Diversity in Sport

Sport has come a long way in the field of diversity over the past 50 years.  Athletes are no longer judged on race as they used to be.  However, is the problem solved?  Absolutely not.

Although all races of athletes are now accepted in professional sport, not everything else is.  Coaches, staff, and front office positions are highly dominated by white men, which discriminates against both minorities and women.  Players are still judged based on sexual orientation, which is very apparent with Jason Collins coming out this past week and being the first active professional athlete to do so.  If a woman wants a job in sport, she might as well not look past the WNBA, MLS, or NBA.  Trying to get anything aside from an entry level job from the NHL, NFL, or MLB is highly unlikely.

While the diversity issue in sport is improving, it has much room to grow.  Initiatives like the Rooney Rule are showing effort, but more needs done.

Jason Collins

This week Jason Collins made history by being the first active player in an American professional sport to come out as gay to the public.  As an NBA player, it was both bold and inspiring that he came out while still playing in the league.  This story seemed even bigger to me after being in Diversity Issues and going to the Tackling Homophobia presentation by Esera Tuaolo.  I have seen via Twitter many people supporting and thanking Collins for what he did.  I hope this continues to be the reaction and that the public, NBA, and his teammates support him rather than discriminate again him.  I also hope to see more players comfortable enough to come out in the NBA and other leagues.  These athletes, being role models, have the opportunity to positively benefit our youth and culture, and it is my hope that they take this opportunity to do just that.

Marathon Participation

After the tragic Boston Marathon bombings, I am curious to see if participation in marathons will drop or rise.  I could honestly see it going either way.  Participation may drop out of fear of safety and another bombing/terrorist event.  However, I could also see it going up with people running in honor/memory of the Boston Marathon runners and to show support.  With the Pittsburgh Marathon coming up on May 5th, I'm interested to see who actually shows up.

--Jayme

Disappointing Braves

Overall, the Braves were a bust this weekend.  After such a hot streak and being labeled the "best team is baseball," it could almost be assumed they'd sweep the Pirates in their four game series this weekend.  Thursday night, which I didn't get to watch, was a win as expected.  But from there on nothing quite went as expected for the Braves.

I sat in Elephant and Castle on Friday as I watched them play a pitiful game against the Pirates.  The only highlight was BJ Upton cussing out the umpire on national tv (which later got blurred out when replayed).  But, hey, I found my new favorite player since Chipper retired.

Saturday, when actually going to the game, it was cold.  However, I figured, last night was a fluke, at least it'll be worth sitting in the cold for the win.  And what happens?  Another loss.  At least I got a McCutcheon bobble head, right?

Sunday was yet another loss, which I could hardly believe.  The best team in baseball just lost 3 of 4 to the Pittsburgh Pirates?  Impossible.

But let's look at the bright side - the Pirates just beat the best team in baseball 3 times in a row.  As my back up team, it is slightly exciting to see they're on the uprise and CAN play baseball.

Baseball Weekend

After a long week of exams, lesson plans, presentations, and teaching, I am estatic to attend my first MLB game of the season.  Even better, this game is on Saturday at PNC with the Braves vs. Pirates.  I'm also looking forward to Sunday's afternoon game, too.

After taking the Facility and Events in Sport course, I can't help but think what types of things this organization did to attract me to this Saturday night game.  The opposing team playing is my favorite so I go to at least 1 game everytime the Braves are in town.  It is also Andrew McCutcheon bobble head night, which is attracting many fans.  While I could care less about the bobble head, I do enjoy larger crowds and a better baseball atmosphere.  Another attraction is the nice weather coming up this weekend.  Last, the 7 p.m. game time leaves plenty of time to tailgate tomorrow before the game in the nice weather.

Enjoy your weekend!
--Jayme

Sport & PE

As a Physical Education major, I've recently had the opportunity to be introduced to some new sports and activities through coursework this semester and Mini Convention held on SRU's campus today.

In classes, I have been introduced to angleball, danish longball, gaelic football, and more.  With the right promotion of these sports, I could see them really taking off in youth sports and in the US.

Although I was only able to attend the Mini Convention this morning, I was introduced to SCUBA and Brain Gym activities through sessions.  Lifetime activities like SCUBA seem to be taking off more than team sports at this time.  Parents are pushing their kids to join lifetime sports like tennis, bowling, and more.

Could this be a danger for the popularity of team sports in our culture?  Personally, I think the viewing of sport will be safe for a long time in the US, but participation may drop.

--Jayme

Enough About Ware

Sports news always seem to beat a topic until it's dead.  The story on Kevin Ware is no different.  Yes, his leg break was terrible, one of the worst seen, and grusome.  However, it is being treated as if he suffered a major, life threatening injury on national TV.  From the way people are talking about it and tweeting/retweeting "#PrayForWare" you'd think he developed untreatable brain cancer and full body paralysis while on the court against Duke.  He broke his leg and was on crutches by the next day.  Now, ESPN, let's move on.

Rutger's Coach Fired

Are we getting way too soft in sports?  How do we know when enough is enough?

Today it was reported that Rutgers football coach Mike Rice was fired for verbal and physical abuse.  This sounds extreme and like a justified reason for termination.  However, the physical abuse was shoving and throwing a ball at players and the verbal abuse was gay slurs.

I think the gay slurs needed punishment and need recognized.  When it comes to throwing a football at a player, is that really worth termination?  Sports, especially football, are full of emotion and intensity.  Football is also full of contact - is it that big of a deal that that contact is coming from the coach rather than teammates?  If a player did this, would they be kicked off the team or just punished?

I may not have the entire story and missing some facts, but I feel this is an over reaction.  It's going to be interesting to see if the NCAA begins monitoring many team's practices and what other punishments come from that.

--Jayme

Louisville Break

Seeing Kevin Ware break his leg in last night's Louisville vs. Duke game was painful.  What was more painful was the fact that the replay was aired multiple times following the injury.  From a sport communication viewpoint, was it appropriate to show the replay or should it have been stopped sooner?

Part of me says it should not have been replayed a single time.  It was a very graphic and grusome injury given the fact his bone actually protruded from his leg.  You also don't want to become the station that highlights a college athlete being injured as a form of entertainment.

However, it happened.  The audience is interested.  What if the viewer was up getting a drink and game back to their television and the game was on hold with players crying and stretchers - shouldn't they get to know and see what happened?  Ware wasn't being violated and it wasn't a violent foul or anything.  If someone doesn't want to see it, shouldn't they just turn their head?

Overall, my opinion is that after the first replay (at that point the station probably wasn't even sure what happened yet), the clips should have been stopped.  I think this just because how graphic the break was and a college athlete doesn't need that replayed 100 times on national television.

What do you all think?

--Jayme

Heat Loss

Well, the Heat's 27 win steak is finally over.  While this was no doubt an impressive streak (that'd be an undefeated season for most high school teams), I'm glad it's over.  I think nearly everyone that isn't a Heat fan will agree with this.  I'm not glad they lost because I hate the Heat or even care about the NBA at all.  I'm glad they finally lost because I, along with the rest of America, am tired of that story being the only thing ESPN ever covers.  So now, here's to (hopefully) proper coverage of March Madness!

Homemade Bracket

Last week, I was lucky enough to travel to Florida, Haiti, Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Mexico for the Spring Break.  Unfortunately, this meant that there was no Wifi or computers to get a bracket and print it to fill out on Selection Sunday.  Fortunately, I was able to catch the choices on Sunday and write them by hand before I lost cable connection.  My homemade bracket is shaky, messy, and hard to read.  After the true madness going on during this March Madness, it is also pretty far off already.  Gonzaga and Georgetown losses threw me off, so now I'm just banking on Duke making it the whole way through to win it all.

Go Blue Devils!

Control the Game

As I watched ESPN after the Duke vs UNC game Saturday night, I saw some footage that was bizarre to me.  In a baseball game between Canada and Mexico, there was an all out brawl.  The entire team, coaches, and staff of both teams was in the middle of a huge mob of a fight.  After it was finally broken up, there were some injuries, and they continued on with the game!  I understand that if only one player is in a fight that they should just be ejected and the game played on, but this was everyone!  From the stands, water bottles were thrown at the first base coach and trash onto the field.  This was not only such a poor display of sportsmanship to me, but I feel like the managers at the stadium needed to take better control of the situation and react to it differently!  It just is not something I hope to keep seeing frequently in sport.

Until next time,
Jayme

March Madness App

Happy Tuesday!  While completing the technology assignment for Sport Communication, I came across an app for the iPhone that I think is very cool.  It is called ESPN BracketBound.  It has information about nearly every aspect of college basketball - and only college basketball.  I prefer this to the regular ESPN app because I could care less about the NBA and NASCAR.  There are schedules, rankings, news, video clips, rosters, and more for every single team in every single conference.  After Selection Sunday, which is this Sunday, there will also be features added to create your own bracket for March Madness.  If someone is not a huge basketball fan but still likes to participate in the excitement of the tournament, there is an option for the app to complete a bracket for you based on what you find important (rank, schedule toughness, conference, and more).  This is definitely a very neat app that I will be using throughout March Madness.

--Jayme

See Ya, ______. Hello, ACC!

Conferences in college sports are, in my opinion, an absolute mess.  It was previously announced that both Syracuse and Pitt would be leaving the Big East and joining the ACC for next season.  While this was very exciting to me because Duke will now be playing in Pittsburgh once every basketball season, it all seems absurd to me.  Just recently, it was announced that if Notre Dame chose to leave the Big East, the ACC would accept them for the summer.

The entire concept of conferences needs re-evaluated in college sports.  A team's conference should be based on its location so there isn't all of this switching around.  Of course they can travel to play other teams for non-conference play, but conferences should be based solely on location.  In Pennsylvania, how are Pitt and Penn State in different conferences when they are located this close in location?  Changing the conference system would also save schools a great deal of money on travel and accommodations for the teams.

With all these recent moves and negotiations I don't see the system changing anytime soon, but it is something that should be changed.

--Jayme

March Madness

It is newly March and that only means one thing to many Americans - March Madness.  Personally, March Madness is my absolute favorite time of the Sport Year and I am very excited for it this year.  This college basketball season seems so different than the rest in that the National Championship could go to nearly any team in the Top 15.  Obviously I want Duke to win it all and I believe they can with Ryan Kelly's recent return, but it's exciting knowing the brackets will be crazy this year.  With no undefeated teams and multiple Top 5 upsets, it's anybody's year.  And that's what the madness is really about.

Now I just have to wait for Selection Sunday brackets on March 17th!  Get those pens ready.

--Jayme

Bye, Bye Woodson

As a Green Bay Packers fan, I had to do a double take when I saw on Twitter that the team released Charles Woodson last Friday.  Charles Woodson, arguably the core of their defense, is being released?  After some issues with injury and perhaps his age beginning to climb (he is 36 years old), I can see some room for concern.  That does not mean I like this decision. 

Woodson is hands down my favorite defensive player and I proudly wear his jersey every Sunday.  I'm not sure how many more Packers losses of favorite players I can handle.  Brett Favre, although not Green Bays fault, was a tough blow.  This year Donald Driver, a Packers great, is choosing to retire.  And now Woodson, too?  So God help me if Jordy Nelson is somehow off the roster in the next five years.

Looks like I'll be in the market for a Nelson jersey this off-season and hope that M.D. Jennings or another player can step up to "replace" Woodson.

--Jayme

Gaining Experience

Happy Monday!  I can't believe it's already the last Monday in February.  Over the past few months, I've been trying to focus on gaining experience for my future careers.  Although I've been doing this in various ways, my work at the Grove City YMCA seems to be most influential.

Every Sunday I keep the scorebook and help to run the Adult Men's Basketball League at the YMCA.  Last night, there were issues with the referees, some player attitudes, and uniforms.  The referees were not even close to on the same page and were not working well with each other.  The players spent more of the game complaining about calls and using profanity than actually playing.  And although this is the 5th week, half of the teams still do not have proper uniforms with numbers.  Even though these issues are minor, every week my eyes get opened to what the sport field is actually like.  I'm beginning to learn how to solve problems on the fly and how to communicate with unhappy referees, players, and spectators.  The most important thing that I've learned is my attitude completely changes the solution.  If I am respectful, pleasant, professional, and sincere, people take what I have to say much better and accept it.

Overall, this league, combined with Youth Soccer that I also run, is a great learning experience that will definitely benefit me in the sport field upon graduation.

Have a great week!
--Jayme

Baseball Season is in the Air

Good afternoon!  With this cold, miserable weather still in the air, it's hard to believe that baseball season is quickly approaching.  Team's recently fully reported to training camp and games begin this week.  Granted, this is all going on in the sunny state of Florida, it seems way too early for baseball.

Pirates tickets have been on sale, and I have even secured a few sets myself.  As a normal family in central PA, we have always followed the Pirates.  However, my boyfriend is an avid Atlanta Braves fan, and I've slowly jumped on the bandwagon.  Because of this, every year we go to Pittsburgh to watch the Braves play the Pirates.  This year they play early in the season, and we already have our tickets for the April 18th and 20th games. 

Although I care less about baseball than I do football and basketball, baseball games are one of my favorite events to attend - it's a comfortable, relaxing family atmosphere for a cheap price with warm weather.  So I'm ready for baseball season and all that it brings along to get here!

Countdown?  2 months.  I hope it goes quickly.

--Jayme

Twitter in Sport

Hello, all!  Recently I've been very involved with Twitter, and I've increased who I follow.  I used to merely follow my friends and a handful of celebrities, but my ways are beginning to change.

Twitter is a great source for quick, up-to-date info regarding sports.  Teams have made Twitter accounts and someone updates them nearly play-by-play.  The combination of being a poor college student without cable and a very busy college student forces me to miss more games than I would like.  By following Duke Blue Devils Basketball on Twitter, I get updates every few minutes on the game.  Whoever updates the Twitter lets me know the statistics of players having a good game, overall score, and any injury information.  Prior in the week/day, it also lets me know exactly when Duke is playing and what network it will be airing on.

What better way is there for a sport fan to keep up with their team than on Twitter?  It's an app that is already used daily and doesn't involve me downloading a new app to clog up my iPhone screen.  That's the best of both worlds if you ask me.

Happy Tweeting!
--Jayme

Duke vs. UNC

This week is ESPN's Rivalry Week in men's college basketball.  The Duke Blue Devils vs. North Carolina Tar Heels is always a popular game during Rivalry Week, and this year it did not disappoint.  With Duke doing better than originally expected (least by me) and the Tar Heels having a poor season in ACC play, I expected a little more of a blow out.  However, with Ryan Kelly out and the rivalry atmosphere, it proved correct that anything can happen.

Luckily, Duke came out with the win after trailing for a majority of the game.  Seth Curry pulled through, but Ryan Kelly was still missed.  It will be clutch if he can be back for March Madness.

The last seven games of the season will continue to be exciting with Duke seeing teams like Miami, Boston, and Maryland.  And what other way is there to end the season besides a Duke vs. UNC rematch?  The next month of college basketball will definitely continue to be exciting.  The most exciting part? March Madness.

--Jayme

Organization Tactics

We are constantly asked what important traits of sport managers are.  Characteristics such as good communication, leadership, motivation, and the ability to work long hours always are named.  Another important characteristic named, which is helpful in every career field, is organization.  As college students, it is hard to remain organized.  In particular, I am especially busy this semester.  In one day I have 6 classes, a 3 hour shift at the Grove City YMCA, a shift on campus with the Accredidation Coordinator, and homework.  Between all that, I need to find time to eat and exercise, too.  How can it be done?

I found a great organizational tool in Google Calendars.  With Google Calendar, you can create multiple calendars for every chapter of your life, change the colors of events based on topic, set alerts, and even share your calendar with others.  On top of all this, you can sync the calendar with an app on your cell phone and have it at your fingertips at any moment.

Personally, with Google Calendar I put my work schedule on one calendar, classes on another, and due dates on yet another.  Then, every day I can overlap them so all three may be viewed at once.

Overall, it is a great organizational tool to keep organized.  As future sport managers, organization is a trait that must be conquered now.

Have a great day & stay organized!

--Jayme

Duke Solution

Happy Wednesday!  Do you know what the best thing about this Wednesday is?  Duke men's basketball plays NC State tomorrow night at 9.  Do you know what the worst thing is?  As poor college students, my roommates and I don't have cable.  I knew there needed to be a solution for this problem.

After missing the first 3 games of the season, I found the solution - xfinity.com.  Because my parents have Comcast xfinity, we also have an online account.  I recently found that I can log on to their website and it streams channels like ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3, and ESPNU online!  If I don't feel like watching it on my small laptop screen, I can even connect my laptop to my TV with an HDMI cord and watch it full size.

With this solution, peace is restored and it is back to a happy Wednesday. Isn't technology and online streaming great?

--Jayme

Nice to meet you!

Hello! Jayme, here.  This is my second blog, but my first about sport.  My original blog was created on Blogger for Technology Education in Physical Education.  I was led to my first blog as a Health and Physical Education major at Slippery Rock University, just as I am led to this as a Sport Management minor in Sport Communication.  It is my goal to keep up better with Sport by Jayme than I did my last one.

Here's a little bit more about me.  At the moment, I'm 21 years old.  As previously touched on, I'm a junior Health and PE major and Sport Management minor at Slippery Rock University.  I plan to teach either elementary PE or secondary health classes.  However, I can also definitely see myself working at a YMCA, which is where the minor comes into play.  Most of my time is spent on schoolwork, but I am also employed by the Grove City YMCA as an Afterschool Youth Supervisor.  I orginially took the position to gain experience in a sport environment with youth, but it really opened up my eyes to other career choices throughout the YMCA organization.

Throughout the semester, I hope to touch on topics that range from sport communication and media to current and new technology. 

I look forward to having you back to view my posts & feel free to comment!

-- Jayme