As an avid sports fan I watch Sports Center on ESPN every night. It has gotten to the point where the only channel that will be on my TV for weeks at a time will be ESPN, and I often find myself watching SC 3, 4, sometimes 5 times in the same day. I pride myself, among other things, on my sports knowledge and in a crazy world the world of sports is often a great escape for me.
I decided to take this course because of my great love for sports and figured a class on sports, and the many amazing women in sports could not be half bad. Early in the semester I was relieved that, not unlike my predictions, this class is always interesting and very often thought provoking.
One of the reoccurring thoughts that have crossed my mind since being in this class is how little female sports are shown on ESPN and Sports Center. To be honest, it is pretty obvious why this happens. There are a couple reasons I can see. The main one being ESPN is mainly marketed toward men; just like different channels such as The Hallmark Channel and Oxygen are marketed toward women. Another being that greater demand is to see highlights from the main US sports leagues (NFL, MLB, NBA) than women’s sports leagues (WNBA) or even lesser supported men’s leagues (NHL, MLS).
This all being said, the point of this blog is to give big ups to ESPN and Sports Center for spending a good amount of time highlighting the struggling WNBA during the Playoffs, and mainly the Championship Series which ended Friday. I felt that Sports Center really got involved in giving the WNBA its due respect with a proper amount of time highlighting each game, the players, the coaches, the fans, and the league in general. Finally, they decided to try and get the average SC watching sports fan involved in women’s sport. It was well overdue and they did a great job with it.
Danny Welsh
Kin 338I S06
1 comment:
The person that posted this blog sounds almost exactly like me. I too pride myself on sports and anything related to them. I too find myself watching sportscenter far too often. I took the class for many of the same reasons.
BUT I am going to disagree to an extent. I agree that sportscenter is directed toward the male population and that they focus on the big three sports of MLB, NFL, and NBA and I agree that ESPN did make a small attempt to show some of the WNBA but really not much was accomplished... at least not for me and my friends. I still probably cannot name any WNBA teams and can only name one or two players. In my opinion there are a couple of main reasons for this.
First of all they did not show anything at all about the WNBA until the playoffs. There was never once coverage of a regular season game unless some major record or accomplishment occurred.
Secondly all they did was show a brief highlight of the playoff games. I personally cannot remember a single time watching a show like PTI where Wilbon was giving his insight into the WNBA playoffs or any analysis into the game whatsoever. It was simply a highlight.
Lastly, even the sports that are mentioned like the NHL or MLS or even NASCAR for that matter,sports not considered the major sports in America, still get much more attention than almost any women sport with the exception of tennis.
Chris Wolf
Tu/Th 9:30
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