The Modern Journalist

Straight to the Source: A Sports Story

One of the arguments I’m making in the book is that news organizations need to find a way to remain relevant in a world where every content company — regardless of what kind of content — can create a service that reaches directly to readers.

We’ve seen some of these effects in television already. The NFL Network, for instance, formed so that the National Football League can work towards leveraging its product — football — directly with its consumers. Obviously, the league makes tons of money from networks bidding to show the games; however, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that we will someday live in a world where all the games are shown on an NFL-owned network (both television and online).

If that happens — if the information from the league is centralized in one place — sports departments will need to find a way to stay relevant. I don’t think that will be difficult, but it will certainly mean taking a look at how they operate.

Which brings me to this press release, which showed up in my RSS feed thanks to PRNewswire:

Major League Baseball fans continue to access MLB.com and the 30 club sites on their mobile devices for the latest baseball information, including news, real-time scores and live pitch-by-pitch accounts, in record numbers. This past Saturday, the MLB.com network of mobile sites recorded 11.9 million page views, marking the first time a single day surpassed 11 million page views.

This is, I think, a big deal.

Right now, I don’t have cable since all the networks and most of the cable channels stream their shows online. But Major League Baseball also allows me to watch any game — except the one that is blacked out in my local market — for just a few dollars per month. I spend most of my time at MLB.com and not ESPN or my local paper.

I go straight to the source.

That doesn’t mean I don’t care what my local paper has to say about the Reds, but I haven’t read one word about the team at the site. I’d rather go hear from experts who can put my team in a context beyond just what is happening day to day.

I don’t think I’m the average user, though, since I spend more time online than most people; however, it will cause a problem at some point because — while newspapers continue to struggle with attracting eyeballs — younger readers and tech-savvy readers will increasingly seek out the most direct source of information, assuming the content is solid.

What’s even more concerning is that national networks — like ESPN — are beginning to creep into the local market as well.

In other words, news organizations need to plan for how they can outdo national organizations that have the money and the inclination to build national, local networks.

I’ve discussed what a modern sports section might look like in the Newspaper 2.0 section of the blog, but it will require an overhaul of thinking on the part of papers before it’s too late.