In addition to completely reinventing the way information is
exchanged through an entirely new medium, social media has brought the
connected world closer together than ever before. Not only can we interact with
those who are already close to us personally, but also we can reach out to
those who are on a different level than ourselves. This includes the countless
celebrities and icons that rely on social media to virtually stay connected
with their fan bases. Although fans do not typically have the most direct
opportunities to express opinions with their idols, there is still a greater sense
of connection in the network on social media. Many role models and celebrities
in the world of sports fall into this portion of people with fan bases in the
world of social media. They are
reinventing how sports fans get the information they desire. Opinions and
updates for individual athletes have never been more readily available to the
public since the creation of ESPN. Nowadays it seems that when every athletic
superstar isn’t playing the game itself, they are updating Facebook and Twitter
pages nonstop. However, self-reported tweets and posts by players should never
be mistaken for true pro sports journalism.
It is true
that social networks bring athletes closer to their fans and the ones who care
about them the most.
But naturally, these accounts can provide a medium for
their opinions and ultimately their biases. This is not to say that it is
necessarily a bad thing for athletes to be able to go public with their
thoughts on a particular subject, but it can cause issues as their followings
can very easily pick up those very same perspectives and mistake them for
facts. This was very evident during the
recent NHL lockout that carried into early 2013. The lockout was an overall
conflict between the National Hockey League and the National Hockey League
Players Association (NHLPA). For the excessive duration of the lockout, the
players were nonstop posting hateful and disapproving tweets and posts against
the NHL, claiming they were doing their fans a disservice by gradually canceling more and more games of the season. Personally, I am a huge hockey
fan and I must admit to succumbing to players’ opinions, which I still do side
with to this day. However, they all resulted in close-minded responses from
fans (like myself), and not understanding that the NHL was in a very tough spot
that at least deserved the slightest bit of recognition. Those opinions have
certainly lingered. While us fans are more than content to have our beloved
sport back in action, there is still a reasonable amount of animosity towards
Gary Bettman, the commissioner of the NHL. This is a prime example of Twitter opinions shaping the collective and overall opinion of a fan base.
There are times when one can tell a lot about an athlete and his/her personality through the use of social media.
Clearly, some athletes are better sports than others. In other words, while many athletes project a favorable and generous self to the worlds of Twitter and Facebook, there are certainly others who fall under the spectrum of “sore losers” and bad sportsmanship. An example of this occurred this past week on the popular sports talk show “First Take”. The topic of discussion for this episode was Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman’s Twitter feud with Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis. The two got into an extremely heated public argument on Twitter over who was a better cornerback, calling each other names and referring to the other as “irrelevant”. Revis has been a known cornerback who established himself during several seasons with leading statistics while Sherman, after only playing two seasons, has put up stellar numbers. The feud led to many interviews for Sherman and finally, an appearance on ESPN’s “First Take” which is hosted by two of the most critical sports personalities in media, Skip Bayless and Stephen A. Smith. When Bayless questioned the motives behind Sherman’s Twitter argument, Sherman returned by directly attacking Bayless as a person and journalist, criticizing his work and personality. The overall result of the appearance revealed a great deal about Richard Sherman and his inability to recognize facts that do not appear in his favor. This ultimately demonstrates how social media can lead to a greater deal of knowledge about professional athletes than the athletes themselves intend to reveal. It is yet another chapter in the world of social media that proves how truly prevalent it has become in our society and culture.
I like that you used the recent examples of the NHL lockout and the Sherman and Skip Bayless conversation for this post. They help add resonance to the topic for people who follow sports and watch ESPN. I think it would have been helpful if you included the history of the NHL lockout in this post, and gave a few arguments from the opposing side, perhaps from a press conference or an interview with Gary Bettman. Since you said in the first paragraph that opinionated tweets "should never be mistaken for true pro sports journalism," providing some examples of more balanced reporting would have helped strengthen your line of reasoning. Your second subhead gives the reader an idea of what to expect from the paragraph, but your first subhead is a sentence that would not give a scanner the idea of the topic you approach in that paragraph. The first sentence of that paragraph, with tiny modifications, would have been a more explanatory subhead that delineated the impact of Twitter on public opinions of sports issues.
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