We Want Tiger Woods Dirty Laundry According to Those in the Know
By Evan Weiner
September 2, 2010
http://www.examiner.com/business-of-sports-in-national/we-want-tiger-woods-dirty-laundry-according-to-those-the-know
(San Juan, PR) -- It was rather sad walking into a sports bar on a cruise ship and seeing Tiger Woods on a bank of televisions yet again explaining away his actions and his divorce prior to playing golf at a tournament in Paramus, New Jersey last week. Tiger talked just after his ex-wife Elin Nordegren gave an interview to Time Warner's People Magazine, a slick supermarket tabloid type publication. Tiger Woods is ultimately responsible for his life and actions but his sordid tale does not need to be splashed all over the place and it was thanks to Harvey Levin and his TMZ show, a show that is pushed on the American public through the "family values" guy Rupert Murdoch on his Fox owned and operated stations and by Time Warner, Levin's business partner on TMZ, and Murdoch's cable TV news competitor.
Murdoch and his News Corporation (which includes Saudi investors) own FOX News Channel while Time Warner has CNN.
Levin, based on his "success" in reporting the Tiger Woods story, wants to increase his sports coverage and the "gotcha" mentality. Levin was a crackerjack reporter on the OJ Simpson 1994 murder trial while at KCBS-TV in Los Angeles. His poor reporting on the story included showing a tape that Levin claimed showed the Prosecutor Marcia Clark entering O. J. Simpson's home prior to getting a search warrant nearly ended the trail. The KCBS tape was discredited which forced Levin and KCBS to apologize for showing "misedited" tape.
Levin, a lawyer by trade, still works in the "news" business. Apparently an apology is all you need to get ahead after making a huge mistake that at one time would have cost him and others their jobs. But no more, mistakes get you better deals. Levin went on and became a legal analyst on "The People's Court" -- one of the legal shows that one insider said was fueled by alcohol and "over-the-top" contestants who might not get all the money that they win in the court case on the show.
Levin is a key player in the TV "news" business. The radio and TV “news/talk” business that has been seized by drug addicts, alcoholics, xenophobes, gamblers, sexual harassers, sexual predators, johns, woman beaters, political operatives and disgraced politicians (and other political operatives) who in some cases ended up doing jail time. These are the people who shape the news debate thanks to their enablers, Murdoch, GE's Jeffrey Immelt, CBS' Sumner Redstone, Time Warner, Chancellor Radio, Premiere Radio, Lowry Mays' Clear Channel and Mark Masters' Talk Radio Network.
Masters employs among others Michael Savage (thrown off MSNBC for gay bashing) and the "embattled" Dr. Laura who decided to quit her radio show after she repeatedly using a derogatory racial term to make whatever point a radio talk show host can make in an entertaining form because her first amendment rights were violated.
A good many of these people who host talk radio or Cable TV news shows are school yard bullies who are never challenged by anyone during their shows (the whole talk show genre is a scam with “screeners” putting on callers and the know-it-all host playing lord over the airwaves with peasants being granted 90 seconds of their precious time usually genuflecting before the talk show lord). Yet when the talk show hosts are caught with their hand in the cookie jar, they scream, poor, poor pitiful me. They also have problems with being called out with Dr. Laura the latest crybaby. Only in radio can someone (a talk show host) can constantly put down callers and hang up on them can be victimized if someone criticizes them. Dr. Laura is quitting her talk show because her first right amendment, she claims, has been violated.
Larry King is being exalted as his retirement date is nearing. Why? Larry King was a below average interviewer with little news or journalistic credibility among the people in the know but he was a star for some reason. Perceived perception more than likely as a persona of Larry King was sold and people bought into it. Larry’s personal life including the eight marriages to seven women and the money problems are perfect in the tawdry world of radio and Cable TV news operatives.
This is the world in which Levin operates and where Tiger Woods got stuck and this world threatens the Professional Golf Association financially--because the PGA has one megastar in Tiger Woods who brings in the cash and got golf into the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio. The International Olympic Committee saw money in Tiger and added golf to the lineup of sports and ignored baseball and softball. Tiger was gold until Levin’s reportage.
Tiger Woods does not have to be grilled by sportswriters. He is a golfer, nothing more and nothing less. He is not a role model which is little more a sportswriters' word invention to sell newspapers about a century ago when newspaper owners figured out they could report on sports and make some money off of the sports industry.
Hero worshipping is a better term than jock sniffers and sportswriters created hero-athletes. Sportswriters also genuflect in front of jocks and in some cases have been abused both verbally and physically by jocks who have among other incidents poured water over their heads, stuffed them into lockers, have had food and tape recorders flung at them.
Athletes are not and should never have been considered role models. They aren't but the mythology is so well entrenched in sportswriters and sports fans minds.
The sportswriters who cover golf and Tiger Woods sounded like the baseball writers who could not figure out that banned substances were being used in baseball in the 1990s. They had no clue about Tiger. The baseball writers were also ignorant even though the Washington Post's Thomas Boswell and NBC's Bob Costas had publicly said they thought steroids were being used in the game. The golf writers complained they never got to know Tiger and if they did, well they would have said something.
Sure they would have. Sportswriters are an extension of sports public relations departments and there is no quicker way to get access shut down then start saying what you know to be true instead of writing what the industry expects. Baseball Hall of Fame pitcher Steve Carlton cut off media access while he pitched for the Philadelphia Phillies because of some of the things written about him. The Baseball Hall of Fame has a “media” section and inducts baseball writers into the museum—an absurd notion as writers are supposed cover baseball not be applauded by the baseball industry---and it was rather fitting than one time Texas Rangers, Kansas City Royals and St. Louis Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog and New York Daily News baseball writer Bill Madden went in together as Madden and his colleagues were in Whitey’s words of the mid-1980s one of those “good baseball people” – baseball writers as opposed to other media representatives from radio and TV.
Levin wants to expand his TMZ franchise into sports. It would be a first in the United States but Levin is far behind the Brits and Fleet Street in terms of spewing the sports gossip. Footballer (soccer) star Georgie Best was a darling of the London tabloids for his lifestyle.
Meanwhile the PGA officials have to be wondering about the tour's financial future with Tiger Woods not playing well and the whole Levin pushed narrative about Tiger and his ex-wife. Levin's gang of "journalists" got the story into the public but what should have been a private matter may do some significant damage to the Tour and may harm some people who depend on money raised by the Tour and given to charities.
If Tiger Woods continues to slump and is not in contention for a Sunday victory in any tournament that he has entered, television ratings will slide as Tiger brings eyeballs in front of the TV to watch golf. Redstone and CBS along with Immelt's NBC might and Brian Roberts' (Comcast) Golf Channel decide the Tour is not worth the investment as the networks have deals in place until 2012 that pays the PGA $255 million. Roberts, of course, will run NBC if everyone signs off on the Comcast-NBCUniversal agreement which would give Comcast NBC and the Peacock Network's cable networks which include USA, msnbc and CNBC.
Tiger Woods has already lost endorsements. The PGA could also lose endorsements if people turn away from golf because Tiger isn't playing well and some of those marketing partners may walk away from sponsoring tournaments which could mean that the PGA drops some events. The PGA gives a portion of the revenues from each tournament to charities, it is unlikely Levin's TMZ or his partners Time Warner or Murdoch will make up the charitable contributions.
At the end of the day, Tiger Woods has to take responsibility for his actions but that should have been a private matter. The sports bar on the ship went on with life after the TV banks had Tiger’s talk, there were other games and highlights and there were patrons who sat watching the screen with their drinks in hand. The old Tiger, the pre-November 2009 Tiger showed up on Thursday but it was the post Harvey Levin and TMZ Tiger that came to Paramus on Friday. One day Tiger will become yesterday's news and some other poor and unfortunate fellow or girl will be ensnared by Levin and his ilk. Don Henley's lyrics in his October 1982 song Dirty Laundry are as current and spot on today as they were in 1982 except there are more places where Dirty Laundry shows up then in 1982 as Tiger Woods could have told reporters on Thursday in Paramus.
Henley complained that "Crap is King". So far Tiger has refrained from singing "Dirty Laundry" but dirty laundry is being presented everyday as fact all you have to do is turn on the AM radio dial or flip on cable TV news and it is there in gross tonnage.
Evan Weiner is an award winning journalist, a radio-TV commentator and an author of The Business and Politics of Sports. He can be reached at evanjweiner@yahoo.com
Showing posts with label Tiger Woods. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tiger Woods. Show all posts
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Tiger, Harvey Levin, Time Warner and Murdoch and American journalism
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-3926-Business-of-Sports-Examiner~y2009m12d15-Tiger-Harvey-Levin-Time-Warner-and-Murdoch-and-American-journalism#
Tiger, Harvey Levin, Time Warner and Murdoch and American Journalism
By Evan Weiner
December 15, 2009
(New York, N. Y.) -- In all the stories about Tiger Woods, the one that doesn’t stand out is how much money charities will end up losing because people like Harvey Levin keep pushing the envelope and claim it is journalism. This much is known, Woods dropped out of his own charity tournament in late November and attendance was way off without the golfer at the Thousand Oaks, California course.
That meant a loss of money that would be given to charities and people who need help. That is not something Levin and his ilk give much thought to.
What happened with Tiger, the mistresses, his family is Tiger Woods’ business and he has to deal with his problems. The general public does not need to know what is going on. The public does not have a right to know even though Tiger Woods is a public figure. Woods is a golfer and a corporate pitchman, he is not a governor of a state who spent time with a hooker in Washington, DC, he is not a governor of a state who decided to take off to Argentina to be with his lover and disappeared for five days and not tell any state officials about not being around which is unconscionable for the leader of a state and should be an impeachable offense.
Woods is a golfer. That is what he does best.
The Woods story is taking a familiar route with the media being led by the nose by people like Levin and his benefactor Rupert Murdoch. Levin and Murdoch together in bed? Yes, you see Levin’s TMZ television show is picked up by Murdoch’s WNYW in New York and his stations in Chicago and Los Angeles. TMZ’s franchise TV show is distributed by Warner Brothers Domestic Television Distribution and the show is also partially produced by Warner Brothers Telepictures along with Levin. So two of the United States’ three cable TV news entities have an interest in TMZ and further the Woods story as Murdoch’s FOX and Time Warner’s CNN are giving the people what they want or are they?
And the media pile on includes spin doctors, public relations agents, the amateur and professional psychiatrists and others who are giving their professional advice to Tiger and how he can reclaim his pedestal. It seems like we have heard this story before with Alex Rodriguez the last sports icon to fall last spring. The Yankees won a World Series and Alex Rodriguez seems to be doing fine.
The Tiger Woods story doesn’t resonant in gyms or in the Eastchester, New York CVS store. Inquiring minds need to know, so I asked a woman who has worked at the store for a long time whether there has been a spike in sales of Murdoch’s New York Post, the National Enquirer, People, US, Star the Globe and all the other “entertainment” magazines and papers and the answer was a resounding no.
The National Enquirer is on the ropes financially; the New York Post has lost a chunk of circulation and is in the red. CNN and FOX would not be profitable without the Cable TV Act of 1984 which does not allow a la carte cable TV pricing.
Murdoch, the hero of the conservatives and moralists, really does pull the wool over his audiences’ eyes sort of like the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain. His audience never seems to notice that he hired the former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer’s hooker as a sex columnist for his New York Post, or that the Post has ads for escort services or that his WNYW TV station runs spots for escort services.
Levin is an interesting story. He nearly blew up the O. J. Simpson case as a reporter for KCBS in Los Angeles back in 1994 by showing a video with a wrong time code of the prosecutor Marcia Clark searching Simpson’s home before a search warrant was issued. Levin had to apologize for his mistake, but he has continued having a TV career despite his almost over-the-top miscue.
Levin is now the host of The People’s Court. AOL helped get TMZ.com off the ground. AOL was owned by Time Warner when that happened in 2005.
The court TV genre is popular but perhaps it is time for either the House or Senate’s Committee on Legislative Oversight start taking a serious look at Levin and others in the genre if a veteran TV booker who shares a first name with a one time gossip columnist and a last name with a baseball writer is correct. According to the booker, court shows look for people who are over the top who get easily excited and are interesting. Before the court shows are taped, there is a lot of alcohol available to drink and then it is show time. To get a plaintiff to sue a defendant on the show, the plaintiff is given a sales pitch by a producer which consists of what do you have to lose, you probably aren’t going to get your money anyway from this man or woman so come onto the show and you are guaranteed something.
There is a catch though. The plaintiff might win a judgment but the show’s budget has been stretched and that the plaintiff might not get the all of the money from the show’s producers because the show’s budget has been stretched.
If Congress could investigate TV game shows of the 1950s, they can look into Levin and others who engage in this type of genre. After all, Levin has no problem going after people like Tiger Woods or Mel Gibson or Britney Spears or Michael Richards (by the way, how did TMZ not run afoul of the do not tape performances announcement that accompanies all performances and put the Richards meltdown on a website without getting sued for copyright infringements?)
Woods is just the latest in a long line of people who were placed on a pedestal by the media and now the media is feasting over his rapid demise as an icon and idol. Golf writers, who sound a lot like baseball writers who were caught with their collective pants down by not writing about alleged steroid usage in the sport (although the Washington Post’s Thomas Boswell and sportscaster Bob Costas did write and talk about their suspicions) are now doing a mea culpa.
Leonard Shapiro in the Washington Post has expressed some sort of guilt by not following Tiger Woods into the bedroom. Shapiro in his column also fingers fellow writers for not following Woods on his sexual romps.
This is what the Murdochs, Levins, Time Warners have created. But the point is that people don’t care. No matter what the media barons say, it doesn’t sell newspapers, if scandal did, Murdoch would be rolling in dough with the New York Post and not blaming the Internet for the decline of newspaper readership. TMZ would be pulling a 46 percent share of the audience during its time slot and the National Enquirer would be flying off the shelves.
Back to the gym, there was a conversation between a senior woman and a man from one of the Caribbean islands. The woman said “look men like sex, Tiger Woods is a man, he is a powerful man and woman throw themselves at him whatever happened, it is his business.” The man in the other end of the conversation had an interesting point about the American media, how they like to build up people and then knock them down and that didn’t happen in his home country.
Back in the 1980s, the veteran New York sports columnist Dick Young used to write about “My America”. Young’s America in his mind cared about law and order so he expected that the Major League Baseball players who were linked to cocaine usage would get booed upon their return from court or a suspension or even jail time. None of that ever happened because people just want to be entertained.
In the 1980s and 1990s, grown men used to quiver in line when Mickey Mantle did baseball card autograph shows even though they knew about Mickey’s drinking and infidelity.
They loved the Mick.
Tiger Woods is an entertainer. No more, no less. He is not the Commander in Chief conducting two wars, nor is he trying to turn around a severe recession. He is not trying to find a cure for cancer. He is not a school teacher nor is he is member of the clergy. He is a golfer. That’s it.
But Levin and is ilk have hurt charities in their quest for an extra three viewers to make their presentations more valuable for advertisers and knock Woods from his media made throne. The Professional Golf Association donates a piece of the gate in every city that a tournament is played to local charities. Without Woods, charities are going to suffer. Tiger Woods drives the gate and that part of the story is going unreported by Murdoch, by Levin, by CNN. They just a reporting on how much money Tiger Woods could lose in endorsements.
It is a sad, sad commentary on what passes as the news industry in the United States. But as a one time WNEW-FM, New York disc jockey turned WABC-TV, New York political reporter named Pat Dobson once said on the air, the media just follows the New York Post’s lead.
It is that mentality that is sinking the journalism business rapidly.
One last thing, when Tiger Woods returns to the golf course, he will be welcomed back by the consumer just like those baseball fans who cheered the guys linked to cocaine in the 1980s.
evanjweiner@yahoo.com
Tiger, Harvey Levin, Time Warner and Murdoch and American Journalism
By Evan Weiner
December 15, 2009
(New York, N. Y.) -- In all the stories about Tiger Woods, the one that doesn’t stand out is how much money charities will end up losing because people like Harvey Levin keep pushing the envelope and claim it is journalism. This much is known, Woods dropped out of his own charity tournament in late November and attendance was way off without the golfer at the Thousand Oaks, California course.
That meant a loss of money that would be given to charities and people who need help. That is not something Levin and his ilk give much thought to.
What happened with Tiger, the mistresses, his family is Tiger Woods’ business and he has to deal with his problems. The general public does not need to know what is going on. The public does not have a right to know even though Tiger Woods is a public figure. Woods is a golfer and a corporate pitchman, he is not a governor of a state who spent time with a hooker in Washington, DC, he is not a governor of a state who decided to take off to Argentina to be with his lover and disappeared for five days and not tell any state officials about not being around which is unconscionable for the leader of a state and should be an impeachable offense.
Woods is a golfer. That is what he does best.
The Woods story is taking a familiar route with the media being led by the nose by people like Levin and his benefactor Rupert Murdoch. Levin and Murdoch together in bed? Yes, you see Levin’s TMZ television show is picked up by Murdoch’s WNYW in New York and his stations in Chicago and Los Angeles. TMZ’s franchise TV show is distributed by Warner Brothers Domestic Television Distribution and the show is also partially produced by Warner Brothers Telepictures along with Levin. So two of the United States’ three cable TV news entities have an interest in TMZ and further the Woods story as Murdoch’s FOX and Time Warner’s CNN are giving the people what they want or are they?
And the media pile on includes spin doctors, public relations agents, the amateur and professional psychiatrists and others who are giving their professional advice to Tiger and how he can reclaim his pedestal. It seems like we have heard this story before with Alex Rodriguez the last sports icon to fall last spring. The Yankees won a World Series and Alex Rodriguez seems to be doing fine.
The Tiger Woods story doesn’t resonant in gyms or in the Eastchester, New York CVS store. Inquiring minds need to know, so I asked a woman who has worked at the store for a long time whether there has been a spike in sales of Murdoch’s New York Post, the National Enquirer, People, US, Star the Globe and all the other “entertainment” magazines and papers and the answer was a resounding no.
The National Enquirer is on the ropes financially; the New York Post has lost a chunk of circulation and is in the red. CNN and FOX would not be profitable without the Cable TV Act of 1984 which does not allow a la carte cable TV pricing.
Murdoch, the hero of the conservatives and moralists, really does pull the wool over his audiences’ eyes sort of like the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain. His audience never seems to notice that he hired the former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer’s hooker as a sex columnist for his New York Post, or that the Post has ads for escort services or that his WNYW TV station runs spots for escort services.
Levin is an interesting story. He nearly blew up the O. J. Simpson case as a reporter for KCBS in Los Angeles back in 1994 by showing a video with a wrong time code of the prosecutor Marcia Clark searching Simpson’s home before a search warrant was issued. Levin had to apologize for his mistake, but he has continued having a TV career despite his almost over-the-top miscue.
Levin is now the host of The People’s Court. AOL helped get TMZ.com off the ground. AOL was owned by Time Warner when that happened in 2005.
The court TV genre is popular but perhaps it is time for either the House or Senate’s Committee on Legislative Oversight start taking a serious look at Levin and others in the genre if a veteran TV booker who shares a first name with a one time gossip columnist and a last name with a baseball writer is correct. According to the booker, court shows look for people who are over the top who get easily excited and are interesting. Before the court shows are taped, there is a lot of alcohol available to drink and then it is show time. To get a plaintiff to sue a defendant on the show, the plaintiff is given a sales pitch by a producer which consists of what do you have to lose, you probably aren’t going to get your money anyway from this man or woman so come onto the show and you are guaranteed something.
There is a catch though. The plaintiff might win a judgment but the show’s budget has been stretched and that the plaintiff might not get the all of the money from the show’s producers because the show’s budget has been stretched.
If Congress could investigate TV game shows of the 1950s, they can look into Levin and others who engage in this type of genre. After all, Levin has no problem going after people like Tiger Woods or Mel Gibson or Britney Spears or Michael Richards (by the way, how did TMZ not run afoul of the do not tape performances announcement that accompanies all performances and put the Richards meltdown on a website without getting sued for copyright infringements?)
Woods is just the latest in a long line of people who were placed on a pedestal by the media and now the media is feasting over his rapid demise as an icon and idol. Golf writers, who sound a lot like baseball writers who were caught with their collective pants down by not writing about alleged steroid usage in the sport (although the Washington Post’s Thomas Boswell and sportscaster Bob Costas did write and talk about their suspicions) are now doing a mea culpa.
Leonard Shapiro in the Washington Post has expressed some sort of guilt by not following Tiger Woods into the bedroom. Shapiro in his column also fingers fellow writers for not following Woods on his sexual romps.
This is what the Murdochs, Levins, Time Warners have created. But the point is that people don’t care. No matter what the media barons say, it doesn’t sell newspapers, if scandal did, Murdoch would be rolling in dough with the New York Post and not blaming the Internet for the decline of newspaper readership. TMZ would be pulling a 46 percent share of the audience during its time slot and the National Enquirer would be flying off the shelves.
Back to the gym, there was a conversation between a senior woman and a man from one of the Caribbean islands. The woman said “look men like sex, Tiger Woods is a man, he is a powerful man and woman throw themselves at him whatever happened, it is his business.” The man in the other end of the conversation had an interesting point about the American media, how they like to build up people and then knock them down and that didn’t happen in his home country.
Back in the 1980s, the veteran New York sports columnist Dick Young used to write about “My America”. Young’s America in his mind cared about law and order so he expected that the Major League Baseball players who were linked to cocaine usage would get booed upon their return from court or a suspension or even jail time. None of that ever happened because people just want to be entertained.
In the 1980s and 1990s, grown men used to quiver in line when Mickey Mantle did baseball card autograph shows even though they knew about Mickey’s drinking and infidelity.
They loved the Mick.
Tiger Woods is an entertainer. No more, no less. He is not the Commander in Chief conducting two wars, nor is he trying to turn around a severe recession. He is not trying to find a cure for cancer. He is not a school teacher nor is he is member of the clergy. He is a golfer. That’s it.
But Levin and is ilk have hurt charities in their quest for an extra three viewers to make their presentations more valuable for advertisers and knock Woods from his media made throne. The Professional Golf Association donates a piece of the gate in every city that a tournament is played to local charities. Without Woods, charities are going to suffer. Tiger Woods drives the gate and that part of the story is going unreported by Murdoch, by Levin, by CNN. They just a reporting on how much money Tiger Woods could lose in endorsements.
It is a sad, sad commentary on what passes as the news industry in the United States. But as a one time WNEW-FM, New York disc jockey turned WABC-TV, New York political reporter named Pat Dobson once said on the air, the media just follows the New York Post’s lead.
It is that mentality that is sinking the journalism business rapidly.
One last thing, when Tiger Woods returns to the golf course, he will be welcomed back by the consumer just like those baseball fans who cheered the guys linked to cocaine in the 1980s.
evanjweiner@yahoo.com
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Tiger Woods and Broken Journalism
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-3926-Business-of-Sports-Examiner~y2009m12d6-Tiger-Woods-and-Broken-Journalism#
Tiger Woods and Broken Journalism
By Evan Weiner
The United States must not be conducting two wars or trying to get out of a severe recession or trying to figure out how to solve the health care crisis. You see two big name so-called journalists, Bob Schieffer of the CBS television network and the New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd have decided to comment on the golfer Tiger Woods personal problems which means all is well with the world and America.
Schieffer on his CBS-TV Face the Nation public affairs program and Dowd in her New York Times column.
The fact that Schieffer, the one time CBS Evening News anchor, and Dowd are throwing on their two cents on Woods shows just how far journalism has sank. Schieffer, if he has to weigh in on Tiger Woods, should just go back to his Friday night dinners and discussion of fantasy baseball with his brother Tom, the former Texas Rangers President and Rangers Managing General Partner George W. Bush like they did in the 1990s and Dowd, well someone at the New York Times likes her. Hopefully for the columnist that like will still be on display in the future as later this week the New York Times plans lets go of a number of employees.
The Times is hemorrhaging money and has to lay off personal.
The times are a changing and the New York Times is not what it once was nor is CBS News, the home of Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite. Murrow helped bring down Senator Joseph McCarthy on the See It Now show back on March 9, 1954 and Cronkite concluded the Vietnam War was not winnable on February 27, 1968 during a CBS news program which set into motion a series of events that might have had a heavy influence on President Lyndon B. Johnson’s decision not to seek re-election in 1968.
To be fair, both Murrow and Cronkite did preside over a lot of fluff programming as well with Murrow hosting People to People and Cronkite was an anchor at the 1960 Winter Olympics and did the narration of the Violent World of Sam Huff as part of the “The Twentieth Century” series on October 30, 1960.
There is a lot going on in the world. A global climate conference in Copenhagen, more troops will be headed to Afghanistan, unemployment at 10 percent, the on going health care debate and in the sports world, head injuries in football. All of that is significantly more important than whatever is going on between Woods and his wife.
The tearing down of an idol is nothing new in American journalism and now it is Tiger Woods turn to feel the wrath of the jock sniffers who report on sports. Somehow Tiger didn’t level with them, as if the reporters who follow golf deserve an explanation of his exploits. Of course Tiger has never palled around with sportswriters types anyway and now they can even the score since he is not their friend. Hell hath no fury like a sportswriter or sportswriters scorned.
There will be fewer reporters following Tiger Woods around in 2010 as the newspaper industry continues to bleed red ink and the radio/TV industry cuts back on news programming. The funny thing about the entire Tiger Woods coverage is that newspapers, radio and TV are giving the people what they want.
Scandal.
Of course if scandal really did sell, the National Enquirer would not be reeling. The New York Post would be selling millions of papers daily instead of seeing plunging circulation and the Gannett newspapers would not be laying off reporters, closing down printing presses and furloughing employees. The Gannett papers including USA Today, the New York suburban papers including the Journal News and others have ceased to be legitimate publications.
Newspaper executives and newspaper owners like Rupert Murdoch can scream all they want about how Google and the internet have inflicted a great deal of damage on their circulation and advertising but the truth is simple. Newspaper owners, publishers and managers sat snug while people like Craig Newmark came up with a better idea, Craig’s List, which took millions of dollars away from papers by charging far less for classified ads.
It is true advertisers are cutting back because of the economy yet marketers are willing to spend more on web advertising.
Tiger Woods is not going to sell any more newspapers or even more National Enquirers. But don’t tell that to various executives.
At one time, newspapers provided the backbone of publicist for sports. Notre Dame owes a great deal to the writers of the 1920s who sold the public on the mythology of George Gipp, the Four Horsemen and Knute Rockne. Newspapers made Babe Ruth and Red Grange household names in the 1920s and sports has embraced newspapers and sportswriters have gained a sense of entitlement which includes voting for various sports hall of fames and for individual players and manager or coaches awards which impacts on the earnings power of athletes, coaches and sports executives.
Today college students don’t read newspapers and young people get sports information from team websites, league websites, blogs, TV and radio. The golden age of the newspaper in America is gone and AARP members are the last generation that depends on newspapers for information. That is an undisputed fact.
Tiger Woods is a genuine 14 carat superstar with major ability in his field which is golf. Tiger doesn’t need sportswriters around because the truth of the matter is that he doesn’t say very much and his talent is always on display and people who follow Tiger don’t need a sportswriters’ analyst of his ability. They can listen to the former professional golfer who is part of a television network’s presentation of a golf tournament.
By the way, Tiger is not in trouble with the law. The case is closed and done with Tiger playing a small fine. But the media is not done with Tiger, the story they created about Tiger has come undone and it is payback time. Yet Tiger is not going to add to the media bottom line with scandal. It doesn’t work, if it did Confidential magazine would still be in circulation.
Tiger Woods never really sold newspapers but he did draw eyeballs to the TV screen whenever he played in a tournament. Woods sponsors are not fleeing and the Professional Golf Association’s media partners whether it is Summer Redstone’s CBS, General Electric’s NBC (soon to be merged with the Philadelphia-based Comcast, the multiple systems operator which owns the Golf Channel and Versus, which carries PGA shows), Disney’s ESPN and ABC in the US or the Disney-owner TSN in Canada along with RDS and CanWest north of the border and the numerous televisions partners globally can’t wait for Tiger to play in the tournaments they are showing. XM Satellite Radio, another financially struggling entity, is not dissolving its partnership with the PGA because of Tiger’s car accident or apparent National Enquirer fodder lifestyle.
Schieffer should keep his CBS Face the Nation program focused squarely addressing important American issues and Dowd, well she should go back to the Breck Girl (John Edwards) type columns on politics. Tiger will get more viewers for Redstone by playing golf; Tiger will not bring Redstone or Schieffer any new viewers. Dowd’s columns on Tiger will not help bring readers back to the New York Times.
As soon as Tiger is back on the golf course, all will be forgiven. Tiger is just another jock, another human being; although he is a superior golfer and he will make his money which is more than can be said for the New York Times or the National Enquirer.
Tiger Woods and Broken Journalism
By Evan Weiner
The United States must not be conducting two wars or trying to get out of a severe recession or trying to figure out how to solve the health care crisis. You see two big name so-called journalists, Bob Schieffer of the CBS television network and the New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd have decided to comment on the golfer Tiger Woods personal problems which means all is well with the world and America.
Schieffer on his CBS-TV Face the Nation public affairs program and Dowd in her New York Times column.
The fact that Schieffer, the one time CBS Evening News anchor, and Dowd are throwing on their two cents on Woods shows just how far journalism has sank. Schieffer, if he has to weigh in on Tiger Woods, should just go back to his Friday night dinners and discussion of fantasy baseball with his brother Tom, the former Texas Rangers President and Rangers Managing General Partner George W. Bush like they did in the 1990s and Dowd, well someone at the New York Times likes her. Hopefully for the columnist that like will still be on display in the future as later this week the New York Times plans lets go of a number of employees.
The Times is hemorrhaging money and has to lay off personal.
The times are a changing and the New York Times is not what it once was nor is CBS News, the home of Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite. Murrow helped bring down Senator Joseph McCarthy on the See It Now show back on March 9, 1954 and Cronkite concluded the Vietnam War was not winnable on February 27, 1968 during a CBS news program which set into motion a series of events that might have had a heavy influence on President Lyndon B. Johnson’s decision not to seek re-election in 1968.
To be fair, both Murrow and Cronkite did preside over a lot of fluff programming as well with Murrow hosting People to People and Cronkite was an anchor at the 1960 Winter Olympics and did the narration of the Violent World of Sam Huff as part of the “The Twentieth Century” series on October 30, 1960.
There is a lot going on in the world. A global climate conference in Copenhagen, more troops will be headed to Afghanistan, unemployment at 10 percent, the on going health care debate and in the sports world, head injuries in football. All of that is significantly more important than whatever is going on between Woods and his wife.
The tearing down of an idol is nothing new in American journalism and now it is Tiger Woods turn to feel the wrath of the jock sniffers who report on sports. Somehow Tiger didn’t level with them, as if the reporters who follow golf deserve an explanation of his exploits. Of course Tiger has never palled around with sportswriters types anyway and now they can even the score since he is not their friend. Hell hath no fury like a sportswriter or sportswriters scorned.
There will be fewer reporters following Tiger Woods around in 2010 as the newspaper industry continues to bleed red ink and the radio/TV industry cuts back on news programming. The funny thing about the entire Tiger Woods coverage is that newspapers, radio and TV are giving the people what they want.
Scandal.
Of course if scandal really did sell, the National Enquirer would not be reeling. The New York Post would be selling millions of papers daily instead of seeing plunging circulation and the Gannett newspapers would not be laying off reporters, closing down printing presses and furloughing employees. The Gannett papers including USA Today, the New York suburban papers including the Journal News and others have ceased to be legitimate publications.
Newspaper executives and newspaper owners like Rupert Murdoch can scream all they want about how Google and the internet have inflicted a great deal of damage on their circulation and advertising but the truth is simple. Newspaper owners, publishers and managers sat snug while people like Craig Newmark came up with a better idea, Craig’s List, which took millions of dollars away from papers by charging far less for classified ads.
It is true advertisers are cutting back because of the economy yet marketers are willing to spend more on web advertising.
Tiger Woods is not going to sell any more newspapers or even more National Enquirers. But don’t tell that to various executives.
At one time, newspapers provided the backbone of publicist for sports. Notre Dame owes a great deal to the writers of the 1920s who sold the public on the mythology of George Gipp, the Four Horsemen and Knute Rockne. Newspapers made Babe Ruth and Red Grange household names in the 1920s and sports has embraced newspapers and sportswriters have gained a sense of entitlement which includes voting for various sports hall of fames and for individual players and manager or coaches awards which impacts on the earnings power of athletes, coaches and sports executives.
Today college students don’t read newspapers and young people get sports information from team websites, league websites, blogs, TV and radio. The golden age of the newspaper in America is gone and AARP members are the last generation that depends on newspapers for information. That is an undisputed fact.
Tiger Woods is a genuine 14 carat superstar with major ability in his field which is golf. Tiger doesn’t need sportswriters around because the truth of the matter is that he doesn’t say very much and his talent is always on display and people who follow Tiger don’t need a sportswriters’ analyst of his ability. They can listen to the former professional golfer who is part of a television network’s presentation of a golf tournament.
By the way, Tiger is not in trouble with the law. The case is closed and done with Tiger playing a small fine. But the media is not done with Tiger, the story they created about Tiger has come undone and it is payback time. Yet Tiger is not going to add to the media bottom line with scandal. It doesn’t work, if it did Confidential magazine would still be in circulation.
Tiger Woods never really sold newspapers but he did draw eyeballs to the TV screen whenever he played in a tournament. Woods sponsors are not fleeing and the Professional Golf Association’s media partners whether it is Summer Redstone’s CBS, General Electric’s NBC (soon to be merged with the Philadelphia-based Comcast, the multiple systems operator which owns the Golf Channel and Versus, which carries PGA shows), Disney’s ESPN and ABC in the US or the Disney-owner TSN in Canada along with RDS and CanWest north of the border and the numerous televisions partners globally can’t wait for Tiger to play in the tournaments they are showing. XM Satellite Radio, another financially struggling entity, is not dissolving its partnership with the PGA because of Tiger’s car accident or apparent National Enquirer fodder lifestyle.
Schieffer should keep his CBS Face the Nation program focused squarely addressing important American issues and Dowd, well she should go back to the Breck Girl (John Edwards) type columns on politics. Tiger will get more viewers for Redstone by playing golf; Tiger will not bring Redstone or Schieffer any new viewers. Dowd’s columns on Tiger will not help bring readers back to the New York Times.
As soon as Tiger is back on the golf course, all will be forgiven. Tiger is just another jock, another human being; although he is a superior golfer and he will make his money which is more than can be said for the New York Times or the National Enquirer.
Monday, August 17, 2009
IOC Likes American Money But Not Much Else About the States
IOC Likes American Money But Not Much Else About the States
http://www.mcnsports.com/en/node/7496
By Evan Weiner
August 17, 2009
8:00 PM EDT
(New York, N. Y.) --There are quite a few American women athletes who should be fuming at the decision by International Olympic Committee’s Executive Board to keep softball out of the competition in 2016. The American women who play softball are quite good, maybe too good for Olympic competition although Australian women are very good as well and it should be noted that the last Gold Medal Olympic Softball team was from Japan, not the United Sates.
That Japanese team will be the defending Gold Medal winning squad until at least 2020 because softball will not be played in 2012 or 2016. The International Olympic Committee has added golf for the 2016 Games which means they could have Tiger Woods competing and that means extra eyeballs in front of whatever technology will be used in 2016, a TV, computer, cell and a variation of rugby will be played as well. “Rugby seven” features just seven players per side instead of 15 and the matches are shorter.
Golf is played globally and rugby is another widely played international sport but there are four major golf tournaments annually that eclipse the Olympics -- the Masters, the British Open, the US Open and the PGA Championships -- along with the Ryder Cup. International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge is a former rugby player on the Belgium National Rugby Union team. The addition of rugby to the competition means that the International Rugby Board will have to step up marketing incursions into the BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia, India and China, along with the United States and Canada. Rogge and the IOC will give rugby an international platform which could bolster rugby’s profile.
Rugby is a minor sport in all of those countries.
Golf has big names, sponsors that don't worry about mass marketing but go after a specific demographic and there is the Tiger Woods factor. Although Rogge denied that bringing golf into the Olympic family has nothing to do with money, it is hard to believe he is telling the truth. That would not be the first time an International Olympic Committee leader would be stretching words.
The 2014 and 2016 Olympics American TV deal still needs to be negotiated and there is a good case that money and star power, golf and Tiger, triumphed over softball for that very reason. Seven years from now, Tiger Woods figures to still be a prominent player on the Tour, his name is gold to advertisers and frankly the IOC likes every nickel or pence that can scrounge up. It is usually nickels though as the IOC likes mintage or paper with dead presidents and other American movers and shakers portraits or busts.
The big TV money comes from the United States and in the past two decades that meant General Electric's NBC division. GE/NBC has given the IOC billions.
The IOC passed on negotiating a TV deal for 2014 this year because the business/advertising/marketing climate is not good, Tiger Woods is a leverage chip whether Rogge wants to admit it or not. GE will make a bid, Disney (ESPN) figures to also promise big dollars and perhaps Rupert Murdoch and FOX will want in, but Murdoch will need a cable TV network with more pop than the patchwork regional cable sports TV networks around the United States. FOX News Channel will not pre-empt programming for the Olympics although Murdoch does have a bunch of cable networks at his fingertips including FX.
The United States and the IOC are not good business partners. The IOC takes and takes and takes and cedes nothing. The reason that baseball is not in the Olympics competition has more to do with Major League Baseball not bowing to the IOC's demands of having "big name" pro stars in the Olympic competition and probably far less than steroids usage. Simply put, MLB owners and players don't look at the Olympics in the same way that Rogge and the IOC does.
The IOC thinks the Olympics are the end all of sports competition, the pinnacle, except for World Cup Football (soccer). Only a fool and there are a lot of fools that have led the IOC over the decades would believe the Olympics experience is more important than the World Cup and Olympic organizers take what they can get from FIFA in terms of players. Not every great active football player participates in the Olympics. An Olympic Gold in football pales when it is placed in competition with the World Cup. Countries have gone to war over the World Cup qualifying tournament (Honduras and El Salvador in 1969)
America seems to have no sway with the IOC despite being the biggest backer of the Games. There is one other aspect of the relationship between the IOC and the United States that is overlooked. In 2004, who made sure that the Athens Games and the participants in the Olympics were safe?
Not IOC security. Not Greek security.
The cost of defending Athens and Greece between July 2004 and October 5, 2004 when the Paralympics Games ended was estimated to be more than $1.5 billion. Much of that cost was picked up by the United States who at the time was fighting two wars, one in Iraq and the other in Afghanistan.
The Greeks planned to use American Patriot Missiles to shoot down planes or other possible airborne threats if they needed to do so. The United States, along with other countries, had plans to evacuate its athletes in the event of an attack. NATO and the United States supplied spy aircraft, there was a blimp hovering over Athens that was complete with sophisticated sensors. The Greek Air Force flew constant patrols.
Back in 2004, it seemed that intelligence agencies were so sure that some group (not necessarily Al-Qaeda) would attempt to attack the Games that training to stop terrorists has become an Olympic event. In 2002, there were more American boots on the ground in Utah than in Afghanistan.
With all due respect to Canadian military and Canadian law enforcement departments, the United States military and law enforcement officials will be in Vancouver later this fall and winter to help secure next February's Vancouver Winter Games. Vancouver is just quick drive up I-5 and British Columbia Highway 99 from Washington State and there is already a major tightening of the US-Canadian border. The Americans will also be present in the United Kingdom in 2012 when the Olympics stop is in London.
The United States Olympic Committee is involved in a battle with the International Olympic Committee over a proposed USOC channel which would show past Games featuring American achievements along with pre-Olympics events in various sports. The IOC is afraid if the USOC goes ahead with the channel, it would hurt the international delegates' standing with General Electric and NBC and dilute the value of the Games which garners in billions from GE/NBC. GE/NBC has the rights just to the Vancouver Games and the 2012 London event. Perhaps the IOC is worried about the USOC cannibalizing the 2014 or 2016 TV deal which is why Tiger Woods becomes so important.
Softball officials could try again in 2020 but Major League Baseball probably has the right idea in walking away from the Games. There really is nothing that can be gained, baseball has the World Baseball Classic and while it is not on the level of Football's World Cup, it is a cash cow for baseball and they do not have to share the revenues generated with the IOC, a group that seemingly has one hand in the pocket, grasping the wallet of a partner.
Softball is not a cash cow for the Olympics. Where would Rogge and the IOC be without American TV dollars and America's military? That thought is a nightmare but the IOC pushes Americans around regularly. The IOC will take American TV money, accept bribes, although that practice has publicly stopped, use American soldiers to protect Olympic venues but they don't want minor league and college level baseball players in their tournament nor do they want softball. You see neither brings in the currency and cash on the barrelhead is what they IOC is all about, particularly American greenbacks.
Softball players deserved better, they work hard and for virtually every softball player the Olympic competition is the pinnacle but they don't have Tiger Woods on their side and Rogge played rugby. If softball officials wanted to get back at Rogge and the IOC they should schedule their own tournament and keep all of the revenues. If softball is a money generator, the IOC will be back. Money generation, not competition, is the heart and soul and business of the Olympics.
eweiner@mcn.tv
http://www.mcnsports.com/en/node/7496
By Evan Weiner
August 17, 2009
8:00 PM EDT
(New York, N. Y.) --There are quite a few American women athletes who should be fuming at the decision by International Olympic Committee’s Executive Board to keep softball out of the competition in 2016. The American women who play softball are quite good, maybe too good for Olympic competition although Australian women are very good as well and it should be noted that the last Gold Medal Olympic Softball team was from Japan, not the United Sates.
That Japanese team will be the defending Gold Medal winning squad until at least 2020 because softball will not be played in 2012 or 2016. The International Olympic Committee has added golf for the 2016 Games which means they could have Tiger Woods competing and that means extra eyeballs in front of whatever technology will be used in 2016, a TV, computer, cell and a variation of rugby will be played as well. “Rugby seven” features just seven players per side instead of 15 and the matches are shorter.
Golf is played globally and rugby is another widely played international sport but there are four major golf tournaments annually that eclipse the Olympics -- the Masters, the British Open, the US Open and the PGA Championships -- along with the Ryder Cup. International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge is a former rugby player on the Belgium National Rugby Union team. The addition of rugby to the competition means that the International Rugby Board will have to step up marketing incursions into the BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia, India and China, along with the United States and Canada. Rogge and the IOC will give rugby an international platform which could bolster rugby’s profile.
Rugby is a minor sport in all of those countries.
Golf has big names, sponsors that don't worry about mass marketing but go after a specific demographic and there is the Tiger Woods factor. Although Rogge denied that bringing golf into the Olympic family has nothing to do with money, it is hard to believe he is telling the truth. That would not be the first time an International Olympic Committee leader would be stretching words.
The 2014 and 2016 Olympics American TV deal still needs to be negotiated and there is a good case that money and star power, golf and Tiger, triumphed over softball for that very reason. Seven years from now, Tiger Woods figures to still be a prominent player on the Tour, his name is gold to advertisers and frankly the IOC likes every nickel or pence that can scrounge up. It is usually nickels though as the IOC likes mintage or paper with dead presidents and other American movers and shakers portraits or busts.
The big TV money comes from the United States and in the past two decades that meant General Electric's NBC division. GE/NBC has given the IOC billions.
The IOC passed on negotiating a TV deal for 2014 this year because the business/advertising/marketing climate is not good, Tiger Woods is a leverage chip whether Rogge wants to admit it or not. GE will make a bid, Disney (ESPN) figures to also promise big dollars and perhaps Rupert Murdoch and FOX will want in, but Murdoch will need a cable TV network with more pop than the patchwork regional cable sports TV networks around the United States. FOX News Channel will not pre-empt programming for the Olympics although Murdoch does have a bunch of cable networks at his fingertips including FX.
The United States and the IOC are not good business partners. The IOC takes and takes and takes and cedes nothing. The reason that baseball is not in the Olympics competition has more to do with Major League Baseball not bowing to the IOC's demands of having "big name" pro stars in the Olympic competition and probably far less than steroids usage. Simply put, MLB owners and players don't look at the Olympics in the same way that Rogge and the IOC does.
The IOC thinks the Olympics are the end all of sports competition, the pinnacle, except for World Cup Football (soccer). Only a fool and there are a lot of fools that have led the IOC over the decades would believe the Olympics experience is more important than the World Cup and Olympic organizers take what they can get from FIFA in terms of players. Not every great active football player participates in the Olympics. An Olympic Gold in football pales when it is placed in competition with the World Cup. Countries have gone to war over the World Cup qualifying tournament (Honduras and El Salvador in 1969)
America seems to have no sway with the IOC despite being the biggest backer of the Games. There is one other aspect of the relationship between the IOC and the United States that is overlooked. In 2004, who made sure that the Athens Games and the participants in the Olympics were safe?
Not IOC security. Not Greek security.
The cost of defending Athens and Greece between July 2004 and October 5, 2004 when the Paralympics Games ended was estimated to be more than $1.5 billion. Much of that cost was picked up by the United States who at the time was fighting two wars, one in Iraq and the other in Afghanistan.
The Greeks planned to use American Patriot Missiles to shoot down planes or other possible airborne threats if they needed to do so. The United States, along with other countries, had plans to evacuate its athletes in the event of an attack. NATO and the United States supplied spy aircraft, there was a blimp hovering over Athens that was complete with sophisticated sensors. The Greek Air Force flew constant patrols.
Back in 2004, it seemed that intelligence agencies were so sure that some group (not necessarily Al-Qaeda) would attempt to attack the Games that training to stop terrorists has become an Olympic event. In 2002, there were more American boots on the ground in Utah than in Afghanistan.
With all due respect to Canadian military and Canadian law enforcement departments, the United States military and law enforcement officials will be in Vancouver later this fall and winter to help secure next February's Vancouver Winter Games. Vancouver is just quick drive up I-5 and British Columbia Highway 99 from Washington State and there is already a major tightening of the US-Canadian border. The Americans will also be present in the United Kingdom in 2012 when the Olympics stop is in London.
The United States Olympic Committee is involved in a battle with the International Olympic Committee over a proposed USOC channel which would show past Games featuring American achievements along with pre-Olympics events in various sports. The IOC is afraid if the USOC goes ahead with the channel, it would hurt the international delegates' standing with General Electric and NBC and dilute the value of the Games which garners in billions from GE/NBC. GE/NBC has the rights just to the Vancouver Games and the 2012 London event. Perhaps the IOC is worried about the USOC cannibalizing the 2014 or 2016 TV deal which is why Tiger Woods becomes so important.
Softball officials could try again in 2020 but Major League Baseball probably has the right idea in walking away from the Games. There really is nothing that can be gained, baseball has the World Baseball Classic and while it is not on the level of Football's World Cup, it is a cash cow for baseball and they do not have to share the revenues generated with the IOC, a group that seemingly has one hand in the pocket, grasping the wallet of a partner.
Softball is not a cash cow for the Olympics. Where would Rogge and the IOC be without American TV dollars and America's military? That thought is a nightmare but the IOC pushes Americans around regularly. The IOC will take American TV money, accept bribes, although that practice has publicly stopped, use American soldiers to protect Olympic venues but they don't want minor league and college level baseball players in their tournament nor do they want softball. You see neither brings in the currency and cash on the barrelhead is what they IOC is all about, particularly American greenbacks.
Softball players deserved better, they work hard and for virtually every softball player the Olympic competition is the pinnacle but they don't have Tiger Woods on their side and Rogge played rugby. If softball officials wanted to get back at Rogge and the IOC they should schedule their own tournament and keep all of the revenues. If softball is a money generator, the IOC will be back. Money generation, not competition, is the heart and soul and business of the Olympics.
eweiner@mcn.tv
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)