Media scrutiny is always greatest when the players earn millions and teams profit billions; I get that. The glare from the cameras and the microphones can be suffering. I do not envy that with today’s players. Would I like their salaries? You bet! Who wouldn’t? But, sometimes I wonder if the media just camps out at said team’s headquarters and finds the juicy news a little too often.
I am not a traditional sports journalist. I didn’t get my training in journalism the traditional way. I kind of learned it through (don’t tell anyone about this) blogging. I urge you to keep quiet about this. I can’t have people believe that I was a blogger.
I chuckled Saturday night when a member of the Weatherford Bullets‘ coaching staff referred to me as media. Who do they think I am, Mac Engel? Come on; I’m just a guy who runs a website. I have accumulated enough “points” to count as media, maybe.
I have had the opportunity to receive press credentails to football games including the Armed Forces Bowl and the dirt races at Texas Motor Speedway. Heck, they even let me go to the TMS annual media day. They’ll let anyone in those things, huh!
The best I can tell, most journalists try to find something good to write. They are looking for stories. We (me) are always looking for stories to post here at dfwfootball.net. Whether it is a game write-up or scores, we (me) are always trying to find something to keep the site fresh.
The big guys, you know, the Star-Telegram and the Dallas Morning News, hire guys, maybe more, to do nothing to but write about the Dallas Cowboys. Of course, that is what people want, Cowboys coverage 24-7. Not me.
I get tired of hearing these same old gossip-like stories from Valley Ranch. I mean, all you hear is, “Did Jerry say that, or did he really mean this? What does it mean that Coach Wade can’t talk to the media? Should Jerry still be the GM?” Blah, blah, blah!
Have you heard the latest of the non-sense coming out of Valley Ranch? I don’t know how you couldn’t have unless you haven’t listened to sports news in the past week. I listen to Galloway and Company on my way home, and that seems to be all they have talked about this week.
Apparently, Terrance Newman hates Tony Romo. Did you know that? Maybe he will hate Jason Whitten next. With any luck, maybe Newman will be the new Terrell Owens. Fireworks make for better news, right.
No less than four articles have been written about this. It seems that Newman questioned Romo’s focus in regards to his relationship with girlfriend Jessica Simpson in an interview with WFAA, channel 8. Man, that Dale Hansen can stir up anything! But wait, our good friend Mac Engel of the Star-Telegram tells us that his comments were “misconstrued.”
Just in case we don’t believe him, Mac’s wife Jennifer reminds us that There’s no trouble brewing between Terrance Newman and Tony Romo. After closer inspection, and there’s always a closer inspection, it seems that the two played golf together Monday and that Newman is behind Romo 100%. That’s good news, now can we just move on!
Now that that is cleared up, let’s move on with the point.
Sometimes, I think we go overboard on our coverage of the NFL, particularly the Cowboys. What, you say you want Cowboys 24-7? Why? Do you really want to read/hear those little off-handed remarks and rumors? Then Vince McMahon was on to something with the XFL.
Big city newspapers are struggling to be profitable, but they are willing to spend money to employ several people to show up at the team headquarters and search for some juicy story for their adoring public. Really?
What if the public don’t want to read about those juicy stories? What if they would rather read well written stories about the team and evaluations of off-season moves? Do we really need to send six to eight members of the media to the Cowboys headquarters at Valley Ranch every day?
I am not saying that we don’t need to cover the Cowboys, but maybe we suffer from “Cowboys Overexposure.” As big city papers seem to struggle, is it possible that smaller papers might be doing just fine, thank you very much.
There is nothing else sports-related to report on. Is there? Of course not. Well, I have counted almost 20 football teams in the Dallas-Fort Worth area that play in independent minor league and semi-pro leagues. Actually, I know I am leaving a few off.
The interesting thing is that it seems that maybe people still want local news. Websites like Topix.com and the local PegasusNews.com have customized portals for readers to find news about their own neighborhood.
There is only so much I can hear about the Cowboys. The Cowboys need to prove themselves on the field, not on the six-o-clock news. I don’t need a “sound-bite.” I need to see them win on the field. It is my wish that the media would simply “shut up and let them (the Cowboys) play.”
Besides, their is a whole bunch of other teams that are playing right now.
