M
y son thinks I’m comatose when I watch football on TV and not much better when in the stadium.
There are a number of explanations for why he or any other normal, rabid, foaming-at-the-mouth, chew-the-ref, cuss-the-coach football nut case would think something was wrong with drab-don’t-get-excited-and-yell me.
Mostly, it’s because during my working years (50-plus), watching football was for mostly professional reasons. Yeah, I know, scouting coaches can get excited during a gridiron match, even if they have no allegiance to either team on the field.
Well, let me tell you it’s absolutely taboo, an actual you-can-go-to-reporter’s-hell screw-up to become “emotionally involved in the game.”
That means the show-no-favorites dictum is in effect all during game week, but more especially on game night or day for a reporter.
Oh, sure, community newspaper folks might get just a bit more involved and less “formal” in watching the hometown boys lay it on the line on Friday night. But, all in all, (Grantland) Rice’s Rules of Reporting Games compels us to be as fair as possible, even though the “opposing” newspaper covering their town trying to beat your town is totally biased for their home-base school.
If I’m a human with a trace of a pulse, you say, I’ll be rooting for one team or another. Yeah, you’re right, but I didn’t say I was never rooting for someone to win the game.
Anyone can write, “Smith ran off right tackle for 11 yards and a touchdown.” That means a sportswriter has to be able, just like a reporter covering a presidential debate, to describe moves and strategies in a way that will be easily understood by each and every reader. Professional pride enters so that hopefully you are capable of describing it in a clear and concise way, yet not have your reader drop off into slumber land while reading.
It has always been easier for me to describe some “regular” news event more rationally than the gridiron’s glory-grabbing gallops (see, told ya).
A news reporter can apply a more analytical mind to a sequence of events in, say, a court case or even a car wreck than they can a “rational” analysis of the home teams’ game-winning touchdown drive.
Plus, sportswriters can “get away” with just a touch of “homer-ism” while covering a Friday night football foray more easily than he can a conspiratorial city council conflab.
I always fought like crazy to keep from editorializing in sports news stories. Somehow, it’s easier to do that in a straight news story than in a football game story, particularly if it’s a small town and you’re the editor-publisher of a community newspaper and a playoff spot is riding on the outcome of this Friday night fracas.
But, when you put on the sportswriter cap instead of the judicious city council critic senior graduate mortar board, those loyal subscribers hunger for a little homer-izing. Certainly, the readers want you to be as “juicy” as possible so as to grease their gossipy gifts of gab for back fence or coffee shop summations of the proceedings, but readers expect some ammo for rationalizing the crucifixion of the quarterback or, even more desirable, the home coach.
However, if you’re going to be true to the tenets of unbiased journalism, you have to be able to dissect a sports play so that you sound like a knowledgeable Joe Buck instead of a haranguing Howard Cosell.
So, that’s why I’m still and quiet while watching football. You understand don’t you, Son?
Willis Webb is a retired community newspaper editor-publisher of more than 50 years experience.
wwebb@att.net
