Storyline: You may have missed two recent sports stories of note: limited media coverage of women’s sports and fan safety in Major League Baseball.
I’m always on the lookout for sports stories that fly under the radar, that is, stories reported by the media but often missed by sports fans. Two stories of that kind stood out recently. Both are political and both are worthy of attention.
The first story was reported by Dave Zirin, sports editor of The National. It’s about women’s sports, especially noteworthy these days because of the Women’s World Cup.
Five days ago Zirin tweeted (@EdgeofSports): “Hearing that 2% of SportsCenter devoted to women’s sports when women are over 40% of D-1 athletes.” Earlier that day he tweeted: “Women’s sports TV coverage, less than it was 10 yrs. ago, 10 yrs ago it was less than it was 20 yrs. ago. And 20 yrs. ago? Less than 30 yrs. ago.”
It seems to me that the TV media can and should (emphasis on should) do better than that.
Courtesy: The Washington Post
What I find interesting (make that “sad”) about this story is that Hope Solo is getting plenty of press and TV coverage regarding her family violence litigation case. There are some, including Christine Brennan, who believes she should have been shelved by U.S. Soccer, restricted from playing in the World Cup.
It’s another example of how personalized stories can trump social issues in sports. It’s not that personal stories are unimportant and shouldn’t be covered. It’s just that the media–not just players or a sport–can be the story when it comes to social issues. When that happens the media needs to do a better job of turning the lens on itself. That doesn’t always happen.
Tonya Carpenter (Courtesy: newslocker.com)
The other story is about Major League Baseball. The source is USA Today’s Bob Nightengale. The issue is fan safety. That’s right: safety of the fans, not players. The headline read: MLB must increase netting at the ballparks. The article was stimulated, in part, by the horrendous situation at Fenway when fan Tonya Carpenter was hit by a flying baseball bat.
But the story is also related to Nightengale’s personal experience. Attending a Mariner’s game in Seattle, he wrote: “The only obstruction between the batter and my face was the hitter standing in the on-deck circle.”
Nightengale went on to report that over 50k balls enter MLB ballpark seats every season, and–get this–over 1.7k fans are injured EVERY YEAR by batted balls that fly into the stands.
ESPN’s Outside the Lines did a very good job of covering this story last week. It’s a real issue. And what I didn’t understand–until watching the show–is that MLB gets a free pass when it comes to injuries coming from batted balls and lost bats. If hurt, you pay. And it’s not as simple as “always paying attention” while attending games. Two guests talked about injuries that happened so quickly that fast response wouldn’t have been enough.
Nobody — I mean nobody — should ever fear injury when attending a MLB game.
Courtesy: U.S. News & World Report
