©2007 Bonesville.net
All Rights Reserved.
Bloggers beware. The NCAA
is policing the press box at its championship events, and you might be
the primary perps targeted for ejection.
Forget that policy about
no cheering in the press box. The NCAA has bigger fish to fry, and those
pounding their keyboard during live events are prime suspects for
intense investigation.
Just ask Brian Bennett.
The Louisville Courier-Journal scribe was cuffed and stuffed by the NCAA
police for providing a live blog on his newspaper’s Web site during
Louisville’s 20-2 annihilation of Oklahoma State in the baseball Super
Regional.
Because Bennett’s blog
discussed game action — but not play-by-play — it was considered to be
in violation of the multimedia rights agreement the NCAA has with both
CBS and ESPN. In other words, the NCAA doesn’t want anyone competing
with CSTV’s GameTracker or ESPN’s 360 coverage of games.
That’s quite a compliment
to Mr. Bennett, actually. Seems the NCAA fears that his cyber musings
might compromise the excitement of real-time play-by-play in its textual
glory.
Rubbish.
The Louisville
Courier-Journal Web site isn’t so desperate for content that it staffed
Bennett to blog each pitch. But it is creative enough to increase the
entertainment value of a sport that can use any avenue of exposure it
can get.
If the NCAA is seriously
concerned about play-by-play documentation of games it oversees, the
closest competition is the thousands of fan message boards that post
live game threads. And the NCAA has no chance of stopping that.
At least this isn’t the
case at all college sporting events. Though blogging hasn’t been a
common practice at East Carolina, there is no policy stating that it is
off limits at Pirates events, and Director of Athletics Media Relations
Tom McClellan sees no reason to create one.
"Unless someone from a
higher authority approaches us and asks that we curtail or eliminate the
blogging practice from a national, league or organizational directive, I
really can't find a justifiable reason why we would prohibit blogging
from Web sites that are officially affiliated with East Carolina, its
opponent, conferences or those which are considered established and
recognized traditional media outlets," McClellan said.
"Perhaps I'm missing the
boat," he added, "but I'd consider that additional exposure and a means
for our great fans to get added information, insight and a birds-eye
'text-view' for events that perhaps they can't attend."
The NCAA would be wise to
follow ECU’s lead here. Especially with low-profile sports like baseball
that could benefit from the attention.
NCAA fumbles Duke LAX ruling
On one hand you have to
admire the NCAA. With its decision to grant Duke lacrosse players an
extra year of eligibility, the NCAA displayed a contrasting humanitarian
side to its iron-fisted reputation.
But on the other hand —
the objective one — you have to question why it chose the infamous Duke
lacrosse case to play the sympathy card.
In doing so, the NCAA no
doubt avoided intense media scrutiny. The last thing it needs is more
bad press over the perceived notion that it doesn’t have the best
interest of the student-athlete at heart.
A year’s worth of Duke
tuition says that thinking played a huge role in the decision.
As noble an act as it
might be, the NCAA should have denied Duke’s request. Because last I
checked, it was Duke’s decision to cancel its own season, not something
that was unfairly forced upon the Blue Devils’ top-ranked program.
Sure, it’s a nice gesture.
After all, these players did have a full season of competition taken
from them.
But just how fair is this
move to other programs across the country? Not very.
Besides, the NCAA
shouldn’t burden itself with cleaning the mess made by the Duke
administration’s mishandling of the situation.