Will sports editor answer: Where did bowling coverage go?

[AlwaysWrite]

Will a newspaper sports editor be willing to respond to questions about why his sports pages no longer contain any bowling coverage whatsoever?

http://www.examiner.com/article/ope...where-did-bowling-coverage-go?cid=db_articles

 

[jeff.clark]

Well, I'm not a sports editor but I would guess that most sport editors report what the majority of people are wanting to read or watch. These people are driven by demand and the sad truth is, there are fewer people in the masses that care about bowling in any aspect, reading or watching. The ones that do now are dieing off, this increasing smaller group of people are not being replaced by younger viewers. This is also true about replacement bowlers for those like me. I'm 52 years of age and I have noticed over the last 25 years fewer and fewer youth bowling as compared to the late 60's and early 70's.

When you have dwindling participation, it want be long before you get dwindling coverage of a sport.

 

[AlwaysWrite]

Dear Jeff:

I understand your point about printing what the majority of people want to read. HOWEVER, that doesn't begin to explain why a newspaper will run 2,200 column inches of local golf scores while, at the same time, not publishing so much as a single column inch of local bowling scores.

No one will ever convince me that listing the names of 12 people competing in a local golf best-ball or scramble should have newspaper publicity, while the same newspaper won't devote even a line to a local bowler who rolls a perfect game or an 800 series.

Further, the newspaper continues to cover local tennis, and I can guarantee that tennis -- especially in this area, dominated by senior citizens -- in nowhere near as popular as bowling. And the newspaper also has no problem in sometimes publishing up to 20 inches of soccer results, including soccer matches from Germany, The Netherlands and elsewhere.

 

[jeff.clark]

Bill,
You make very good points and I agree it's a crying shame. However, there must be a reason why and we can all only speculate as to what that reason is.

My thought is, since we can't get sport editor's to reply to this I can only assume it's not the sport that's the problem, it's the people. It's unfortunate that most americans don't have high opinions of people that bowl, it's like we are 2nd class citizens. Take movies or TV shows for instants, on the few times bowling is involved, people in bowling centers are portrayed as classless, mocked and made fun of and considered trash. It boils down to image, bowlers as a whole has been lowered to the level of trash. No one wants to see it or talk about it.... It's not true and is sad.