Just a Game

When I turned fourteen my mother took me to the local Hill Sports sporting goods store.  She told me that I could pick out whatever baseball mitt I wanted, and my eyes immediately shot to the top shelf where all of the most expensive baseball mitts were on display.  I had been researching the best leathers, styles, and sizes of mitts for a few weeks and I knew the exact one I wanted the moment my gaze landed on it. The Nokona AMG 1150, a.k.a. " The  American Glove".  Not daring to take any of the tags off for a few weeks, I began to break in the mitt exactly how I wanted it to work.  I drilled a hole into an old baseball and stuck the longest screwdriver my dad had right into it so that I could start pounding and softening the leather.  I had the nicest glove leather conditioner I could find and spread the sweet smelling ointment over ever bit of the surface of the glove.  Next, I would place two baseballs in a specific spot and let it sit all night. ...

Amber Lee once posted on Bleacherreport.com : "There are more women holding prominent positions in the sports media today than ever before. Some have already found unprecedented success, while many others are stars on the rise who are just getting started." If anyone is up to date on current sports writing or reporting, then they will surely be able to recall hearing from a woman in these venues.  The reason is that it is no longer 1977 .  I feel like the issue of women sports reporters not being treated as equals has been pounded into the ground so deeply, and fertilized by evidence so well that it is finally a flourishing tree.  The first fruit is beginning to ripen and fall.  I disagree with this article that was written by A. Big Country , in which was claimed that the sexism battle for women sports reporters was far from over.  Every case that this guest blogger was referring to didn't happen even after 1990!  Those were old problems.  The...

When dealing with legislation, rules, regulations, policies, laws, bylaws, treaties, agreements, terms, etc. It is easy to get burned out, throw hands in the air, and give up.  It is easy to just go ahead and let someone else who is smarter and better qualified deal with the problem. Many sports fans today feel this way when it comes to athletes and mainstream media's use of social media and the policies surround this vast jungle. Ohio State and Clemson Universities met in the NCAA college football playoffs in December of '16.  There was many factors that caused the great buzz regarding this game, and one factor was the social media battle  that persisted between the two teams before and after the game.  Things were said that many argue should never have been said.  Things that cannot be undone, and that are adding to the already complex lives of those student athletes and their respective teams.  One thing that may have helped in the ev...

Among the most popular people on social media are today's star athletes.  For instance, world famous soccer player, Cristiano Ronaldo, has over 51 million Twitter followers .  That's similar to the entire country of South Korea following him on Twitter!  Needless to say, if Ronaldo wants to get a piece of information to his fans, he can do so with a few strokes of the fingers and he has the world's attention. But what about athletes who do not use social media? Why do they not use it, and how does it effect their personal and professional lives? The truth is, I am not aware of any professional athletes that do not participate in social media.  This is an aspect that has permeated our lives, and for very good reason.  There are very many cases where athletes have ruined their image and/or their teams reputation through the usage of various social media platforms. Here are just a few reasons that professional athletes need to have a (well-monitored)...

The question that one may ask while reading or viewing the tabloids on the recent scandal involving a famous athlete or coach is the same one that this post is titled after.  What is so interesting about the lives, or perhaps the seemingly hidden lives of those that we see running, jumping, and swimming on the biggest stages in their respective realms? For those who study communication, it is common knowledge that social interaction is one of mankind's basic needs .  This is how we develop our own perception of self, especially when we are exposed to what the media and "insiders" of the game portray as perfect.  This is called framing.  When just a piece of an artifact is isolated and magnified to alter the image.  Framing can go both ways, and so can our reasoning for paying attention to the blunders of athletic wonders. Individuals enjoy sifting through the many stories of the decisions and consequences that their favorite athletes.  People l...

The image of a "fan", which is simply an abbreviation of the word "fanatic" , used to look like this picture above.  Becoming more prevalent each year in the world of sports is the mode of fandom termed "Fantasy Leagues".  Any sports fan will know what this is, and maybe even what the new fantasy fan may look like! The truth is that this is what the sports fan is turning into.  But it may come with a cost! That is one reason why so many states are now considering how appropriate it is for fantasy sports team owners to bet on their fantasy teams, or for leagues to require a fee upon entering into a draft.  There are four commonly acknowledged types of fantasy fans that have been identified. Statistical enthusiasts, fan-first, homers, and social players. These will not be described in detail, but it will suffice to say that these are all based on satisfying an individuals various needs through fantasy sports league play. I would ...

The best way to to handle mistakes, in my opinion, is to take full responsibility.  As with many things in life there will be exceptions.  But when it comes to sports, there is a lot of money involved.  Baylor University Athletics earns  over $67 ,  and recently there has been a whole revelation of news and reports revealing multiple sexual assaults committed by Baylor football players.   This has hurt the current image of this university. I have become familiar with William Benoit's  5 strategies to repairing or improving an image.  Personally, as I stated earlier, I think that it is most effective to fess up and take responsibility for whatever it was that was done. But, this will bring in the full load of consequences and many people may still have very hard feelings. This strategy is called "mortification" .   The head coach of the Baylor football team is named Art Briles, and was fired after the information came out concerning...