Being in the national spotlight was difficult and a little Several of the writers said, "I wonder what's up with that.". We shagged foul balls, but in retrospect, I guess we were more decorative than functional. Portis said he thinks a female reporter who has the access to see male football players naked is bound to get turned on. Some summers we went to 20 games; others we went to about 56. I think you'd need to show that male reporters are not allowed into female locker rooms to show a double standard. I had been lobbying for this for a long time, so when the opportunity presented itself, I said Id Check out some of our favorites so far. I got home, took a run and cleaned up and dressed for the ballpark, grabbed my go bag with computer, lipstick, notepads, pens, hairbrush, Altoids, and antacids and headed down I-30 to see what flak awaited me. SAGAL: We'll be back in a minute with more of WAIT WAITDON'T TELL ME! Why? A, while he was gone, the club had viewed the classic Monty Python Dead Parrot sketch and decided Mr. Palin was too vulgar to be readmitted to the premises; B, he got back to London but couldn't be readmitted because he was poorly dressed; or C, he tried to drive himself to the club in central London but got lost? Its basically the same interview, over and over again, Islanders forward Anders Lee said Monday, taking off his pads in the corner of the locker room. He starts parading around the locker room with his buttocks exposed, saying Gitte over and over again, Eskenazi says. But instead, the man who is an idol to thousands of children launched into a verbal tirade loudly insulting my intelligence and shouting for someone to remove me from the clubhouse. But now it was late September, and my editor wanted me to interview Mr. October about what it was like not to make the playoffs. It was supposed to be about the fact that I had some negative things to say about my early work environment. They gave me all the weird stories. I'll always remember that no one else laughed, for whatever reason, and that made me feel good. They said they weren't selling those yet because they hadn't been tagged. Please enable JavaScript to experience Vimeo in all of its glory. Kids at the tanning salon want to know if I date the players. That's when a security guard came up to me to ask why I was there. Or go back to feature writing. So, 35 years ago, Herman and another woman a Montreal radio reporter, Marcel St. Cyr gathered with other reporters after the game and walked in to conduct postgame interviews. teams to grant her access and not all agreed quickly. [4] One player, Zeke Mowatt, "fondled his genitals" in front of her. But the road has been anything but smooth. Like, I understand getting the whole story for your readers. There are postgame press conferences and media availability throughout the week. But some paranoia lingers. (She had tried to do the same thing at the Boston Globe, but could not get past security.) The Star-Telegram phone began to ring. / CBS News. For eight months, the editors refused to assign me any stories. For most of the guys who hang around for more than three dates, my job suddenly becomes a problem. Even in the relatively overlooked NHL, the New York Islanders draw about 30 journalists a game. He remembered my chatting him up at lunch on Media Day, when I sat next to him and Brian Cushing and asked why the punt coverage was so porous with players not staying in their lanes, and how he was going to improve his turn over margin. From a New York Times obit by Richard Sandomir headlined "Robin Herman, Who Pried Open Doors in the NHL, Dies at 70":. or "You haven't written any good stones in the last month. That's before they tell me I don't have any business in the locker room. Three female reporters were denied access to a NFL locker room this weekend, because of their gender. The one thing that keeps you focused in a locker room is simplethese guys are not wearing clothes, and the only way you can identify who they are is by face recognition. So everyone's kind of shuffling around. As I steamed over this, I took a shot of courage (a cold Starbucks Caf Latte) and pondered my circumstances. Eskenazi recalls an episode from the New York Jets locker room in 1988, when defensive end Mark Gastineau pulled down his pants to show Eskenazi a tattoo on his hind quarters reading Gitte, short for then-girlfriend Brigitte Nielsen. But this was something else. Gayle Gardner began working for ESPN in 1983 as a SportsCenter anchor, becoming one of the first women to regularly anchor a nightly network sports broadcast. I feel like because we get paid so much money, and were such macho dudes that everybody is like, fuck em.. We never wanted for anything we really needed, but my parents, raised in the Depression, were cautious about spending. Good God, all I had wanted to do was cover sports. SAGAL: And some of the players were like, wait a minute, we don't want girls in here. He carried me to the back of the outfield wall and climbed the slatted boards with his right arm and clutched me in his left. But I can understand the athletes being naturally uncertain what to make of women, of me. I'm no wimp; I can take a lot. There were reporters all around the lobby of the downtown Hyatt, waiting for coaches to arrive after a golf game. Alrighty then, time to search out the first player I wanted to talk toUSC quarterback Mark Sanchez. And it's OK to spit your sunflower seed hulls on the floor. For years I was hopelessly mired in phone answering and score taking, watching as others in similar positions moved up and on. I had to think as much about how to handle the next unwanted advance or suggestive quip as I did trying to figure the Mavericks' averages. While all this was going on, I began helping out with Dallas Cowboys sidebar articles and weekend coverage of the Rangers. When men gather at bars and golf courses and any of the other traditional salt licks for male bonding, do they ask the gynecologist what Mrs. Holcombe's hooters look like? Scoreboard: Caps Ovechkin Outdoes Pens Crosby and Malkin, Rangers First Pick Is One With Ties to the Islanders, Devils Work a Trade So They Can Select Brodeurs Son, Islanders Make Deal With Wild Before Selecting a Defenseman in the First Round. TAFOYA: But still, tune in each Sunday night. However, Briggs thought otherwise. I was covering the minor league team in Wilmington, Del., one night. I remember hiding in a tree outside a North Dallas bank waiting for an SMU running back because we had heard this was where he picked up his money. He was from Venezuela or the Dominican Republic, and guys from way south of here often start their careers as young as 16 or so. I can't remember the number of times I've picked up the phone in the sports department, answered some trivia question, and, when the answer didn't win the guy a bar bet, had the caller demand, "Put a man on this phone." Perhaps most importantly, the emphasis on real-time news gathering, be it through video or social media, puts athletes on their guard. Once, after they'd let me try my hand at writing for a year or so, editors told me I'd never make a writer. 1950) is an American sportscaster who worked for ESPN and NBC Sports beginning in 1987 until 1993. But on top of it being my first foray behind the red door, I was scared because of who I was interviewing: a superstar with a surly streak. So I remain cautious, probably overly cautious, about appearances. Logic says they might not. Or at least made me feel that way. As of 2013, she was working as a freelance writer.[1]. As it stands now, the NFL allows female reporters in locker rooms, but only after games. when she asked if he'd like brown gravy or cream. She also was a national columnist for AOL's FanHouse sports website, and a columnist and the first woman in Sporting News' 120-year history to write the magazine's monthly back page. Vikings fans got to agree with that. Hell, why do these guys need to come into the locker room to ask questions anyway? One of my greatest honors. I'd heard the stories: the tales of women who felt forced to make a stand at the clubhouse door; of the way you're supposed to never look down at your notepad, or a player might think you're snagging a glimpse at his crotch; about how you've always got to be prepared with a one-liner, even if it means worrying more about snappy comebacks than snappy stories. The only way a female reporter can do her job in a locker room is if the players don't look at her as a chick. I began experiencing panic attacks and became practically addicted to the antianxiety drug Xanax, buying it from bartenders and acquaintances when my prescriptions ran dry. I noted being in the middle of the room when a player came out of the shower, spotted me, and turned around and went back in. SAGAL: And is this something you always wanted to do? The hockey teams locker room isnt as rancid as expected. Sometimes I take a seat in the dugout, where a few of the guys are filtering in, grabbing bats and bubble gum. September 19, 2010 at 2:43 p.m. TV Azteca reporter Ines Sainz was uncomfortable with catcalls she received in the New York Jets locker room as she waited to interview quarterback Mark Sanchez . SAGAL: Actually, it was B with George Washington. The game was boring. Half the cost of the team's fine was to defray instructional materials the league could send to all teams and players, and Tagliabue wrote a letter to Kiam expressing his belief that the incident had "damaged" the league. You take a right turn before you have to walk straight into the naked men and the soap. Female sports reporters reveal the dark side to sport locker rooms FEMALE sports reporters reveal the dark side of reporting on male-dominated sports. And this was so long ago that the guy who opened the door said lady in the locker room. Take the blanket no-comment dished out by Dallas Cowboys star and alleged domestic abuser Greg Hardy after a game last year. I try to explain, which is difficult because Donna and I are on different sexual wavelengths. You're the person they throw down to as SAGAL: And you've got the reports in the sideline, well, this guy's injured, well, this guy feels this way. I seriously considered taking a job as a researcher for a law firm. Build a site and generate income from purchases, subscriptions, and courses. And now the game where we ask people who've achieved great things questions that diminish all their achievements. So is it awkward for you? Ball on the reporter in female nfl locker room change to. from Indeed, athletes are increasingly coached on what to say to reporters in interviewsand what not to say. You're the sideline reporter. We've invited you here to play a game we're calling SAGAL: OK. Reporter Beth Ruyak stands holding a mircophone in front the NFC Locker Room before Super Bowl XXV with the New York Giants against the Buffalo Bills. I kept saying, Im not the story; the game is the story,' Herman said, reflecting on the night. He ran into a dark office where I found him hiding under the desk. I was a common sight in and around the Rangers digs in those days, so it was no longer like I was some rookie, afraid to speak my mind. We were a middle-class family of four with one kid just a few years from college and another a few years from kindergarten. Its a bizarre world that weve come to live in. Nope, in fact, I was invisible. NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said Sunday that the league and the Jets began looking into the situation when they were made . Not sports writing, but the best of every column written in the state that year. She was 70. No one seems to know when the first female Equipment . Now, one of the first all-men gentlemen's clubs in America was the Schuylkill Fishing Company of Philadelphia, a club that played a minor role in Revolutionary history when what happened there? I think I may have actually gained some respect in various journalism and sports circles. In 1973 she was hired as the New York Times' first female sports reporter. A feature on the woman who washes the Rangers' clothes was not out of the question. Olson was born and raised in the metropolitan area of Phoenix, Arizona. The other was a first-person piece about the last game at Arlington Stadium. Team dressing rooms are typically open to journalists before or after practices and games. [7][8], Eventually, NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue ordered an investigation under the aegis of former Watergate scandal prosecutor Philip Heymann;[5] the 60-page report concluded that Olson was "degraded and humiliated." I had enough natural talent, I felt certain, that with one high heel in the door, I could work my way into a writer's jobmaybe even someday cover baseball. But I couldn't back out. We all just kind of deal with it, says Jenni Carlson, a columnist for The Oklahoman and self-described shorter person who fights to see and hear her often giant interview subjects. I really want to be as unobtrusive as possible, so I will turn away from someone who is dressing or, if I have the time, wait until he has put his shorts on before I approach. I said, "Well, you better get used to it now, because there are women all over clubhouses in the big leagues. The repetitiveness and intensity of the format can be more frustrating. "I am done, but I don't want him to think I am leaving because of him.". "It's the same as a man in the locker room to me.". A female reporter conducts post-game interviews with members of a men's soccer team in the locker room. Were you a football fan growing up? Ludtke could gain access to baseball clubhouses to cover the World Series in 1978 and she wrote an Op-Ed piece for the Times when the New England Patriots were harassing Lisa Olson, a reporter for the Boston Herald at the time. Olson sued the team, and the players she implicated were fined by the NFL after its own investigation. Tell Me When It's Over is an interview series in which we ask former athletes about the moment they. A small band of medianormal-sized humanstries to keep out of half-naked players way as they dip behind a curtain sporting the teams logo and into the showers. David Cone, Wells's teammate, gave Olson and Marchiano Wells's address. Herman, though, found herself a part of a much larger moment, a wider-ranging battle for equality in the workplace for women. The access is great, but it does create some very. And here I'd been hoping for a controlled rollout on this thing. All-Star Game in Montreal. [1], In 2013, Olson's incident with the Patriots was addressed in the documentary Let Them Wear Towels, part of ESPN Films' Nine for IX series that commemorated the 40th anniversary of the enactment of Title IX. Whats more, players are increasingly media empires in and of themselves, lessening their incentive to cooperate with journalists. That seemed like such a dumb thing to say. to that woman.". I wrote management repeatedly. Phyllis George Brown, a former Miss America winner and the first female sportscaster to work at a major network, died on Thursday after complications from a blood disorder she had developed. It seems logical to me. Do you go into the locker room? And yes, he gave me a pat on the shoulder afterwards. Raffy said, "Hey, he wants to talk to you," pointing to Kenny Rogers. When the day finally came that she would break down a huge professional barrier, Robin Herman did not have much time to prepare. It is the sports leagues and teams that decided interviews were to be It's the reason I'm a sportswriter, and I learned it from my dad. It was At the same time, though, I dont think getting a glimpse at a players brat and potatoes is included in the information-gathering process. It's like having a male gynecologistif he's fairly comfortable doing his thing, it makes the female patient fairly comfortable. I wonder how these female reporters and staff would feel showering and changing with men in their locker room? Since I watched hockey as a kid, it was always this way.. Whoops! Several were guys who had been my superiors at one time or another and were just so gushing with their praise. Now almost everyone had stopped watching football and was watching me and Reggie. A few feet in, I realized a hall ran in front of the showers. When you've interviewed a 17-year-old mother whose daughter was stillborn for lack of prenatal care, how tough can it be to talk to a young pitcher who's lost to the Angels for lack of run support? No less than two or three times a home stand, the feeling hits againalmost always as I walk down that tunnel from the upper deck that spits you out in back of home plate. [10], After the incident became public, Olson was subjected to harassment by fans of the Patriots. During my first four years at the Star-Telegram I took one day off to model at an auto show and five days off to get married. That first-person ode to Arlington Stadium was entered in a contest. I'd actually never been in an NBA locker room until last winter. Herman was a hockey reporter covering the New York Islanders when she and another female reporter were allowed to interview players in the locker room as their male counterparts were commonly permitted to do . SAGAL: All right. Thank you for visiting Slap Shot. Some simply called me a "stupid bitch" and hung up. Ines Sainz: NFL Investigates Jets Sometimes I'm kind of quiet in a group interview, and I have this feeling other reporters will think it's because I'm a dumb ol' girl. many of her friends were going through similar, if much less public, struggles in fields like advertising and law and medicine. And theyre very conscious that everything they say could get out.. A female reporter conducts post-game interviews with members of a men's soccer team in the locker room. Copyright 2013 NPR. SAGAL: B, George Washington himself went on a three-day bender there. TAFOYA: No, it is, but the emotional rollercoaster of being a fan, it's just not worth it. Of the latest scores and many to. Dressed in a pair of virgin white flats, I trudged through the Arlington Stadium tunnela conglomeration of dirt and spit and sunflower seeds, caked to the walkway like 10,000-year-old bat guano at Carlsbad Cavernsdreading the task before me. Property. That's something he'd say to anyone, I realized. "Jenn," he asked, "do you want to be treated like an 18-year-old kid or a woman?". Ms. Olson was reporting on the New England Patriots in 1990 when she was sexually harassed in the locker room. The Major League Baseball season counts nearly twice as many, while the shorter NFL campaign sees much more focused media attention. Fugitive in $18 million COVID fraud scheme extradited to U.S. Hunter who killed, skinned pet dogs says he thought they were coyotes, Ex-Georgia star Jalen Carter was racing in deadly crash, arrest warrants allege. I don't have a radio talk show yet, but I now make my living writing about sportsat the moment, mostly the Texas Rangers. Michele Tafoya, welcome to WAIT WAITDON'T TELL ME! A collage on the walls above them shows newspaper headlines and media coverage of famous victories, ringing the small dressing room like a halo. Instead of saying so-and-so is a good player, and heres a quote, I include some Vines and GIFs to show why hes so good, says Kevin Trahan, who writes for Vice and SB Nation. Actually, I tell them, one of the most peculiar side effects of my job is that it seems to run off men in personal relationships. Get two questions right, and you win our prize. 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