Jared Max: If It Bleeds, It Leads — Boo To The TMZ-ification Of Sports

By Jared Max
» More Columns

If I were a child today, it seems unlikely to me that I would strive to be a sportscaster.

When I grew up, sports was Toys "R" Us. It was a pack of Fruit Stripe gum. It was an attractive leisure from a serious life. Sports was a secret ticket which could allow me to gain entry to a life avoiding what nearly every American adult chose to do: work

Nowadays, our sports section is the police blotter. Competition seems to have become a backdrop to stories about famous athletes doing things that have nothing to do with sport. Because the tales are salacious -- compounded by the size of one's star -- there is a Radio City-sized stage lit every night to host terrific drama.

Drama. Not sports.

If I were a media mogul and could determine the layout for the sports pages, I would relegate a thin column for the daily sports police blotter on the same page that contains transactions and Vegas lines. If you buy a paper or turn on the TV/radio these days you will likely be exposed to stories based primarily around a police blotter.

To me, this is boring. It is distracting. And it pales in comparison to the interest my friends and I had every week in college reading the Public Safety Briefs in The Hofstra Chronicle (which, today, remain more entertaining than our sports police blotter, disguised as a sports section).

On Friday morning (I kid you not), these were the top national sports headlines:

- HUNDREDS OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE INCIDENTS WERE IGNORED DURING A 30-YEAR NFL TENURE, SAYS FORMER LEAGUE EXECUTIVE

- NFL AND PLAYERS ASSOCIATION TO DISCUSS NEW PLAYER-CONDUCT POLICY

- PROSECUTORS SEEK ARREST OF ADRIAN PETERSON; AWAITING FELONY CHILD ABUSE CHARGES, VIKINGS RUNNING BACK VIOLATED HIS BOND, ADMITTING HE 'SMOKED A LITTLE WEED'

- COWBOYS SAFETY C.J. SPILLMAN WAS ACCUSED OF ATTEMPTED RAPE LAST DECEMBER

- COLIN KAEPERNICK FINED $10,000; 49ERS QUARTERBACK WORE BEATS HEADPHONES INSTEAD OF NFL-ENDORSED BOSE HEADPHONES

- LASER-POINTING FAN TOLD HE IS NO LONGER WELCOME AT LIONS' FORD FIELD

- GEORGIA STAR RUNNING BACK SUSPENDED; TODD GURLEY UNDER INVESTIGATION FOR PROFITING MONEY FOR SIGNING HIS AUTOGRAPH

Buried below this devilish list of eye-catching candy was Friday morning's first legitimate national sports story: Star receiver A.J. Green is unlikely to play against the Panthers because he aggravated a toe injury. While this news was insignificant to me, it was most compelling because it was a sports story -- slotted ninth in the batting lineup.

Question: When did TMZ-style reporting plant its flag over a seemingly willing and submissive sports media?

Question: When did the sports media accept TMZ Sports as its lord and savior?

I get a kick out of Harvey Levin's show. It offers the most creative approach I know to covering stories about celebrities I care little about. The show entertains me. If it pops up on my television, I watch it for mindless pleasure, aware that it is entertainment. Sadly, with each passing day the entertainment section bleeds into the sports section, which continues to spill into the news section.

I wanted to be a sportscaster, not a TMZ guy.

Growing up watching "The NFL Today" on CBS, I was inspired by Brent Musburger and his ability to set the sports table with clarity and excitement. I imitated him at home and at school.

"You are looking live ... at Mrs. Appel's seventh-grade English class ... where today, grammar takes center stage!"

I was drawn to broadcasting by other giants, too.

"Hello again everyone, this is Howard Cosell, Speaking of sports, tonight in Bergen County, N.J., World Championship Boxing! Fighting out of the red corner, wearing blue trunks and a yellow shirt, weighing in at 87 pounds, my brother, Aron!"

As long as I can recall, I have subscribed to a calling which "Rush" drummer/lyricist Neil Peart wrote about in 1991: "Some of us pursue ambitions where the odds against success are great (and where we might have to stay adolescents all our lives). That is called bravado."

When I read this in college, I was so excited that my beliefs were shared by my favorite rock band that I paid $50 to have a personalized license plate which read BRAVADO. (I even got it signed by two of the three members of "Rush." To me, pursuing a life in sports used to seem like this bravado. While the odds against success remain great today, the carefree "adolescent" element seems to have been terrorized into being an afterthought.

While there are exponentially more sports networks and media outlets today than there were decades ago, there seems to be fewer channels addressing the type of sports stories which drew me to this career as a child. Sports news has become real news.

If it bleeds, it leads.

If I may borrow a line from a 1976 movie about media and society, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!"

You May Also Be Interested In These Stories