Abstract

The sports departments at newspapers across the country suffer from identity crises. Newspaper editors often consider sports a necessary evil: Sports sections are among the most read, but sports are not viewed with the same respect as other newspaper staples, such as crime news, politics, and business. Add to this the impression held by many editors that sportswriters do not take themselves seriously and sometimes engage in ethically questionable practices, and it is no wonder that sports departments are often looked upon as the "toy department" of newsrooms—an often-used criticism that originated from an epithet by Howard Cosell (1974) that "Sports is the toy department of life."