Women are making strides in other areas however that same progress cannot be said the same for those in basketball media. Next people who cover the sport of basketball must be given large roles in the media based on knowledge and credentials not based on being a male or female. Also, women and men play the same exact sport so there is no gap in terms of ability to break down the game, therefore, there must be no disparity in the amount of media coverage from men and women. Women in media for basketball must be given the opportunity to be the focal point as the lead analyst instead of men dominating that role. If women are always secondary in their role compared to men then there will never be an equal opportunity for success, money earned, …show more content…
Women are not given the opportunity to succeed in basketball media like men are. In addition, only 2 of ESPN’s top 25 play by play announcers were female the and none of the females were in the top 20 (Deitsch 1). Women are not given the best jobs possible and can not be any higher on this list because of the lack of opportunity given to them by these network companies. Furthermore, the week 16 schedule of Men’s college basketball announcers list had only 5 out 137 games with women calling play by play and only 4 women Beth Mowins called 2 games that week (Pucci 1). Men dominate the broadcast teams therefore if women want an opportunity they must have longevity or work their way up through sideline reporting, unlike the men. After that, though they still would have very slim chances to call a game as a lead analyst. Continuing now consensus would believe that now the women would dominate the broadcast for Women’s college basketball, however, only 16 out of the 70 games on the schedule were all female broadcast teams (Pucci 2). Concluding that even in women’s basketball men are still as much needed and involved as the women. This does not give women the platform to themselves and give the men the more important role. Women being given the opportunity to succeed is the first step, but then being accepted by the rest of the industry is the next step to equality that …show more content…
Smith an NBA insider and host of his own show ESPN “First Take” earns approximately three million dollars a year (Broder 1). Now Rachel Nichols who is also an NBA insider and host of her own show “The Jump” earns approximately 1.5 million dollars a year (“NetworthBio” 2). There is a clear female to male discrimination in sports media within basketball as both of these people are equal to their job and yet the male earns double of what the female makes. Furthermore, Rachel Nichols cannot be the main part of the discussion on “The Jump”, but needs to have two additional men be the primary focus in the conservation that is happening. The networks who are in charge of these shows do not want women to be the focal point, but to have them be men because they are more dominant and recognizable. Also, Doris Burke who has worked in college basketball and the NBA for the past 25 years with ESPN is relegated to sideline reporter for the NBA Finals instead of being able to call the game. That role is not given her because the broadcast crew is all men even though she has been working for ESPN longer than the other two color analysts. Women can work longer and be more accomplished and still get the secondary role because she is competing against a man for that position. Success has a variety of ways to get their and women by far have a harder time reaching success than men do in the basketball industry for media. Roles must become bigger for women in basketball media coverage.
Turn on ESPN, and there are many female sports reporters, and many reports on female athletes. Flip through Sports Illustrated, and female athletes are dotted throughout the magazine. Female athletes star in the commercials. Female athletes are on the cover of newspapers. Millions of books have been sold about hundreds of female athletes. However, this has not always been the case. The number of females playing sports nowadays compared to even twenty years ago is staggering, and the number just keeps rising. All the women athletes of today have people and events from past generations that inspired them, like Babe Didrikson Zaharias, the All-American Professional Girls Baseball League, Billie Jean King, and the 1999 United States Women’s World
Women have been playing basketball for over a century before the Women's National Basketball Association came into existence. It was here at Smith College where many women got their first taste of the game. Women were described as having a "masculine performance style... rough and vicious play... worse than in men" (Hult 86). This aggressive playing style had to be modified because the violence and rough-housing that was going on were becoming intolerable. Eventually the Official Women's Basketball Rules were modified in that there was no dribbling allowed on the court at all, players were not allowed to make physical contact with each other and women were not allowed to grab the ball out of another women's hands.
Robinson, J., Peg Bradley-Doppes, Charles M. Neinas, John R. Thelin, Christine A. Plonsky, and Michael Messner. “Gender Equity in College Sports: 6 Views.” Chronicle of Higher Education 6 Dec 2002: B7+.
Messner, showed that women’s sports took up only 6.3% of airtime while men’s took up 91.4 %.(1989,2004,p.4). And the hit show Sportscenter was showing men more than women at an astounding ratio of 20:1 (Messner, 1989, 2004, p.4). Also the coverage and the after game interviews are far less than men. They don’t get enough exposure showcase the talent and entertainment of a women’s game. If a man is highly masculine and highly skilled at what he is doing, he gains that respect and popularity so easily without really doing a thing. For men this brings money, merchandise, media coverage, and fans. More fans means more and more money. Which conclusively brings more success to the franchise, and that’s one example why male professional sports overpower female. Women have an extreme disadvantage when it comes to this because they are not popular in means of sporting events, they don’t have as many fans, don’t have a lot of people to buy the merchandise, and they don’t have the money to treat you with a higher salary. You don’t see contracts in the WNBA like you do in the NBA, for example the salary cap for each team in the WNBA is $878,000, while the NBA is $58 million. (Garland, 2012). That is a huge difference for playing the same sport in the same country. This also goes hand in hand with endorsements. Men make millions and millions extra from endorsements which women don’t usually get. For example, LeBron James at 18 years old signed a deal with NIKE for $90,000,000 just because he was good at basketball, Nike is lucky LeBron wasn’t a bust, but you would never see a company risk that type of money with a female athlete that young. (USAToday.com,
In 1970 only 1 in 27 girls participated in high school sports, today that ratio is 1 in 3. Sports are a very important part of the American society. Within sports, heroes are made, goals are set and dreams are lived. The media makes all these things possible by creating publicity for the rising stars of today. Within society today, the media has downplayed the role of the woman within sports.
...ennis, basketball, soccer, and martial arts—have come from the days of cheerleading and synchronized swimming when she was growing up in the ’70s.” Disparities in media coverage and over-sexualized female athletes on magazine covers is something that needs to come to an end because of its effects on both male and female viewers, young and old, athletes and non-athletes. Both female and male athletics influence young people and shape their personality and morals as they mature. Retired WNBA player, Lisa Leslie credits her participation in basketball with shaping her character, as well as her career. “Sports can also help teenagers during an awkward time in their development.” (“Women’s Athletics: A Battle For Respect”). The solution is to come together as a society and identify how to balance the respect for female and male athletes in the media.
Gender discrimination is prominent in every industry, but it is as though the sport industry is one of the worst. Women in the work force currently receive only 80 cents to every man’s dollar (Holmes, 2016). However, female athletes both in America and internationally receive a far lesser compensation for their attributes. The only difference of the sports being played is who plays them. There should be no reason why a male athlete receives better pay simply because he had a 50% chance of being born a man. At birth, no one controls the gender, but as they grow and mature, they control their personality and development. Payment should be on personal skills and not gender. As a female STHM student focusing on sport management and a former athlete,
It has taken many years for women to gain a semblance of equality in sports. Throughout history, women have been both excluded from playing sports and discriminated against in sports. Men’s sports have always dominated the college athletic field, but women were finally given a fighting chance after Title IX was passed. Title IX, among other things, requires scholarships to be equally proportioned between men and women’s sports. Although this was a huge gain for women, gender inequality still exists in sports today. An example of this persisting inequality can be seen when looking at men’s baseball and women’s softball. In college, baseball and softball are both major NCAA sports. It is widely accepted throughout today’s society that baseball is a man’s sport, and softball is a woman’s sport. Very few people question why the two sexes are separated into two different sports, or wonder why women play softball instead of baseball. Fewer people know that women have been essentially excluded from playing baseball for a long time. This paper will focus on why softball has not changed the way women’s basketball has, why women continue to play softball, the possibilities and dynamics of women playing baseball with and without men, and the most discriminating aspect of women being banned from playing professional baseball.
The discrepancies in media coverage in coverage of female and children athletics have large gaps, but are gaining momentum in sharing equality. Major athletic leagues such as the NBA and FIFA World Cup have wide gaps in marketing and ratings for their male and female athletes. Children are future athletes and superstars, but as funding and coverage in athletics caters to the males, women are breaking the barriers to being in the spotlight of sport. Both genders contribute equally to athletics, and challenge the each other to accept new ideas and change. The sports world that has a single gender dominating the media is unjust.
Most people watch some form of sports, whether it be the Olympics or the highlights on ESPN. The NBA and NHL playoffs are underway and theyit seems to be the only news on ESPN. There is almost no coverage of the WNBA playoffs or any female athletics. Tennis isone of the only big sports on ESPN for women. While during the Olympics the coverage seems to be non-stop and close to equal. Women’s participation in sport is at an all-time high and has almost become equal with men’s, however,. sSports media does notfails to show this equality and skews the way we look at these athletes. Through the disciplines of sociology and gender studies, it can be seen that despite the many gains of women in sports since the enactment of Title IX, “traditional” notions of masculinity and femininity still dominate media coverage of males and females in sports, which is observed in Olympic programming and sports news broadcasts.
Female athlete coverage in the media is a complication due to far less coverage than male athletes receive. Statistics show that females already receive less than ten percent of coverage, although this is much more than they received just a short time ago. Shauna Kavanagh said in an article that when she was younger, female sports were never on TV. “All of my sporting heroes were males,” she said. Although strides have been made for female athlete’s, there is still a long ways to go. Kavanagh secondly went on to express that she feels the press does not cover woman athletics imperfectly; they simply don’t publicize them enough. People are still much more interested in ma...
Gender in sports has been a controversial issue ever since sports were invented. In the early years, sports were played only by the men, and the women were to sit on the sidelines and watch. This was another area of life exemplifying the sexism of people in which women were not allowed to do something that men could. However, over the last century in particular, things have begun to change.
In summary, Despite opponents argue, fans want to see thunderous dunks and incredible athleticism over the lesser abilities of females, male competitions is more intense and there is more at risk, and male driven associations produce more revenue than female driven associations. It is apparent that male and females are built differently therefore they have different abilities, females go through the same types of events and often have more on the line, and female athletics aren 't given the same recognition or praise. Then, maybe one day female will receive the same amount of pay as their male counterparts. As, Vera Nazarian once implied, “A woman is human. She is not better, wiser, stronger, more intelligent, more creative, or more responsible than a man. Likewise, she is never less. Equality is a given. A woman is human.”
Even though progress was made in the appreciation of women’s sport and the crowds women’s sports brought In which mean a rise in ticket sells for women’s sport, but the media coverage is still treating women sports as if we were still in the
Way more television sources support and cover the NBA than they do the WNBA. With the money that the NBA gets paid just so these sports reporters can run their stories, they can afford to pay their players more. The WNBA only gets covered by ABC, ESPN2, NBA TV, Lifetime, Oxygen, and NBC, and these stations only run their stories for about 5 minutes where to the NBA they talk about them for hours. When the games are going on you can only view the WNBA regular season games on ESPN, and NBA TV and their finals on ABC (McCullick, 2012), where you can view the NBA regular season games on ESPN, ABC, CBS, NBC, TNT, TBS, and NBA TV (NBA). Even if we could get more sponsors to support the WNBA and more support from the minority community since they are the ones who show the most interest in basketball maybe these women could get a raise in their checks and would not have to have side jobs on the side to live, when their dreams and hard work is not paying them what they deserve to get paid. Half of these women on the court can play basketball just as well as the majority of the men on the court, the only difference that they may have is that the men are more capable of dunking than the women but that does not mean that women cannot do it, because WNBA 's own Candace Parker as known as the female Kevin Durant has proved to everyone that a women can dunk a basketball on multiple occasions during a