This is what I noticed long ago: On sports radio and TV, the sportscasters all say the exact same things, often word for word. It is obvious that the PR departments of most teams simply write the stories or reports and just send them off to the sports departments to mimic on air.
Stay away from the slightest inkling of negativity about a team. Or else. The Maple Leafs steered by Brian Burke are the lead in Ontario, with the Don Cherry revelations coming out of Toronto about Burke trying to get him fired. The Canucks in Vancouver control what is said and who says it. Attested by what happened to Tommy Larscheid recently. He had just too much emotion about the Canucks and didn't hesitate to say when they were just plain bad. But he cared. And even when Brian was here he tried to get writers fired who were way too objective. Control of the media is now the norm.
Witness the revelations coming from the NFL about bounty hits on players. And never a word in the sports sections until players themselves brought it out! And the NBA broadcasting phoney crowd noise at games like laugh tracks on comedy shows, everyone cheering and having a wonderful time if you were watching on TV or listening on the radio .... until the fans IN the arena, watching on their portable TVs wondered where that crowd noise was coming from in a silent game! Did the sports media reveal this blatant cheating by the league? Nope.
And IF you could afford tickets to actually attend a hockey game, haven't you wondered why that music is soooo loud? It is so that no one can ever hear a disgruntled fan yelling at the refs or the team in between plays. To me that used to be part of the fun, the heckling and comments. "Hey ref, you're worse than Eggo!" and "Hey ref, you must be pregnant, you missed two periods awready!"
Silence today is a no no because you might hear fan reaction to Luongo's third goal in the first five minutes!
So in the latest goings on, we saw Cody Hodson traded out of the blue. The rumors persisted that Alain Vignault had a personality clash with Hodson. So he went. And the Canucks' head office, realising they had committed a PR blunder, sprang into action. They blamed Cody's Dad for engineering it. They blamed Cody's agent for instigating it. The said Cody asked for a trade. The Canucks referred to the Cody Hodson 'Camp' butting heads with the team, trying to make like it was one large corporation against another. Trying to make it seem fair and just while they badmouthed fan favorite Cody. But on Cody's minutes-after-the-trade interview, he was totally stunned by the news. Convincing everyone who saw it that it was not a known option to him, or a wanted option.
Of course I use the term, 'the Canucks' instead of naming any particular sports media because it is basically ALL of them who do exactly what they are told, when, where and how. When a sportscaster speaks, he is simply channeling the contrived opinion of the Canucks.
And they blunder on obediently, advertising dollars piling up, burying integrity beneath all that cash. They are signed sealed and delivered by the sports teams.
And the fans are screwed blued and tattooed. No matter what color jersey they are wearing.
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