So you want to know why I thought the McGregor article sucked?
Here’s just one example:
“What the national game needs is more “hockey outsiders” not beholden to the minutiae dispensers. And what all sports needs is more old-fashioned storytelling.
Tell us about the players, please. Tell us how the game is being played. We actually don’t care all that much about minor trades or whether the suspension is four games or six, or how the contract has an average cap hit of $X-million a year. A couple of good insiders can handle that role; it doesn’t take an entire network to chase.”
The games needs more outsiders? Hello??? How many hockey writers are there that you follow? Isn’t that exactlty whar we have today?
What he’s missing is one of the reasons for what he is calling blackberry journalism. Blogs. No, not like this one. Good ones that deal with sports. What’s happened is that the so called experts have had to label themselves as “insiders” because there are so many alternatives out there to what there used to be. Think about it. On a daily basis how many blogs do you read on sports vs. traditional media outlets? There are so many great outlets that create the exact kind of content he claims that we are missing.
Those outlets never existed before. In Toronto alone with the Leafs, Raptors, Jays there are tons of quality blogs which offer the exact type of content that he speaks of. His article ignores that completely.
Furthermore, he may think that we don’t care about minor trades or suspensions, but take a look at popular websites, call in shows and tweets and see just how much activity those types of secondary stories garner.
The reality is that because of modern technology schmucks like me have a voice. Those so called experts get labelled insiders because that’s what they have to hold on to. It’s not so mush their expert opinions as it is their insider information. I mean no disrespect to many of them, but truth be told do you really care about their opinion or more about the information they have?
Honestly ask yourself, when an insider tells you about a rumor do you want to know what he is hearing or what his opinion is? My hunch is that while some may say both, the reality is there are a ton of outlets for opinion. The pressure is on the MSMers to break the stories, to have access to insider information that others don’t have.
Again, just my opinion but the article is off base and out of touch and that’s just one reason. Technology has greatly improved the menu that we have to choose from as sports fans.
TSM