Sunday's N.Y. TIMES MAGAZINE featured a special issue
called "Bizball," devoted solely to the sports industry.
The issue came with four separate covers -- since the
"sports industry is coming at us from all directions" --
featuring formally-dressed CURTIS MARTIN, ALLAN HOUSTON,
LINDSAY DAVENPORT and JOHN SMOLTZ. Among features from the
all-sports issue: Harvey Araton wrote on, "The New Rules Of
The Game: A Murderers' Row of Media Barons Is Stepping To
The Plate, Providing Sophisticated 24-Hour Sports Coverage
While Shunting Average Fans To The Television Sidelines.
But As The Money Piles up, So, Too, Do Worries About Fair
Competition, Loyalty And Fan Alienation." ALAN DEUTSCHMAN
profiled News. Corp. Chair RUPERT MURDOCH and his FOX SPORTS
NET, which Deutschman wrote "raises a variety of troubling
questions about the nexus of big sports and big media."
DAVID SAMUELS profiled agent SCOTT BORAS under the header,
"The Most Hated Man In Baseball." BUSTER OLNEY profiled a
meeting between Orioles Owner PETER ANGELOS and three
Orioles fans who had never met the team owner. Asked how to
curb salaries, Angelos said, "When owners get together, they
hope they can reach an understanding -- not collusion, but
an understanding -- that we've got to hold these levels
down. Then, when they go their separate ways, a great
player becomes available and all of that understanding and
careful consideration of expenditures goes out the window.
You've seen that happen with the Chicago White Sox, you've
seen that happen in Florida. ... There's an ego factor
there." In his profile of NBA Commissioner DAVID STERN, NBC
Sports Chair DICK EBERSOL said he speaks to Stern 300 days a
year. BRUCE SCHOENFELD wrote that the NBA is "widely adept
at shaping media coverage of its teams and players" and that
league employees "scour newspapers, monitoring the quotes of
players and executives, and they don't think twice about
punishing the messenger." The magazine's final piece had
MIKE RUBIN profiling ESPN (N.Y. TIMES MAGAZINE, 10/18).
