In the Sunday 7/21/02 edition, it focuses on. amongst others, Rich Eisen, John Madden and Tim McCarver
Man's Best Friend by Peter De Jonge (reg req. etc)
Full Version: NYT Magazine Article on Sportscasters
Update: I skimmed the article when I posted the link, now have read it in its entirety. This passage is rather thought-provoking:
For this community, sports is, more than it has ever been, a refuge from the real world. When I asked Eisen if he could imagine a major sports broadcaster today taking a stand as heroically unpopular as Cosell's support of Muhammad Ali, he said: "The days of the heavyweight champion as civil rights leader are long gone. You think you'd see Ali rolling around on the floor of an ESPN Zone? I don't think so. The days of a tennis champion as a gender rights leader are over. Anybody expecting that now will be sadly disappointed.
and also:
And as was obvious to Disney when it bought ESPN in 1995 and to anyone who has been to Bristol and has seen the Pentagonian girth of its headquarters, hard-core sports fans are not a fringe cult. With the odd allowance for extreme mathematical or artistic ability and eccentric parenting, they include pretty much every heterosexual male in America
I hope that even as I type this message the editors of Outsports, THE credible voice of gay sports fans in America, are composing a "beg to differ" response!
[ July 21, 2002: Message edited by: Wurm ]
For this community, sports is, more than it has ever been, a refuge from the real world. When I asked Eisen if he could imagine a major sports broadcaster today taking a stand as heroically unpopular as Cosell's support of Muhammad Ali, he said: "The days of the heavyweight champion as civil rights leader are long gone. You think you'd see Ali rolling around on the floor of an ESPN Zone? I don't think so. The days of a tennis champion as a gender rights leader are over. Anybody expecting that now will be sadly disappointed.
and also:
And as was obvious to Disney when it bought ESPN in 1995 and to anyone who has been to Bristol and has seen the Pentagonian girth of its headquarters, hard-core sports fans are not a fringe cult. With the odd allowance for extreme mathematical or artistic ability and eccentric parenting, they include pretty much every heterosexual male in America
I hope that even as I type this message the editors of Outsports, THE credible voice of gay sports fans in America, are composing a "beg to differ" response!
[ July 21, 2002: Message edited by: Wurm ]
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