In what was yet another highly intriguing
encounter, Howard Bryant spoke to our class on April 4th.
He was born and raised in Boston, eventually graduating
from Temple University. Interestingly enough, he started out his journalism
career in at the Oakland Tribune, where he covered technology. During that
time, he spoke about interviewing the likes of Bill Gates, even going as far to
credit the experience for him not being starstruck when covering high-profile
athletes.
After covering technology, he eventually moved over
to sports, covering the Oakland Athletics during the “Moneyball” era. I found
that pretty fascinating. Knowing how much movies can distort the truth, it was
interesting to hear what he had to say on the matter since he witnessed it
first hand. After stops at the Bergen Post, the Boston Herald and the Washington
Post he eventually found himself at ESPN, where’s he’s been since 2007.
He spoke on many things, including how the
landscape of journalism has radically evolved over the course of his career. He
stated that when he was first starting out in the profession, journalists would
be able to focus on one specific area of the craft and work from there.
However, he admitted that in this day and age it is next to impossible to
succeed in this business without being able to a variety of things. Today's
journalist has to be so much more versatile than they would have been ten or fifteen
years ago.
What impressed me the most was Bryant's candor. He
pulled no punches, instead speaking his mind freely. I know that it's a
journalist's job to be opinionated, but certain things he said caught me
off guard such as his position on collegiate sports. I was intrigued by his
position on the state of NCAA Division I basketball in regards to athletes
being financially compensated for what they do and his criticism for the
monopoly of power held by college coaches. He made a lot of very valid points
that made me think.
The part of his message that really hit home to me
was when he encouraged the class to “bet on yourself” at least once in your
life. I found that to be particularly profound. He said this while explaining
the career changing risk he took when he stepped outside of his usual comfort
zone and decided to write a book about the history of African-American players
within the Boston Red Sox organization. It said it was the biggest risk of his
career but ultimately the most rewarding, since it helped get him to wear his
today.
Overall, I found Bryant to be a highly intelligent
and very well-spoken individual and I am very grateful that he took the time
out of what is probably a busy schedule to speak to us. Besides that, this
class has honestly been one of the most gratifying experiences I have ever had
as a student. The opportunity to meet, interact with and ultimately learn from
some of the greatest minds sports journalism has to offer, has been an
extremely rewarding experience that I’ve truly appreciated and will never forget.
No comments:
Post a Comment