The disappearing local sportscast, and what can be done to save it

Go watch your local news, wait for the sports segment, and pay close attention.

It's OK, do it. I'll be fine until you come back. Just make sure you intently watch the sports segment. Any local news will be fine, I don't care if they sports guy's name is Joe or Bill or Skip or Big Dogg, it makes no difference (more on that later).

So go watch. I'll be waiting right here.

...

Back so soon? That was quick. All right, now tell me what you remember about it. And not just bland descriptions of the anchor or the set, tell me what really jumped out at you during the sports segment. What story really grabbed your attention?

Hey, don't lie to me! The MLB scores didn't interest you, you already saw those on ESPN.com before coming here (thanks for visiting!). And don't tell me you were mesmerized by basketball highlights from the same angle as when you saw them on FSN earlier.

The fact remains that, for the most part, there is nothing memorable about the sports segment of your local newscast. You know it, I know it, the viewers know it, the TV producers know it, hell, even the sports anchors know it.

It's no secret within the TV industry that the sports segments are being scaled back further and further, resulting in smaller segments of only two minutes, or in some extreme cases, no regular sportscast at all. In fact, in some markets with stations that each broadcast 4 newscasts a night, sports is often only featured in one or two of them.

Sports on local newscasts is disappearing, but it's only because of the domino effect that news stations themselves created. There have been, and still remain, opportunities to make the sportscast relevant on local news again, but it is because of an unwillingness to embrace change, or financial woes, or a decidedly wrong approach by stations, that will make the return of a sportscast an uphill battle.

Local newscasts make their living off the weather.

Nowhere else can people of a given city get such in-depth analysis of their conditions; not on the Weather Channel (which must focus on a whole country), and not online (which doesn't devote itself to hyper-local weather). So, because of this, viewers turn their eyes and advertisers turn their dollars toward the local evening news because of the weather. Ratings and money are made there.

So naturally, a news station will want to maximize off of that fact, putting three weather segments into a half-hour newscast. This, in turn, takes away time for other segments, most likely sports. Sports segments get the lowest ratings, and therefore make the least money, and therefore are the first to get the axe.

BUT, sports segments are routinely low-rated because of the choices made regarding their content.

Looking at multiple sports segments from various local newscasts across the country, it's hard to distinguish one from the other. The stories, the look, and the feeling of the segment never seems to change. In a world that offers more options for sports news that ever before, local sports seems stuck in neutral, doing the same-old, same-old.

First, the stories: As I mentioned earlier, sports segments are getting shorter, which doesn't leave much time to devote to stories anymore. As such, sports departments seemingly give up and pick from the usual, tired stories they tend to recycle. MLB scores and highlights, two plays from a high-school football game, sound bytes from a prearranged press conference or media day. Basically, there's nothing you haven't already seen hundreds of times before. Because of smaller sports blocks or less desire for good stories, sports segments don't do much to make things unique.

Second, the anchors: The stereotype, and often real template, of sportscasters is the loud, brash, cocky type. You know those guys - they usually have a nickname or a catchphrase, but mostly they just have a general smugness about them. Stations want their sports guys to be someone you would "want to have a beer with." Why do stations insist on having these be the guys to give us our sports stories? I wouldn't want to be in a room with one of these guys for more than five minutes, let alone watch their sportscast. What's really important in a sports anchor isn't personality, it's about being able to tell a story through the lens of sports. A good sports anchor makes you care about what you're watching, and thankfully, many stations are moving toward legitimate reporters being the sports anchors.

But again, because of content, there is nothing that viewers will find unique and interesting. Sports segments are short, and there doesn't seem to be a genuine need for in-depth stories anymore.

I spoke once to a sports anchor, and he told me that when he first arrived at his current station, he wanted to do the profile pieces, the in-depth stories, things that people might care about or find interesting. But within months of his arrival, he found that there wasn't time or money to devote to those in-depth pieces.

But would you abandon intelligent, in-depth stories for news? Of course, not. News' essential function is to make the public more informed. So why deprive the public of information about sports?

THERE ARE IMPORTANT SPORTS STORIES OUT THERE, they just need to be found. Of course viewers won't tune in if all you do is scores and highlights, that's why you need to give them something useful and informative, something that shows how sports affects the local community.

In Portland, for example, the topic of the minor-league baseball stadium relocation became an extremely divisive issue among citizens. And yet, the local news limited its coverage into when town hall meeting would take place, or where the proposed sites were. What was missing were stories about the Beavers' history in Portland, stories about the successes and failures of past attempts at building stadiums, stories about residents who would be affected by any relocation attempts.

There are stories out there. Galen Rupp is the biggest star at the biggest track school in the country, let's learn more about him and his upcoming decisions as a professional. Use the medium of TV to show this kid in ways that newspapers can't, like where he gets his extra kick in tight races.

There are stories out there, but dedication and commitment need to be shown by sports departments and news directors to allow those stories to be told.

As it stands right now, in many markets the local sports coverage is limited. These local stations can get closer to their hometown teams and players than any other media outlet can, but we don't see anything unique come out of that access.

I've seen it firsthand, how reporters will go through the weekly grind, asking the same athletes the same questions and framing their responses the same way on TV that night. These reporters, so tired of doing the same thing every day, latch on to any sound byte outside the mundane, not realizing that it is their questions and disinterest that spawns the banal responses. Interesting stories aren't sought out, jettisoned in favor of the easy, the predictable. It's a pattern that continues on and on.

And if the pattern continues much longer, something else will be predictable: the continued decline and disappearance of the local sportscast.

But all it takes is someone with the courage to move forward and embrace the progress of the medium. If local sportscasts want to become relevant again, they must break the pattern of sameness. Take risks on unique stories.

It couldn't hurt.