The ruckus over the Florida Gators being back in the NCAA Final Four made for a bad week for Art Paradise, a Florida State fan who swore to stop reading the paper until after the tournament’s final results are reported Tuesday.
The final straw was the Times-Union’s call for photos of “Gator babies” in orange blue garb, which appeared on Page A-1 beside the announcement of the Times-Union-sponsored pep rally.
“I know this is a big deal, but plastered on Page 1 every day?” said Paradise. “Now we’re going to have to put up with baby pictures? What’s that all about?”
There were other critics as well, but if my inbox and responses to a query to our E-Mail Interactive Group are an indication, a lot of readers really liked the coverage. Even the contrived elements went over well, although there was some resistance to putting so much about basketball on the front page.
“This is a huge story that has been very well covered,” said Bobby Briggs, who may be a serious fan.
“If my house catches fire Saturday, I will drag my 56-inch HDTV outside, plug it into my neighbor’s outlet and ask the firefighters to hold down the noise. Get ‘er done, Gators!”
“I find it refreshing to have something else to focus on for a little while besides the ‘real’ problems of the world,” said Margaret Baylor, who was pulling for the Gators to repeat as national champions. Baylor confided that even her cat enjoys watching college basketball.
“It is really great that the Times-Union has been instrumental in fostering the spirit of unity across the region for the Gators,” said Gus Viera. But others had a different opinion about whether that was a proper role for the newspaper.
“As talented as the basketball team is, your coverage has been way overblown, far too fawning and shortsighted,” wrote Chuck Day. “It has created such a perception of favoritism and biased coverage that your sports department will be hard-pressed to defend its space allocation and decisions for years to come.”
My own view, shared by some in the newsroom as well as expressed by some readers, is that parts of the coverage were over the top – especially in how it was played – in part because there wasn’t always sufficient substantive information to merit the amount of space consumed.
A Tuesday A-1 package about the difficulty of getting tickets to this weekend’s Final Four in Atlanta was the kind of story that’s usually relegated to sidebar status (a few tickets were available for sale on the Web).
Most of Thursday’s page A-1 was consumed by facts and trivia about the four schools in the Final Four. Interesting, but should that take up most of the front page?
A Thursday teaser atop page A-1 asked “Do Gators Prefer Gatorade?” and sent readers to a large graphic in sports that revealed four out of five fans in a blind taste test liked Gatorade better than an alternate sports drink, Powerade.
Of three Gator players questioned, one preferred Gatorade, two had no preference. More than one-third of a page was devoted to revealing the preferences of eight people.
Those observations aside, this is a big story of importance to a lot of readers, and the newsroom brought creativity and enthusiasm to the task while reaching to provide more than traditional coverage.
Thursday’s look at how UCLA once dominated college basketball’s record books, for example, was one of several compelling efforts during the week.
Among their faults is that newspapers are too boring on too many days. The ready, fire, aim approach to providing a little fun and excitement while engaging readers in the story has been refreshing. Some would like to see the enthusiasm carried to other stories that beg for attention.
“If only they would put that much time and effort into really important community issues, such as growth management,” said Kay Ehas, a fan who generally liked the coverage.
“I guess the paper believes it can be a cheerleader for local sports but not for, say, smart growth initiatives.”
