Information overload is changing sports reporting

By Matthew Sherman

The Lake Oswego Review, Aug 13, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Former Lake Oswego High School star and current Minnesota Timberwolves forward Kevin Love recently caused a bit of controversy when he inadvertantly broke the news that Kevin McHale would not return to coach Minnesota this season on his Twitter page.

ERIC MILLER / REUTERS PHOTO

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Earlier this summer, former Lake Oswego star and current Minnesota Timberwolves player Kevin Love caused a bit of a stir around the sports world for what was seemingly a very innocent act.

He posted a tweet.

Love expressed sadness that his coach, Kevin McHale, a long time idol of Love’s, would not be back to coach the team for the upcoming season.

The only problem? No one else had heard the news yet.

McHale had contacted Love shortly after he was told that he was being let go and, understandably, Love assumed that the story had gone public. It hadn’t.

But the real news of the story was not McHale’s firing it was that a player was “breaking” the story via his Twitter page.

Love was summarily called in for a meeting with General Manager David Kahn and told to be more careful in the future and the incident became somewhat of a running joke over the next few weeks.

But Love’s tweet is emblematic of what is proving to be a monumental shift in sports coverage.

A large percentage of professional athletes have Twitter or Facebook pages or are involved in some form of information-doling organization that is set up to give fans an inside look at their daily lives.

Now fans can find out everything from what their favorite athlete ate for breakfast to what’s on his or her iPod to how a player is feeling after a game or practice.

And I’m still trying to figure out if this is a good thing or a bad thing.

I look back fondly at sports reporters from decades ago. They were solely responsible for just about every bit of information that the public would receive on a particular athlete or coach.

They had remarkable access to the teams, travelling on the same planes and buses with them, sitting a few feet away during games and often chatting them up at bars and restaurants.

And with that access came a great deal of responsibility that was often handled improperly.

There are plenty of good examples such as when New York Times reporter Dave Anderson published Reggie Jackson’s famous “I’m still the straw that stirs the drink” quote shortly after Jackson became a member of the Yankees.

That story defined Jackson’s relationship with New York and became part of his legacy for better or for worse.

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