A big game is a big game no matter what media shows up, if any [Hot Type, January 16]. People don’t need sportswriters to tell them they have a rivalry with another high school, for example. Athletes and fans create rivalries, not media.
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Anyway, sportswriters haven’t consistently created heroes since Grantland Rice. And when announcers say, “They’ll talk about this forever,” generally it’s because they have a visceral sense that people will talk about it forever, not because they’re forcing something down the fans’ throats. The 1985 Bears are still beloved in Chicago not because the media tell people to still love them, but because fans genuinely remember them fondly.
I would agree that there are sportswriters who feel like athletes owe them their livings, and I think those sportswriters are wrongheaded. But most sportswriters I know merely want to do their jobs and at least get treated as a human being instead of some locker-room vermin. I suspect some bitterness from sportswriters has to do with the constant travel, inability to form a social life, and long hours as much as anything an athlete does.
The Times acknowledges media-voted award winners and spills barrels of ink on these topics, acknowledging to me that the editors there realize there’s genuine reader interest in them.
Bob Cook
