Sports Bloggers in the Press Box

What do you mean nothing specific...I'm not sure how I could have given a more specific answer to your question, other than to name the Division I school I am speaking of.

 

Ask Len Pasquarelli.

 

Everyone here has made some very good points in regards to bloggers being considered journalists. The only blog that I visit and actually trust got to be the guy who runs la observed.com and the sister blog sports observed.

But NO and I will say it again bloggers do not belong in the press box of a major sports team. I will give the same answer to the smaller city/town papers like in Los Angeles we got the Park LaBrea News, Beverly Press, Culver City News. LA Wave and the Hollywood and LA Independent etc etc. They are supposed to be local/community papers that cover that should stick to what they do best. Providing great sports stories on the high school football team.

 

Lots of radio and TV stations, networks and "personalities" are also lacking in some or all of those things.

You know, you're absolutely right. You'll never, EVER see or hear a "professional journalist" act in such an undignified manner while on the job.

 

Any blogger or community reporter belongs in the press box if they have a legitimate reason for being there. It's not a daily newspaper reporter and television hack box - it's a press box.

 

Where the f**k do you think the word "press" comes from in "press box?"

I have an NFL beat. If I ever get a call from the team's PR people telling me I have to stand in the concourse next season because the PRESS box is full of fan-boy bloggers, I'm gonna quit my job and become a farmer.

Just because you understand HTML and have a website no more makes you a member of the media than dispensing Tylenol to my wife makes me a doctor.

 

Chris_L had a very good thread on this last year. There was/is a group out there trying to establish some guidelines for credentialing bloggers. I hope he chimes in.

 

Why not have some of these bloggers that run sites that get many more hits than some of the papers the journalists represent get?

Some of these bloggers reach far more people than the journalists from smaller markets. Why deny them the chance to get in the box and relay that info to the masses? Especially if more and more people are looking to blogs for info nowadays?

It just seems like the right thing to do.

And no, I don't have a blog.

 

Standards do need to be in place, though.

As a rule, weeklies should NOT be in a college/pro press box simply to be there and write a story. What coverage are they going to provide on a five-day old game different from what you read in 12 other papers? If they proveably, demonstrably [/JDV] can show that they offer a fresh angle, let 'em in -- otherwise, they should not be taking spots from dailies and professionally run Web sites/blogs.

 

Because there are too many of the old guard, like this arsehole below, who figure they have some kind of divine right to a place in the "press box" simply because they work in a place where a press is or may once have been located. Guess that rules out TV and radio guys, eh?

Just because you look pretty on TV and/or sniff jocks in print makes your opinions no more worthy of public consumption than those of a knowledgeable fan who can string three sentences together on a website.

 

Standards, certainly. Doubt anyone would argue that point.

I'm just saying, some blogs have become enormously popular and have readerships that far exceed many of the papers for which people on this site work. And I don't mean that disrespectfully.

There should be a way to include those bloggers. Now, of course, preventing the fan-boy type bloggers that are read only by their frat brothers is warranted.

Personally, I think some of the animosity voiced towards bloggers is really based in a feeling of being threatened. But, it's all good.

 

It also has to do with how the sporting world views these guys. Are bloggers who aren't connected with major media outlets breaking stories? Other than 38 Stitches, er, Pitches. These guys aren't getting scoops and usually aren't viewed at as people who have sources.