Women's Sports Blog

More Holiday Tales

Joe Posnanski is the Mechelle Voepel of men's sports journalism, probably the highest accolade I can bestow (and oddly both of them cover Kansas City).  In this post, he uses the release of the new Strat-o-Matic Negro Leagues set as the background to a meditation on history and memory. 

From The Archives: Chris Evert

I just like this.  I have no idea why.  Leaving aside the dearth of women awarded the 'sportsman' honor, which I've talked about before, it seems ridiculous that Woods has won it twice but Manning and Federer have been left off the scoresheet.  Giving it to Jeter in a year when Federer won the career slam was a classy touch. 

 

The photo is the cover of Sports Illustrated's 1976 Sportswoman of the Year cover, and it depicts Chris Evert in a long, white, Victorian tennis dress and straw hat with red band, brandishing an old wooden racquet in a parlor-type setting complete with ferns. 

It Sucked, And Then I Cried

The downside to the deep emotional investment that true fans put into their teams is the soul-crushing despair that can ensue when things go wrong.  In a second, you go from living for the team to not wanting to live anymore.*  I apologize in advance for the triggering effect this will have on readers' own unhappy sports memories.  The interesting thing is how many of the first ones that came to my mind involve men's teams, which I ostensibly care less about.  I haven't followed the Pacers for years, and the Mets have pretty well run their organization into the ground. 

7. The four point play by the Knicks against the Pacers in the 1999 conference finals.  My mother had just asked me 'is there any way they can come back?' and I told her there was almost no chance because they'd have to hit a three and get fouled. Thereafter followed the most bullshit continuation call in the history of basketball.

6. Kenny Rogers walks in the winning run in the '99 NLCS against the Most Hateful Team In the World, the Braves (bigots and wife-beaters welcome!).  Later Rogers turned out to be a totally unpleasant human being as well, so I don't feel bad for threatening to choke him whenever I hear his name mentioned. 

5. The pre-instant-replay, last-second touchdown thrown by Jim Harbaugh in the 1995 AFC championship game against the Steelers.  With review, I believe we would have been awarded the points and gone to the Superbowl.

4. Erika Valek misses open, game-tying layup in waning seconds of March Madness game '03 vs. Georgia.  This would have ranked higher, but I had left the room already because I couldn't bear to watch the final possession. 

3. The goddamn Steelers win the 2005 AFC championship after Peyton Manning fails to get the team close enough for a gimme field goal and Vanderjagt misses the one farther out.  Made ten times worse by the fact that I was watching the game with a good friend who is a huge Steelers fan, and we were both too polite to make it enjoyable.  I vow not to watch another Colts game until they make the Superbowl. 

2. 2009 soccer championship tying goal disallowed on offside, compounded by being forced to endure the obsequiousness sweepstakes that is media coverage of that creep Anson Dorrance and his insufferable, Yankees-like program.  Cat Whitehill inexplicably kissed enough UCLA butt that I knew to keep the sound off when she was actually commentating on her own team.  

1. 2001 NCAA basketball title game final shot.  Enough said about that. 

*This is excluding those frustrations that occur over time, such as the fact that the Patriots owe the Colts three AFC playoff rematches in which they are not allowed to cheat.

Rest In Peace, Mike Penner

It is my profound hope that if there is such a place as the next world, transgendered LA Times sports reporter Mike Penner will find in it the acceptance that eluded him in this one. 

ESPN's Body Issue: Poor Start

ESPN has put all six covers on the website, and two out of the three women are presented in a sexualized, passive, swimsuit edition type way (including a deliberately unthreatening photo of Serena), whereas none of the men are.  Two out of the three men are only photographed from the waist up, for instance.  They look like 'bodies' as one might see on a weight machine ad.  The Gina Carano image is at least actively engaged in sport, but her being topless doesn't make sense in context.  The most interesting image is Adrian Peterson's, because he's photographed in a non-typical pose for a male athlete.  It's reserved rather than aggressive.  But even he, who is photographed full-form, is wearing shorts!  In other words, the mens' sexuality gets to be implied whereas the women's must be on display and available to the viewer. 

Announcers We Love: Terry Gannon

Gannon is like the anti-matter version of Beth Mowins.  He covers every possible women's sport, maybe because he's one of the few men for whom it's a calling rather than a demotion, and I never get tired of him.  Classy and respectful are two ways to describe his play-by-play, a genre which often turns into a game of 'who can be the most intrusive?'  He's a straight guy who regularly calls ice skating well, for pete's sake.  It's a shame that ESPN no longer covers the LPGA.  He was soundly missed during the Samsung Championship, where the male announcer was competing with himself for the most patronizing and qualifying statements about women's talent ("My god, there are these women, and they can actually hit the ball!  But not as well as men, of course"). 

A Reflection On British Coverage of Euro '09

We are not the only nation to have an adversarial relationship between the news media and women's sports.  British correspondent Katharine reports on Euro '09's reception, with a few editorial changes by moi since it came as an email.

    Since you noted England's progress in the European Championships a few days ago I have been meaning to comment, but was waiting for the denouement of the tournament which came agonisingly last night.  Despite the loss this did represent something of watershed in coverage, though not as much of one as if they had won unfortunately.  But, England versus Germany in association football is an old, old story and that alone should have justified or guaranteed interest in this match even if the tournament as a whole left a lot to be desired in terms of the coverage it received.

A Pleasant But Unsurprising Result At The Open

There is a small enough number of tennis-playing women who have been number one in the world, and a smaller group still of those are under thirty.  Add to that a decimated draw, and you have a Clijsters victory.  It's not like she's some hick from the sticks.  She's a champion who played like one, and in the main didn't have to face too much competition to do it.  Shame on U.S. Open.org, as well, for deciding the most important thing about her victory was that she was "the first mom to win the Open since Evonne Goolagong."  If her child wasn't actually being carried around by her on the court while she played, it's not relevant enough to go in the headline.  It's not as if she's a single mother who had to work while she trained, and lord knows there are actually a number of those in other sports.  The headline story is that her talent is totally unabated from two years ago, and perhaps even greater since mentally she seems much more determined now that she's seen life on the other side and decided it's not that keen. 

The real surprise was Del Potro.  It's particularly unusual in that Roger rarely blows matches; his opponent generally has to beat him, but he crumbled in the fifth. 

How Is It Any Of Our Business?

Very disappointing quality of reportage from Jon Wertheim.  If Melanie Oudin is the athlete, why are the details of her parents' divorce relevant?  Especially to Sports Illustrated?  Just because something is a matter of public record doesn't mean it must be tracked down and published automatically.  It must have been hard enough for her and her sisters to go through that, without it being reported in the media. 

Bud Collins Wants You Kids To Get Off His Lawn

Usually the Times roundtable discussions get at least a few worthwhile points of view in, but yesterday's piece on how to improve tennis was a total dud, beginning with the absence of women (the Deadspin blogger was considered more valuable).  But the height of the silliness came from Bud Collins, a man who with his every public utterance seeks to prove he was past his sell-by date twenty years ago.  If you've ever seen a match from the wooden racquet era, you know that they were slow, ploddy affairs.  They may have looked more artistic to some, but at the expense of athleticism and excitement.  Swimming has done the sports world an incredible disservice by making it seem feasible to turn the clock back on technological advances, and it's now being cited as an example of what tennis ought to do in a return to the wood racquet.   I don't know how you can be taken seriously as a commentator and not see that we are living in a golden age of the men's game.  It would be nice to have a few more pure serve-and-volleyers, but as a comment on the post pointed out, Roger Federer already uses the smallest racquet available (he sure makes tennis seem unartistic, right?) and giving everyone wooden racquets could possibly flatten the field, which I don't suspect anyone wants. 

Bud goes on to the double-header by bemoaning the shrieking epidemic in the women's game, which is about as boring a sexist trope as you can find.  Annoying?  Yes.  Ruining the game?  Get a life.  You need only to look at the comments to see that it's being used as an excuse for misogyny of all kinds.  The one good suggestion found there is to slightly shrink the women's court, which would provide them with court coverage equal to the men's and perhaps improve the level of play across the board.  This has worked in other arenas and I've always wondered how it would look in soccer, as well.  But in the final analysis, if it's got record attendance and record-breaking performances, don't fix it.