Over the last several years, I’ve imposed a sports media
blackout upon myself as a means of reducing unwanted noise in my life. I realized that an entertainment offering
like sports radio is mostly contrived contrarianism to get listeners riled up
and emotional, and therefore tuning in day after day to see where it goes. Sometimes it’s funny and sometimes it’s
infuriating. I started to find the whole
thing to be stupid about 5 years ago so I stopped listening.
And in the midst of Deflate-Gate, I have not fallen off the sports
media blackout wagon. However, it’s hard
not to have some of the idiocy around this alleged conspiracy leak through my
defenses. I think most rational people
would look at this situation and say that if this weren’t the Patriots, it
would be no big deal. Some misguided equipment
manager would get fired and the story would be over. But it is the Patriots, and therefore it’s a
conspiracy to cheat. In fact, it’s more
than a conspiracy – it’s a comprehensive culture of cheating that pervades Bill
Belichik’s entire coaching career. Or so
the sports media would have you believe.
Yes, I’m blaming the sports media (and some other crybabies
around the NFL who fuel it). Of course,
when one blames the sports media for such things, their way of defusing it is
to derisively say, “Yes, blame the media!
It’s all our fault!” And then
they move on to doing and saying the same stupid things they’ve been
saying. Let’s be clear about a few
things going on in the sports media tribe.
They don’t care about the games.
They may say they do, but they don’t.
They care about stories. And more
important, they care about being the one to tell the story. It’s all about them. It’s pure self-interest. Every one of those writers or talking heads
in a press conference wants to be the one to write the big story and to be the
one that asked the question that breaks a story wide open. That’s why we see this lynch mob mentality at
recent press conferences with Belichik and Tom Brady. Question after question on the same topic
being asked in the hope that he or she will be the one that makes them crack
under the pressure. If that happens,
then that media personality becomes part of the story and his star begins to
rise. It’s got nothing to do with the
games or the sport.
I was clued into this mindset several years ago when
listening to WEEI in Boston, and Boston Herald sportswriter Steve Buckley was
on the air. I can’t recall exactly what
may have been transpiring in the Boston sports world at the time, but it was
probably something to do with the Red Sox and Yankees. In this instance, Buckley was startlingly
honest and admitted that he roots for stories.
He was rooting for a particular story to happen or be true at that time,
and I recall thinking that this was exactly the problem with the sports media
in Boston. They don’t care about the
same things that fans care about. Fans
are interested in how the team is playing, what the team’s results are, what
the team and its players need to do to be better, etc. It doesn’t mean that fans aren’t critical of
coaches and players, but it’s more focused on performance. The sports media just care about stories,
even if it’s gossip, because it’s better for them. I wasn’t a fan of Buckley prior to this, and
that hasn’t changed, but I’ll laud him for his honesty.
New England sports fans don’t want to hear about
Deflate-Gate any longer and that’s not because we’re all a bunch of homers who
simply side with the Patriots no matter the controversy. Instead, it’s because we know that this story
is getting pushed by a group of individuals whose self-serving motivation is
blatantly obvious. If you can’t break
the story, make yourself a part of the story somehow.
If you want to get yourself out of the noise, here’s my
advice. Stop listening to sports
radio. Stop watching SportsCenter or any
other studio shows. Just watch the games
and enjoy. The noise of the sports media
only sucks the enjoyment out of something that’s supposed to be fun.
