What's the most underserved sport in terms of coverage?

[ChadFelter]

Seems like there's a growing investment in covering women's basketball lately. I see more and more reporters out at WNBA games, there's a new Just Women's Sports site that is really impressive, ESPN is growing its ESPNW page and The Athletic has one of its best writers exclusively covering WNBA and women's college hoops. I'm sure Gannett and others will follow soon because they're always a couple steps behind.

What's the next niche out there that isn't being covered enough right now? Is it women's soccer? Maybe sports betting?

I've always thought HBCU football and basketball probably have way more interest than the coverage suggests.

Same with some of the less popular college sports: baseball, softball, hockey, wrestling.

 

[bumpy mcgee]

eSports is becoming very big in my neck of the woods with area high schools and colleges starting teams, one area school even hosted a 'signing day,' for a kid and boasted about a recent grad being named head coach at an area college.
also, sports like track and field and swimming in Olympic years always seem to garner higher than usual interest leading up to and shortly after Olympiads

 

[rubenmateo]

Is ESPNW growing its section? I thought Graham Hays was a big loss for them, granted that is now a while ago, but I haven't noticed much additional coverage aside from the WNBA.

I'm interested to see what happens with women's sports coverage. There have been attempts to grow that media presence in the past that failed. But the backing behind Just Women's Sports and TOGETHXR and the talent at The Athletic gives this go-round more potential. Are there too many mouths to feed, though? If a large amount of mainstream outlets start giving women's sports anything close to equal attention — which would be a huge uptick from the single-digit percentage compared to men on SportsCenter or website real estate — will there be enough demand for a significant amount of outlets to be successful?

It can't just be the WNBA and the USWNT. After this summer, there's no major global women's soccer tournament until 2023. No Summer Olympics until 2024. Simone Biles will be retired. Serena's time is ticking. Women's golf is still not back to the relevance of the Sorenstam days, though the Korda sisters could change that.

Which brings me to niche sports you mentioned. There are large communities that follow gymnastics beyond Biles (including NCAA) and NCAA women's indoor volleyball. Wrestling is another that has a big following, and if there's an effort to grow the women's side of that sport, could lead to something. Figure skating, though the lack of a defining American woman hurts and that fan base skews older to those who got swept up in the 1990s popularity.

 

[Col. Nathan R. Jessup]

Wrestling.

Just go to one NCAA match, particularly in the Big Ten, and the fans and overall atmosphere would have you thinking you're at the Super Bowl, when in actuality there's like 10 credentialed media in the whole place and half of them are from the college paper.

 

[JimmyHoward33]

On womens sports, there seems to be this notion on social that the lack of interest is the media's fault. If the meteo paper and national outlets covered the semi-pro leagues, fans would take them seriously. The paper counters with we can't devote resources to something no readers care about.

What's the truth in this chicken and egg scenario?

 

[Mngwa]

On womens sports, there seems to be this notion on social that the lack of interest is the media's fault. If the meteo paper and national outlets covered the semi-pro leagues, fans would take them seriously. The paper counters with we can't devote resources to something no readers care about.

What's the truth in this chicken and egg scenario?

I've puzzled this over for decades, and I'm not sure what the answer is

 

[Tighthead]

I find college softball highly watchable. I know it's on some networks like Big 10 but I wonder if the playoffs could get broader traction. I guess college baseball is a bit of a niche sport in its own right.

Major League Rugby has been a modest success for a new league/fringe sport/minor league. It's been pretty stable, only one or two franchises where things went sideways. Most start up leagues are done within two years.

 

[DanOregon]

Beer pong and cornhole.

 

[Songbird]

I've puzzled this over for decades, and I'm not sure what the answer is

The answer is you don't have to necessarily cover it hard for print but you can cover it (it being whatever the sport is) with a few graphs and/or standalone art in print with links to the website to drive that traffic. You don't have to go cover WNBA or women's falafel tossing or the Black and Brown Integrated Wokeism Olympics (Tuscaloosa is the host city in '24) but it's not that hard to devote SOME space in print to generate/maintain interest and then find much more space on your website.

It's not forking rocket science.

 

[Octave]

I have no use for it, but mixed martial arts. When I was last in a department the regular feedback was that readers wanted more of it.
And I've seen analytics for combat sports and that reporter was dusting everyone else while writing maybe twice a week.
You want to stay in business or keep producing boutique journalism? That's a decision to make.

 

[ChadFelter]

The answer is you don't have to necessarily cover it hard for print but you can cover it (it being whatever the sport is) with a few graphs and/or standalone art in print with links to the website to drive that traffic. You don't have to go cover WNBA or women's falafel tossing or the Black and Brown Integrated Wokeism Olympics (Tuscaloosa is the host city in '24) but it's not that hard to devote SOME space in print to generate/maintain interest and then find much more space on your website.

It's not forking rocket science.

This is a forward-looking question, so if your answer includes the word "print" you shouldn't be on this thread.

 

[ChadFelter]

Wrestling.

Just go to one NCAA match, particularly in the Big Ten, and the fans and overall atmosphere would have you thinking you're at the Super Bowl, when in actuality there's like 10 credentialed media in the whole place and half of them are from the college paper.

Having lived/worked in Iowa for the last decade, I can say that your description of the atmosphere is spot on. I've even been to high school matches where the atmosphere rivals a good college basketball atmosphere.