To be sure, the Covid-19 pandemic has affected virtually every aspect of American life over the past year.
And one of the significant victims was sports — scholastic, collegiate and professional — not because they were more important than public health, feeding communities or small business survival, but rather them being a source of escape for so many home-bound people.
Eventually, the games returned, albeit in empty arenas and stadiums early on, later with fractional numbers of fans.
But also impacted was the sports media, both print and broadcast.
AS NOTED in this space back in September, for the first time in 48 years, I was not credentialed for Bills home games. The NFL had decreed that Buffalo needed to drastically reduce numbers in the press box, which normally holds between 200-250, including media, stat people, club personnel, scouts, etc.
A friend in media relations, who sympathized with my situation, sent me a seating chart which contained 54 names for the season opener. The press covering the Bills consisted of print, radio and TV people from Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse. There were no small- or medium-market newspapers or broadcast outlets. Yet, in my mind, there wasn’t a single member of the team’s credentialed press corps ahead of whom I deserved a seat.
And the impact, in my case, was minimal. No 135-mile round trip to Orchard Park meaning no game story because I wasn’t there in person. Instead, I merely wrote a column and notebook — sans dateline as that infers presence at the stadium.
There was no access to the postgame locker room so I was no different from those in the press box, getting coach and player quotes via Zoom call.
No Bills beat writer attended a road game this season until the AFC Championship Game in Kansas City where the Chiefs let a small percentage of fans into Arrowhead Stadium.
Buffalo’s radio crew — John Murphy and Steve Tasker — did every game on the schedule from the Bills Stadium press box, the away contests via TV. Tasker replaced regular analyst Eric Wood, who couldn’t come to New York from his home in Kentucky all season, due to quarantine restrictions.
ST. BONAVENTURE broadcasters Gary Nease and Don Scholla did the home games from the Reilly Center but called road contests watching TV in the WPIG studios.
And though the Bonnies had six RC games televised nationally, while the satellite truck and production crew were all there, the announcers weren’t. They broadcast the game either from the network studios or their homes.
Times Herald Sabres beat writer Bill Hoppe has been doing his interviews by Zoom all season and another friend who covers the team for a website does his game stories from television using virtual comments from coach Ralph Krueger and the players.
“And,” he told me, “I defy anyone to say they could tell the difference from if I had actually been at the arena.”
But he admits, as do virtually all of us who cover college or pro sports, Covid-19 has already amplified an ongoing problem. Both levels are consciously trying to reduce access to players.
WHEN I first started at the OTH in the mid-70s, after Bona games we’d talk with coach Jimmy Satalin in the training room as he sat on the edge of the whirlpool. Then we walked into the locker area where players were getting dressed and talked to whoever we wanted. If the star of the game wasn’t particularly eloquent, we’d just go to a teammate for comment about the performance.
These days there’s an interview room where the coach and a player or two sit at a table in front of a logoed backdrop.
Part of it, of course, is circumstantial. In the Satalin days, video was limited to 16mm movie cameras whose film then needed processing — videocams had yet to be invented — and women covering men’s sports was in its infancy.
Still, what’s gotten lost in recent years is face-to-face interaction.
These past 12 months have been an aberration because of the pandemic and the necessity for virtual interviews. But that doesn’t change the fact teams prefer to limit access to players, so that we don’t find out after practice — even off the record — who doesn’t like the coach, who’s going through the motions or what’s caused the recent losing streak.
That’s mostly true on the pro-level as social media-emboldened players are much more comfortable expressing their opinions. Thus, I guarantee, there are plenty of media relations-types who love the limited access created by Covid-19’s virtual interviews.
THEN THERE’S the law of unintended consequences.
In a recent edition of Editor and Publisher, a respected media magazine, it was revealed that in the second quarter of 2020 newspapers experienced a 42% drop in advertising revenue while local TV ad money fell by 24%.
It also pointed out that in the year of Covid, 37,000 members of the media were either laid off, furloughed or lost pay.
E&P also indicated that since the pandemic started, 56 newspapers, five magazines, three digital outlets and one radio station have folded. It’s a poorly-kept secret that, in the past 12 months, print and broadcast outlets are hemorrhaging advertising dollars, severely jeopardizing their futures.
It occurred to me, given what’s happened over the last year — broadcasts without announcers onsight, stories written off TV — the corporate view might be ‘Why send media people on the road, paying room, meals, airfare or mileage, when they’ve already proven they can cover events remotely?’
Assuredly, that conclusion hasn’t eluded media outlet decision-makers.
(Chuck Pollock, a Times Herald senior sports columnist, can be reached at cpollock@oleantimesherald.com)
