Athlete-Driven Media

Overview

Athlete-driven media refers to the strategies provided by a wide variety of digital platforms through which professional (and amateur) athletes can communicate directly with their fan base. Sports itself is a global industry whose estimated net worth ranges from $75 to $100 billion annually. Although fans support particular sports and follow entire seasons toward a championship in that sport and maintain fanatic devotion to particular franchises, what principally engages fans are the athletes themselves, their skills, their personalities, and their backstories. Athletes, whatever the level of competition and whatever the sport, are among the most high-profile individuals in a contemporary culture that regards sports as a major entertainment industry. The most successful athletes themselves are seen as role models. Although this elevation of athletes into larger-than-life cultural icons depends largely on their prowess, their athletic skills, the intensity of their competitiveness, and their ability to lead a team to wins and championships, in the digital age that elevation can be greatly enhanced (in some cases, tarnished) through the vehicles of instant mass communication. For example, personal blogs and vlogs, Twitter, Snapchat, YouTube, and Facebook as well as dozens of popular websites and platforms that have been launched in the twenty-first century dedicated exclusively to providing athletes themselves with a forum through which they can actually interact with their fan base in real-time. It is difficult to underestimate the reach of social media among fans and players both. What has emerged is the reality that athletes, both major figures and lesser known players, depend on fan support to enhance their own short- and long-term earnings potential and to help determine their status within their sport. These athletes do not need to rely on public relations firms to generate buzz about their careers or on their own franchise management (whose support may prove fickle) or even on sportswriters and/or radio and television commentators; rather athletes have seized control of that process by using the reach and accessibility of social media outlets to define their own public image and, in turn, to control the course of their own careers.

The emergence of athlete-driven media is relatively recent and reflects the exponential growth and impact of social media. In less than a generation, social media itself has entirely reshaped how people get information. Social media has emerged as the go-to process through which people learn about their world. In addition, social media outlets provide people with a way to share in the news as it unfolds and to provide feedback, sometimes quite emotional, as a way to create a sort of community support group, a way to connect to others and to become a part of that event in real time. Digital natives are particularly adept at media devices and comfortable within the virtual environment created by such communication platforms; many are also uncertain and even indifferent to more conventional print media forums such as newspaper or magazines. Such outlets seem slow, encumbered by presentation protocols and painstaking fact checking, and, obviously, they require the additional focus and diligence required to read information. Even television can seem slow compared with digital platforms and, given the perception that news outlets on television and radio can be controlled and directed by that particular outlet's biases, digital platforms provide feeds that are immediate and seemingly unfiltered. Perhaps most important given the mobility of the digital age, social media platforms can be accessed virtually anywhere, anytime.

Virtually every ancient civilization lionized athletes and recognized their prowess in arenas with spectacular shows of passionate support, yet the modern awareness of athletes as a critical element of a culture's definition dates back only to the middle of the nineteenth century. With the emergence of leisure time coupled with the advent of print media and an educated reading audience, newspapers and later general interest magazines that covered sports allowed those unable to attend sporting events to feel part of the team, part of the sport. In turn, sportswriters created buzz about the team and generated interest in the week-to-week campaign toward a championship. A sporting event needed a narrative, needed a storyteller to give the plays and the players a sense of plot and conflict. These sportswriters often filled a role as grand chroniclers of epic showdowns and took seriously the work of creating colorful accounts of the sports. In addition to their literary skills, these writers came to wield real power. Impress a journalist, get in good with the press, and the publicity shaped a career. Players became characters—their identities shaped by the sportswriters, who over nearly a century of unchallenged dominance made decisions about which athletes would be heroes, which would be villains, which would be spotlighted, which would be ignored. Team management and sports executives came to recognize that power and courted journalists in an effort to maintain a favorable public profile, to enhance their team's earnings potential, and to take advantage of an ever-widening national and then international spectator base.

With the advent of television, this coterie of sportswriters considerably expanded and became a dominant force in sports. Sportscasters themselves became celebrities; their opinions dominated public conversations; they controlled the profile of players and coaches through interview questions and profile pieces. If players refused to play along with sportscasters, if players believed their athletic skill and prowess, commitment, and passion for the game were more important than answering questions or kowtowing to print and media journalists, those players paid an enormous price. Even legendary figures who maintained hostile, contentious relations with the media—among them most notably Ted Williams, Jim McMahon, Barry Bonds, and John McEnroe—were dogged by the label of being spoiled, arrogant, sullen, childish, and bratty.

The athletes themselves had no direct outlet to speak for themselves. They relied on journalists to ask the questions, to edit the answers, and to create around that information a larger narrative that shaped how the fan base and even the general public would perceive the athlete or assess blame or accord credit for that win or that loss, that series, that championship, and ultimately that career. Fans, no matter how informed or how passionate, were passive consumers of that information, relying on the filter of journalists to shape their opinions, feedback that could be voiced only in the relative privacy of home, work, bars, or at the ballpark or sports arena.

Applications

By taking advantage of social media outlets to communicate directly with their fans, athletes have claimed an unprecedented opportunity to control their own public profile and to create a sense of community with their fans. Numerous sites have given high-profile athletes the opportunity to provide longer pieces, in-depth interviews or human-interest features about life on the road, for example, or profiles of family life, journals of conditioning or recovery from injury. The sites might offer a forum for athletes to speak out on sports issues or offer insights into community charity work they perform.

The dominant vehicle for athlete-driven media is the tweet, a short message in Twitter designed to capture an idea or reaction or to provide fans bits of behind-the-scenes news, most often shortly before a game or immediately after. Tweets are a flexible medium, and because they are so concise (originally 140, then 280 characters), they have immediacy. According to a 2015 University of Florida study, the majority of sports journalists and athletes in the four major revenue sports—basketball, football, baseball, and hockey—use Twitter. By the 2020s, sports journalists were expected to report events in real time via tweet. Tweets can celebrate outstanding plays, recognize team work and individual effort, share insights about game strategy, inform fans about injuries, buoy emotions after a loss, and excite a fan base after a crucial win or before a make-or-break game. More and more, athletes use the strategy of social media outlets to enhance their position on the team or to announce imminent trades or free agency decisions, or even to announce their retirement before print media, television, or, in some cases the team's own management office, know. Social media can provide a sport coverage and publicity around the clock, year-round, largely eliminating the concept of an off-season. Even at the collegiate level, many blue chip athletes, often kept within an isolating environment on campus, use social media as a way to create critical ties to their own college nation.

Whatever the moment, whatever occasions the communications, social media platforms such as Twitter connect fans with athletes. Even sports franchises, print publications, and sports networks (radio and television) maintain a presence on social media as a way to tap into that massive fan base. The athletes themselves dominate social media.

Viewpoints

Digital platforms provide athletes the chance to communicate directly with fans. In turn fans themselves become involved in the public conversation about sports, tweeting opinions so they can interact with other fans around the world in real time, even in some cases while the game is actually going on, offering their own take on how best to execute the game. Given the license and freedom of expression within the virtual environment, fans can celebrate heroic plays, fault athletes they perceive not to be working to their potential, and critique team management or coaches.

Fans can also directly assess player performance. No longer are athletes insulated from fan praise or criticism. No longer is "trash talking" an athlete confined to game time. One of the elements of athlete-driven media is that athletes themselves must perforce develop a thicker skin, be more resistant to carping critics, the retrospective wisdom of so-called Monday morning quarterbacking, and general trash talk. Indeed, given the open accessibility to athletes through social media platforms, athletes themselves have to guard against succumbing to "trolls," those anonymous social media agents who post deliberately incendiary comments designed to provoke an unguarded response from high-profile athletes as a way to embarrass them, influence their performance by getting inside their head, or even embroil them in a PR nightmare. Some athletes who have been targeted include Olympic competitors who are trolled during the Games, for example Simone Biles was forced to withdraw from several events for her mental health in 2021. When she was later named the athlete of the year by Time, trolls were highly critical.

Trolls are not the only problem with athlete-driven media. Social media communication can become a distraction. Although team management, front-office game officials, journalists, and even fans frown on it, athletes sometimes tweet during games, on the sidelines or in the locker rooms during breaks. Shots of players on their phone during a game creates a feeling that players are more interested in their public profile than the business of competition. Given the accessibility and immediacy of social media, players are more likely to vent ill-considered opinions. Players have used social media to make ill-advised pronouncements about a game, or the team's management, or other players, comments that have led to friction within teams. Given the evolution of athlete-driven media, athletes are now using social media platforms strategically in a way calculated to create positive branding as a way to improve contract negotiations or to enhance their own visibility for potential sponsorships and endorsement deals. Perhaps the most serious charge against athlete-driven media is the concept that such mass communication platforms ultimately favor individuals over the team or even make individuals bigger than the sport itself.

In addition to social media platforms, athlete-driven media has come to include more deliberate and more substantive websites that have provided athletes themselves with a voice. These websites include The Players' Tribune (launched in 2014 by Hall of Fame Yankee second baseman Derek Jeter), UNINTERRUPTED (the media platform started by Lebron James, perhaps the most recognized and most interviewed athlete of the new millennium), and Unscript'd (which was acquired by The Players' Tribune in 2018). Each provides a forum for in-depth pieces, many written by the athletes themselves, that give particular insights into the sport as well as the athlete. As Jeter wrote in the mission statement for his site, "The Players' Tribune aims to provide unique insight into the daily sports conversation and to publish first-person stories directly from athletes. From videos to podcasts to player polls and written pieces, The Tribune will strive to be 'The Voice of the Game'" (qtd. in Gregory, 2014). Such sites are designed to provide athletes a chance to speak without fear of being taken out of context, misquoted, or judged. In addition to providing expert commentary on sports and the challenges of the profession, these media platforms give athletes the opportunity to voice their opinion on a variety of controversial issues, most notably racism in sports, gender discrimination and sexual harassment, as well as issues about politics and social activism as a way to use their celebrity and their position in sports to raise awareness and promote causes.

Bibliography

Brison, N. T., Byon, K. K., & Baker III, T. A. (2016). To tweet or not to tweet: The effects of social media endorsements on unfamiliar sport brands and athlete endorsers. Innovation: Management, Policy & Practice, 18(3), 309–326. Retrieved May 23, 2018 from EBSCO Online Database Academic Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bsu&AN=119231088&site=ehost-live

Gregory, S. (2014). Dull Derek Jeter's new site could actually be cool. Time.com, 1. Retrieved May 23, 2018 from EBSCO Online Database Academic Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=asn&AN=98679635&site=ehost-live

Sanderson, J., Frederick, E., & Stocz, M. (2016). When athlete activism clashes with group values: Social identity threat management via social media. Mass Communication & Society, 19(3), 301–322. Retrieved May 23, 2018 from EBSCO Online Database Academic Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sxi&AN=113744369&site=ehost-live

Smith, L. R., & Sanderson, J. (2015). I'm going to Instagram it! An analysis of athlete self-presentation on Instagram. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 59(2), 342–358. Retrieved May 23, 2018 from EBSCO Online Database Academic Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bsu&AN=102916064&site=ehost-live

Thamel, P. (2017). The stream teams. Sports Illustrated, 126(4), 62–66. Retrieved May 23, 2018 from EBSCO Online Database Academic Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=asn&AN=120960492&site=ehost-live

Tian, Yu, Pengfei Yang and Desheng Zhang. (2023, Jan.-Dec.) The relationship between media use and sports participation behavior: A meta-analysis. Digital Health, 9, https://doi.org/10.1177/20552076231185476

Young, M. (2021, September 2). Simone Biles fires back at Twitter trolls. Chron. Retrieved June 27, 2022, from https://www.chron.com/sports/article/Simone-Biles-responds-Twitter-trolls-twisties-16430837.php