Bowl.

The Liverpool Post focuses very heavily on football(soccer). Liverpool's local team, The Tranmere Rovers, is covered extensively.  There is a link to the Rover articles, but there is also a Rovers column with five article links right on the front page of the website.  The Rovers appear to be the sports lifeline for Liverpool sports fans.  Horse racing is also a primary sports news focal point.  There are a handful of horse racing article links right on the front page.  There is also Australian Open coverage as Englishman Andy Murray put forth a disappointing performance versus Novak Djokavic in the final this morning.  Also on the website is some minimal coverage on rugby, golf and boxing.

There are also differences in the types of advertisements on the respective pages.  The Dallas Morning News has a big banner promoting Doubleday Book Club.  Its advertisements include ones for iPhone, Walmart and Cialis.  The Liverpool Post hits the reader with pop ups when links are clicked on.  There is a pop up ad for a bar and one for cruise deals.  The ads on the sports homepage are for a camera and one for a sports gambling website.

In doing this comparison, I was a little surprised at how similar the sports pages are setup wise.  I was able to navigate the Liverpool Post just as easily as I did TDMN or any other sports newspaper site i have used.  I was even more surprised at how different the content is.  The sports coverage in England are only covered sparingly in Dallas and vice versa.  It is almost as though the word "sports" in the United States has a completely different meaning in the two countries other than the competitive aspect.



England's own Andy Murray was no match for Novak Djokavic in the finals of the Australian Open this morning, losing in straight sets



TCU, which will join the Big East in 2012, has become a national powerhouse in college football

I follow some of the sports covered in Liverpool.  In fact, I stayed up till 6 am EST watching the Australian Open Final this morning so it was cool to see it covered in such depth on the Post's site.  When I was watching it through the night on ESPN2, I felt as though I was the only one who knew it was going on.  It was surreal to find out how big it was to millions of people 'across the pond'.

Farewell Dandy Don

The pro football world lost someone who played a big part in what it has become today.  Former Dallas Cowboys quarterback and Monday Night Football color commentator Don Meredith passed away last month, leaving behind him a legacy of greatness in the broadcast booth.

Before the MNF trio of Keith Jackson, Howard Cosell, and Don Meredith hit the air in 1970, football broadcasts could be described as being very plain and matter of fact.  Announcers called what they saw on the field and added very little else in the way of color or insight.  Jackson, Cosell, and Meredith changed all of this.  Meredith, in particular, became a household name.  This is because 'Dandy Don' put the game in terms where fans could get a feel for what to look for in the game.  He connected the game of football to the fans who loved it.  And the fans loved him for it.  Meredith also incorporated humor into the broadcasts.  His back and forth dialogues with Cosell were both funny and entertaining.  Football was no longer just a game.  IT WAS ENTERTAINMENT.

Don Meredith spent 9 years (1970-1973, and 1977-1984) on MNF and was in the booth for a couple of Super Bowls.  This only tells a small part of the story though. Meredith's effects on the broadcasting of pro football have lasted far longer than did his years in the booth.  Sure we still see the 3 man colorful group of Monday Night Football announcers(currently Tirico, Jaworski, and Gruden) much like we did with Jackson, Cosell, and Meredith; but Meredith carved out an entire niche for the broadcasting structure that we see today.  NFL TV and radio broadcast teams are almost sure to have an ex NFL player amongst them.  The likes of Aikman, Jaworski, Simms, Millen, Johnston, and Collinsworth grace the booths every time we turn on our televisions to watch an NFL game.  Just like we did with Meredith, we have these colorful ex NFL players connecting the games on the field to us fans sitting in our living rooms.

Pictured here with Cosell and Jackson, Don Meredith became a household name

This practice has become so commonplace in NFL broadcasts that Meredith received the Pete Rozelle Award, given every year to someone who has contributed greatly to the game of pro football, in 2007.  When we turn on our TVs this afternoon for the conference championship games or for the Super Bowl in two weeks, we can still look to Meredith for the way that those games will be brought to us. Dandy Don blazed the trail for what we will be watching, and what we will almost certainly find to be entertaining.

Put Him In Front Of A Camera! Maybe?

Why do I call myself a sports nut?

When describing the level to which sports fans follow sports, there are three categories that fans fall into:  (1) sports observers, (2) sports enthusiasts, and (3) sports nuts.  Sports observers are fans who have a working knowledge of what the home teams are doing and what the national sports headlines read.  They can sound competent in most water cooler conversations and may even enter the annual march madness pool.  Sports enthusiasts are those fans who passionately root for their teams and closely follow the goings on in the sporting world.  The sports enthusiast's mood on a given day can quite often be dictated by how his or her team fared the night before.  And then there is the warped world of the sports nut. A sports nut is someone who's life is centered around sports.  Every non-sports conversation or action is nothing more than the necessary evil before the next game or the 20th visit of that day to Espn.com

I can comfortably say that I am a sports nut.  Just to give you an idea: I watch about 40 hours of live sports per week during football season.  That number jumps to at least 50 hours per week during basketball season.  I would watch more if there were more games on!  Notice that i said 'live sports'.  Those numbers do not include the countless hours that I spend on watching sports news and preview shows as well as at least 100 visits per week to ESPN.com.  I follow baseball, basketball, and football the most closely.  I also follow golf/tennis majors, MMA, pro wrestling, the Olympics, World Cup, Bodybuilding, Stanley Cup playoffs, and boxing.  Starting to get the picture?

How did I get to this point?

I began following sports at age 5.  Growing up in Cleveland Hts., OH, I quickly took to Ohio State, the Browns, Cavs, and Indians.  I spent my childhood idolizing Cory Snyder, Mark Price, and Bernie Kosar.  After the Browns lost in the '87 AFC championship game(just after my sixth birthday) as a result of John Elway's well chronicled 98 yard drive/Richie Karlos' barefooted fg in OT, I wrote Bernie Kosar a long letter in an attempt to cheer him up.  With class, Bernie sent me an autographed picture in return!

This passion of mine for the godsend that we call sports only grew with age.  As I have always been very tall, I naturally took took to being a horse jockey.  I'm just kidding, obviously I played basketball.  I played for St. Ignatius High School in Cleveland.  Our team was largely successful, even making it to the Division 1 state final in 1998.  Unfortunately, my injuries began to mount.  I was forced to gut through my entire junior and senior years with severe foot and shoulder problems that later required multiple surgeries.  I graduated in 1999 from St. Ignatius.

  As I was being recruited by a number of schools from Divisions 1, 2, and 3, although none offering scholarships, I decided to play basketball in college.  I ultimately chose John Carroll University, a small jesuit college in Cleveland, because it afforded me the chance to stay close to home. I still played a year of varsity basketball and was one of three freshman on the team that year to letter, which was no small feat since a freshman had not done so in the four years prior to that.  Playing through the injuries caused me to lose the love for playing that I once had though.  I decided not to play for my last three years at John Carroll.  I graduated in 2003 with a degree in Business Management. 
While my playing days have been over for some time now, my love for sports has only grown.  Not a day goes by where I do not indulge myself in watching sports for multiple hours.  I have made many cross country pilgrimages for sporting events, many times by myself when I could not find someone to go with me. I have also become very well versed and drilled in physical fitness and nutrition.  I body build although not competitively. I have not yet pursued a career in sports as I have worked for my father's school fundraising company for the last 7 years.

Me getting ready to lift weights...while watching sports of course!

So why have I not pursued a career in sports?

Up until the last year or so I always thought that having a job as an ESPN anchor or as a basketball/football television color commentator would be a dream come true.  After all, I would get to do two of my favorite things: watch sports and do public speaking.  I felt this way until I really started to take a closer look at things.  Except for a 2 month busy period in mid August-mid October, I work 35 hours a week.  This has afforded me the ability to settle into my life as a sports nut.  I have put together my own extensive gym in my apartment complete with 2 huge plasma screen hd tvs.  A typical weekday for me includes my working from 8-3(while listening to sports talk on satellite radio in my car most of the day), napping from 3-5, working out while watching Around the Horn/PTI/Sportscenter, and then watching sports from 7pm-1am.  My weekends are much simpler as I just watch sports from 12pm-1am(later if Hawaii plays a home basketball game at 12am est.).  I have being a sports nut down to a science.  So would a 50+ hour a week job (not including travel) with ESPN, really help my being a sports fan?  Sure I would get to meet a bunch of players and coaches as well as be much closer to the action, but I shudder to think how many thousands of key games I would not be able to watch.

 The other issue that stands in between me and many jobs is my shoulder.  I mentioned above that I had multiple sports injuries.  One of them was a severe shoulder injury.  I am on the verge of my third left shoulder surgery in two years and even standing for more than an hour causes me a tremendous amount of pain.  This has been the case since high school and is not something I anticipate improving significantly. With my current job, I am in a car most of the day and generally do not have to stand for much more than forty-five minutes at a time.  My shoulder still flares up, but the surgeries have at least done enough to make it tolerable on most days.  However, there is no chance that i could work long hours or a job that would require me to be on my feet much.





ESPN's Bill Simmons

This does not mean that I could not see a career in sports.  I just have to change my path of thinking!  After giving it more consideration, I decided that a career in sports journalism would be amazing for someone such as myself.  However, I could not help but notice in the textbook that a typical journalist puts in fifteen hours days.  For me, this career path would only be possible if I am able to do a great deal of it from the comforts of my own home.  This is something that I would be able to handle physically and, at the same time, I would be able to watch sports as much as I have been. I know that these jobs are hard to come by, but to have a job like that of Bill Simmons of ESPN.com is what I aspire to have.  My hope is that I am able to learn how to come across and get such a job.  Because it is a job where I can still watch and follow all of my sports, but where I can also write about my first love... SPORTS!