WEC 41 Scrambling for Coverage, Local Print Media Blissfully Ignorant

by Mike Fagan on Jun 6, 2009 6:57 PM EDT in News Comment 16 comments

When we discuss MMA penetrating the mainstream consciousness, we really only refer to the UFC blowing up. We shouldn't be surprised when ESPN and other sports media conglomerates snub a big WEC or Strikeforce card. But shouldn't local print media take an interest when a big fighting event comes to town? Especially when said event features a charismatic local in a monster title fight rematch?

Steve Cofield at Cage Writer has been in Sacramento this week and says the local sports page has high school pole vaulting and PAC-10 rowing on the front page:

This is not meant to smash most of the poor people working in the newspaper business. Their publishers and editors haven't changed with the times. Which includes becoming more internet based and finding ways to get folks under 60 to read the paper. When it comes to sports is there a better way to grab the 12-to-34-year old audience than MMA? Yet on the Saturday before WEC 41 at Arco Arena with a local boy, Urijah Faber headlining the card, the Sacramento Bee didn't even do a story on the event. It gives us a notebook-style piece explaining what WEC and MMA are, and a few qutoes from the fighters. The story is on 6C of the sports section. Keep in mind, Sunday's card will draw upwards of 12,000. Stories deemed front-page worthy over the WEC with a local star in the event: WNBA (three stories), girls' high school pole vaulting and the Pac-10 rowing championship.

...

Before you say MMA isn't mainstream and doesn't help the bottomline - ad sales. I work at a mainstream radio station, doing a mainstream radio show. ESPNRadio1100 and Lotus Broadcasting in Las Vegas finds a way to mesh programming and the bottomline in covering MMA. The Las Vegas Review-Journal just assigned Adam Hill to be the first full-time MMA witer in the country and the Las Vegas Sun posts 10-12 stories a week on MMA. I'm not saying MMA is going to save a paper or a sports section but the lack of coverage represents something bigger - newspapers are still operating with a 1975 mindset. Enjoy all the Belmont Stakes coverage this weekend!

Like Steve said, MMA won't save your fledging news company. The point, however, lies in the mindset of paper editors. Are they making conscious decisions to ignore MMA events or are they simply that out of touch with the times?

0 recs | Comment 16 comments | Share

Story-email Email Printer Print

Comments

I haven’t bought a newspaper since 2004.

Keep firing Assholes!

Out out, you demons of stupidity!

by Ubernoober on Jun 6, 2009 7:02 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs

You better buy a copy of USA Today or I’ll ban your ass.

http://www.sackmikegoldberg.com

by Mike Fagan on Jun 6, 2009 7:11 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Where the hell would I find a copy of USA today in Moose Factory?

Keep firing Assholes!

Out out, you demons of stupidity!

by Ubernoober on Jun 6, 2009 7:14 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

You might want to consider moving to civilization.

http://www.sackmikegoldberg.com

by Mike Fagan on Jun 6, 2009 7:21 PM EDT up reply actions 3 recs

This made me laugh…

by Reaser16 on Jun 6, 2009 7:32 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

RIP Print Media

You’ve had a good run, but now you’re showing your obsolescence.

Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better. -Samuel Beckett

by themachiavellian on Jun 6, 2009 7:12 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Just would like to make a point

That I believe that the WEC might have to shell out coin to get coverage in the local print media by way of licensing or other fiscal agreements.

I know when the Chicago Wolves won last year, the coverage was minimal but growing. Yet, they had already won the Calder cup twice with next to nothing coverage.

Just a thought for all of you to chew on…

by JAYGK95 on Jun 6, 2009 11:10 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Illinois has wolves?

by natyong on Jun 7, 2009 5:23 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Well...

Since the induction of ESPN they have been hiring notable sports writers from all over the U.S. to write for them pre-internet and post-internet. ESPN has shomwhat of the same mind set of Mainstream Newspaper, did you see Madchida’s KO of Evans on the top 10? Even the bottom line sidebar only give UFC main-card results, not MMA results like the bottom line says. MMA dosn’t even have their own segment. Not surprised, any new idea people have these days gets put up on the internet.

by EVeezy on Jun 6, 2009 7:32 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

i live about an hour and half from Sacramento and our local papers have had a few articles about this sundays fights. Nothing Major other than announcing when, where and who’s on the card.

by asmiley420 on Jun 6, 2009 7:57 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Suprisingly i have not seen anything about Strikeforce.

by asmiley420 on Jun 6, 2009 7:58 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I live in Sacramento

The local paper fired half there journalist earlier this year and unfortunately kept the bad ones. Still Cofield is an idiot. WEC has been plastered all over Sac’s biggest sports radio station for a two weeks, it’s not a little radio station . . . the freaking thing covers a huge area and even gets good play in the Bay Area. This WEC has been way more hyped than the last WEC in town, in fact any MMA event to come to town.

by bignerd on Jun 6, 2009 10:51 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Who reads newspapers?

Their lack of coverage is meaningless. They exist for the >50 folks.

by MMARich on Jun 7, 2009 1:07 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

They shouldn't that's the problem.

"Respond intelligently even to unintelligent treatment."

-Lao Tzu

by RoyalB on Jun 7, 2009 4:12 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

You're wrong.

More people read newspapers (online and off) now than ever before.

They just ain’t buying a dead tree version of old news, and unfortunately, there’s a real ‘we have limited space to work with’ mindset in the editorial ranks, even online.

If you see Mark Coleman in person, drop $5 on the floor and watch the fun as he tries in vain to bend down and pick it up.

by Ozzz on Jun 7, 2009 5:39 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I can speak to my own situation at a big city paper.

I cover MMA a bunch. But I do it on top of my existing duties, because I give a damn about it and think it’s a huge untapped market.

It took (as I think I’ve written here before) me sneaking into the newsroom on a weekend and putting UFC stories on the website without permission (after being told not to) to show them the size of the audience and get the green light to submit MMA stories for print.

But recently we got a new sports editor and that person just doesn’t like MMA. No rationale to it, the person just isn’t going there and no matter what I submit, no matter how I ask what they can use, I’ll open the sports section and find softball, high school track, horse racing, even sledge hockey.

All I can get of MMA these days is a small box at the back of the sports section that says “for total coverage of UFC 98, go to our website at…”

It’s got to the point where I look for ‘fitness’ MMA stories so I can get something in the Life section, or political MMA stories so I can get them in News.

Editorial board is behind it large. But one person isn’t, and that stops everything.

Oh, it also doesn’t help that, when we do print an MMA story, we’ll invariably get a letter to the sports editor from some idiot complaining about a minor point they disagree with, saying things like, “If you can’t find someone who knows what they’re talking about on MMA, don’t even bother printing crap like this.”

People don’t write about stuff they like. They only write about stuff that pisses them off. And those letters dictate all.

If you see Mark Coleman in person, drop $5 on the floor and watch the fun as he tries in vain to bend down and pick it up.

by Ozzz on Jun 7, 2009 5:46 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs