Regardless of profession, don’t you get annoyed with certain labels that come with people associated with the profession? Or do you simply accept them as par for the course?
Though I happily escaped the newspaper industry slightly less than a year ago for a career as a route sales representative for Alhambra Water, I still love writing enough to stay involved. Throughout my 18-year career in sports journalism, I had the opportunity to cover every level of sport from Little League to the NFL. The pay was poverty level but I couldn’t imagine myself being happier doing anything else -- or so I thought for many years.
Due to a combination of industry changes I was not on board with coupled with interference of family time, three years ago, I began my exit plan. I trained to get my Class B driver’s license. For two years, I worked part-time as a bus driver for the Springs of Napa and Beau Wine Tours. The former is a retirement home in Napa, CA, while the latter is a luxury transportation company in Sonoma, CA. The extra money was nice but long term multiple employment coupled with family life was going to have diminishing returns.
Fortunately, I have just one job right now. Though the job is physical and up to 55 hours per week, it is Monday-Friday, no weekends, no evenings, no holidays -- and much better pay.
I still keep my hand in the pot with writing through this blog and by helping my former employer on Friday nights during football season.
There’s one statement I heard on more than a few occasions, be it in newsrooms or just in general, that became a pet peeve. Within some newspapers, radio or TV stations, sports has been mockingly called the “toy department.” For starters, I think anyone who has ever used such a description is ignorant at best and an elitist at worst. True, sports journalists do not concern ourselves with serious problems, in the grand scheme of things, and nor do we solve all of the world’s problems.
Sometimes, I hear the statement “Gee whiz, you get to go to games for free.” At which point, I say, “Teachers get into their classrooms for free,” and “Doctors go into their operating room for free.” So, yes, sports journalists should get into games free.
What they cover matters just as much as what anyone else in the newsroom covers. There are people who “only” read newspapers because of sports. There are also people who “only” watch a newscast because of sports because sports coverage has grown in importance as sports have grown in wealth, power and influence.
If you want to say that sports journalists do not concern themselves with “serious” topics, I’ll buy that but the notion of “the toy department” is way off base.
In fact, I would even beg to differ that sports reporters do not deal with serious topics. Granted, it might not be every day, but look at matters such as Major League Baseball players using performance enhancing drugs or any random NFL player running afoul with the law.
Sports journalists are like any other reporters, in that they must find a story rather than just rely on press releases or information given by the team or school they cover. Their stories also involve verifying facts and that part of the job can be a little murky just like a news reporter encounters in their beat.
My biggest issue with anyone calling sports “the toy department,” is, well, there are many, but I’ll start with the fact that they face more intense deadline pressure than news reporters because sporting events take place much close to deadlines (i.e. covering Friday Night high school football). In the process, they are also expected to uphold the same journalistic standards as any other news reporter in the process.
They also work more nights and weekends and sacrifice more time away from their families than anyone in the newsroom, if not the entire newspaper. I do not address this topic looking for anyone to play a violin. Lord knows, no one makes them do what they do.
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