Anyone who watches sports can see the futility of the halftime interview with coaches and players. The time frame for such interviews is often limited to a matter of seconds, a practically useless amount of time to glean anything intriguing. Making the job even more difficult is the unwillingness of the subjects on most occasions to offer even a glimmer of insight.
Those fleeting moments are usually the only times in which sideline reporters are given any significant airtime during games. Occasionally they will be tasked with providing an injury update, or will be brought in by the commentators to give some background information on a player, but even those tasks are fairly menial with little value or added information that the viewer isn’t already aware of.
And yet, the lack of purpose in those moments might not be the most disheartening thing about the sideline reporting job. Watch any game on a large sports broadcast channel like ESPN, FOX Sports or CBS Sports, and the likelihood that a woman is relegated to working the sideline is a near lock. It’s not as if the women are untalented or don’t have any experience either as someone like Holly Rowe, who has been in the industry for decades and has actually managed to bring some depth and color to the sideline interview even with the limits of the job, has yet to get any sort of promotion while her male counterparts continue cycle through the top job openings as broadcasters.
The lack of gender diversity in the upper echelons of sports journalism is nothing new, but it does not make the numbers any less disappointing. According to the 2019 Women’s Media Center annual report, only 10% of sports reporters are female. Off the top of my head I can only think of three women consistently in national broadcasting roles, A.J. Mleczko for NBC Sports’ hockey coverage, Doris Burke for basketball on ESPN and Jessica Mendoza who also works at ESPN covering baseball. Of those three Mendoza is the only one on what would be considered the “A” broadcast team.
There are a multitude of unfounded reasons as to why women have a much harder getting into sports broadcasting. As with any industry that has been male dominated for so long there is always an immense amount of backlash whenever women are finally given their shot. There seems to be belief among some circles of sports fans that women are incapable of comprehending sports terms or tactics and are therefore unable to properly commentate on a game. But, the most restrictive bind placed on female sports journalists is the unwillingness of their bosses to make the leap to put them in broadcasting positions.
It seems unlikely that the sports landscape will experience sweeping changes in terms of its demographics any time soon, but that shouldn’t continue to serve as a deterrent to keep qualified women out of positions they have earned. As with any sort of change there will be pushback and criticism, but if it means a more competent, knowledgeable and charismatic commentating team that is hardly a price to pay.
J4804 Laird 