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TechnographUnwritten code of college athletics
By The Daily Texan, U-Wire
Posted: 5/12/08 Section: Opinion Columns
Either the media are at the feet of college athletics or college athletics are at journalists' throats. There's no in-between.
Last month, The Daily Texan reported on its blog that the Austin Police Department suspended an assault with injury investigation in which Longhorns backup quarterback John Chiles was a suspect. When the Texan originally reported that APD confirmed Chiles as a suspect, assistant athletics director John Bianco wrote several threatening e-mails to Daily Texan sports editor and journalism senior Ricky Treon, calling him unprofessional and his reporting "untruthful." Bianco warned that other news agencies (and potential employers) "realize how you do business now," which "will hurt you in the long run." He also said that if the Texan's editors didn't pull the post off the blog, "John Chiles would understandably have an issue with the entire paper," which would be "unfortunate for the Texan's long-term working relationship with him."
Considering our football players' history with arrests - close to 10 in the last year, for charges ranging from possession of marijuana to having an unlicensed gun to automobile burglary to probation violation - public concern about Longhorn athletes' conduct is high, and the Texan has a duty to hold players accountable.
In a similar situation last September, Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy launched a heated tirade on Jenni Carlson, a sports columnist for The Oklahoman, after she wrote a highly critical column about then-player Bobby Reid. Carlson pointed out instances in which she felt Reid acted undesirably on camera, such as when he let his mother feed him chicken in public and when he laughed with an assistant coach during the final minutes of an embarrassing loss. Gundy claimed that three-fourths of Carlson's column was inaccurate, but when she asked him to clear up the factual errors at a press conference, he replied: "I don't have to."
There are unwritten rules in covering college sports. The bottom line is that press scrutiny is simply not accepted by sports officials or the public fan base. At UT, reporters are not allowed to call athletes, and both athletes and reporters face being reprimanded for unauthorized interviews, no matter what the story is about. More importantly, university officials are under pressure to protect the image of their sports programs, which are at the forefront of bringing in money, identity and recognition to the school. According to NCAA estimates cited in a 2006 Chronicle of Higher Education article, the budgets of college athletics have been growing three to four times as fast as overall university budgets in recent years, and their profits are tax-exempt because government officials have long believed that college athletics contribute to the educational purpose of higher education.
Last month, The Daily Texan reported on its blog that the Austin Police Department suspended an assault with injury investigation in which Longhorns backup quarterback John Chiles was a suspect. When the Texan originally reported that APD confirmed Chiles as a suspect, assistant athletics director John Bianco wrote several threatening e-mails to Daily Texan sports editor and journalism senior Ricky Treon, calling him unprofessional and his reporting "untruthful." Bianco warned that other news agencies (and potential employers) "realize how you do business now," which "will hurt you in the long run." He also said that if the Texan's editors didn't pull the post off the blog, "John Chiles would understandably have an issue with the entire paper," which would be "unfortunate for the Texan's long-term working relationship with him."
Considering our football players' history with arrests - close to 10 in the last year, for charges ranging from possession of marijuana to having an unlicensed gun to automobile burglary to probation violation - public concern about Longhorn athletes' conduct is high, and the Texan has a duty to hold players accountable.
In a similar situation last September, Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy launched a heated tirade on Jenni Carlson, a sports columnist for The Oklahoman, after she wrote a highly critical column about then-player Bobby Reid. Carlson pointed out instances in which she felt Reid acted undesirably on camera, such as when he let his mother feed him chicken in public and when he laughed with an assistant coach during the final minutes of an embarrassing loss. Gundy claimed that three-fourths of Carlson's column was inaccurate, but when she asked him to clear up the factual errors at a press conference, he replied: "I don't have to."
There are unwritten rules in covering college sports. The bottom line is that press scrutiny is simply not accepted by sports officials or the public fan base. At UT, reporters are not allowed to call athletes, and both athletes and reporters face being reprimanded for unauthorized interviews, no matter what the story is about. More importantly, university officials are under pressure to protect the image of their sports programs, which are at the forefront of bringing in money, identity and recognition to the school. According to NCAA estimates cited in a 2006 Chronicle of Higher Education article, the budgets of college athletics have been growing three to four times as fast as overall university budgets in recent years, and their profits are tax-exempt because government officials have long believed that college athletics contribute to the educational purpose of higher education.
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