Editor in chief: Laura Cadiz
Editorial Editors: Bret Jacobson, Laura Lucas
Newsroom: (541)346-5511
Room 300, Erb Memorial Union
P.O. Box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403
E-mail: ode@oregon.uoregon.edu
Wednesday
May 3,2000
Volume 101, Issue 144
Emehikl
Interest in women’s sports is increasing at a rapid rate, but female
athletes continue to struggle with competing in a new arena
Excitement in women’s sports has
arrived.
It arrived with Billie Jean King’s
win in the battle of the sexes. It ar
rived with Nadia Comaneci’s domi
nance of the Olympics in the 1970s. It
arrived with bailers Cheryl Miller and
Nancy Lieberman-Cline in the 1980s.
It arrived with the very beginnings of
the WNBA in the 1990s. It arrived
when Chamique Holdsclaw landed a
major basketball magazine cover and
gave young girls someone to look up
to. It arrived with the popularity of
women’s World Cup soccer. It arrived
when Laila Ali used her father’s left
jab to lay down her boxing opponent
in 70 seconds last month.
The excitement has been arriving
for some time.
And the challenge, joy and
work involved in making
women’s sports a success will
be the focus of the 5th Annual
Warsaw Sports Business Sym
posium. The event starts today
with a keynote address by the
president of the WNBA, Val '
Ackerman, and workshops are
available tomorrow. ,
The focus of this symposium
is on “the changing face of
sports business.” And while
that face certainly is changing,
with the advances come bumps
in the road. It seems that
with every stride women
make, complications arise.
Balancing femininity with
being athletic is perhaps the
first complication to come. The
two characteristics certainly are
not mutually exclusive. But from
the outside perspective, where they
overlap can be confusing. For all
the success the U.S. women’s
soccer team had in the 1999
World Cup, the ultimate victo
ry wasn’t always the hottest
news. After her game-winning
penalty kick, Brandi Chas
tain tore off her jersey to re
veal a sports bra, and the
theme became the perki
ness of her chest and not the
power of her legs.
And when women finally
burst into professional sports — the
WNBA being the first breakthrough
women have had in the Big Four:
hockey, football, baseball and basket
ball — stories in Vogue magazine had
the ball players in couture dresses in
stead of their jerseys. Apparently,
they needed makeovers more than
mad game.
Finally, and most importantly, look
at the few women in positions of
power and how they are portrayed.
How many of the WNBA franchises
have female coaches?. Seven out of 16.
Right here on campus, Jody Runge
is held up as the strong athletic fe
male. Yet Runge is often portrayed as
bitchy. No one really discusses foot
ball head coach Mike Bellotti’s per
sonal life; yet Runge’s has been the
subject of countless articles. Has any
one asked why?
And has anyone asked why, in
sports broadcasting, the women in
front of the camera always play sec
ond fiddle to the announcer with the
deep, older male voice? Men are in
cluded on women's sports programs,
but not the other way around.
For every advance women make,
they are aware that they could go so
much farther.
Thus, dwelling on the challenges
for women in sports should be a moti
vator, not a downer. It should get
women up for the game of their lives.
This business sports symposium is
one path to motivation. Examining
the changing face in sports business
will show people that that face is
more and more often female. That
face is proud, graceful, strong, intelli
gent, fierce, stubborn, gentle, beauti
ful, competitive and relentless. That
is women in sports.
Thinking now of all the women
who have graced the sports stage
throughout the 20th century and who
threaten to become superstars now,
women can revel in their own great
ness. They’ve come a long way, baby.
And they’ve got next.
This editorial represents the opinion of the
Emerald editorial board. Responses may be
sent to ode@oregon.uoregon.edu.
Preserving our best seats will require compromise
For the past two years, I
have worked for all of
you as the lead nego
tiator for our contract
with the Athletic Department
that provides us with tickets
to men’s basketball and foot
ball games. It has been a
struggle to say the least, and
recently it has been as frus
trating as ever.
Each year we, the ASUO
Athletic Department Finance
Committee, try to protect stu
dent seats and keep the cost
down. Students currently
pay about $16 for each ticket
in advance and we can pick
them up without any extra
charge. We pay this through
the incidental fee of which
about $1 million goes into the
sports contract. For the last
two years it has been clear
that we are not using all of the
seats that we pay for, thus we
have kept the fee from rising
by giving up some of our least
desirable basketball seats.
Last year we changed the
agreement so that the Athlet
ic Department would have a
better opportunity to sell any
seats that we did not use dur
ing pre-season, i.e. games that
occurred before the start of
the academic year.
While we will pay the
same amount to the Athletic
Department this year as we
did last year, they are asking
us to give up our best seats
during pre-season, the ones
closest to the 50-yard line.
They have not offered any
thing in return and say that
they will not make much
more money from these seats.
We inquired as to why they
wanted the seats and were
told by the athletic director
that those seats would help
them cultivate prospective
season ticket buyers. This
seems fine to me, as anyone
would want more season
ticket holders, but there is a
catch. They can’t sell the
seats they already have dur
ing pre-season. This begs the
question, why do they need
our seats when they are giv
ing other ones away?
It. is hard for me to be too
critical, because the person
that we directly deal with,
Commentary
Spencer
Hamlin
Sandy Walton, senior associ
ate athletic director, is one of
the most professional and fair
people I have ever known.
While I respect her to the
fullest, my fellow committee
members and I cannot agree
to this with a clear con
science. Those seats have
been ours ever since we start
ed this system in 1987, which
is 13 years of tradition. I feel
in a way that we are entitled
to those seats, especially
since the students here pay
more for their sports seats
than any other school in the
Pacific-10. Yes we get better
seats because of that, but at
the same time there is a
threshold that we are danger
ously close to crossing.
That threshold is the point
where it is forgotten that the
only reason that there was
ever a University football
team or a University in the
first place is that the students
are here. That threshold is
also the point where we are
not the priority anymore and
it is more important for the
Athletic Department to have
some fat-cat donor from Port
land in Autzen Stadium than
it is to have the people who
this University was created
for. Those of us who have
been trying to negotiate this
contract understand the posi
tion that the Athletic Depart
ment is in. We are small in
comparison with the schools
that we are trying to compete
with, but this does not make
treating the students as a
source of revenue acceptable.
There is another concern
about giving up pre-season
seats. We will never get them
back and we fear that if we
give them up for pre-season
then we will be putting them
on the table in the near future
for the regular season. To
solve this dilemma, we have
proposed the following: 1)
The Athletic Department will
sign a contract with the
ASUO that says the depart
ment will be required to offer
us the same seats at a reason
able price for the next 10
years; 2) while the Athletic
Department would be re
quired to offer this, we would
not be required to accept if
we choose to go another
route; 3) we proposed that the
Athletic Department agree to
continue to offer the same
scenario for pre-season
games for the same period.'
We hope that these terms will
be met. While we are unhap
py to give up our best section
during pre-season games, we
are prepared to make the sac
rifice if it means that it will
provide us with a guarantee
that we will not have to fear
losing any football seats for
the next decade. We, the Ath
letic Department Finance
Committee, have been elect
ed by you, the students, to
look out for your best inter
ests; we hope that this letter
will shed some light on our
efforts to do so.
Spencer Hamlin is the ADFC chair
man. His views do not necessarily
represent those of the paper.
Quoted
“ Promoters still
see women as a
sideshow. There is
talent out there.
But to get air time,
you have to be a
Playboy bunny or
have a famous
name.”
—Anne Vitiello, a
commentator for
HBO’s boxing Web
site, on the chal
lenges for women
boxers. TIME,'
May 1.
"It’s the most in
sane thing I have
ever heard in my
life.”
— Tony Vavasis, a
Time Warner ca
ble customer, on
the feud between
Time Warner and
Disney that has
ABC cable chan
nels off the air in
3.5 million homes
since Monday.
ABCNews.com,
May 2.
“’N Sync’s an inter
national musical
treasure. By turn
ing to film, they
will give their fans
around the world
a new medium in
which to enjoy
their remarkable
talents.”
— Total Film
Group Chairman
and Chief Execu
tive Gerald Green
on the boy band’s
plans to star in
their own movie a
lathe Spice Girls.
GO.com, May 2
"They’re quoting
the Bible at us, so
we’ll quote the
Bible back to
them.‘Love thy
neighbor.’”
— Elizabeth For
bell, who marched
in the fourth an
nual national gay
rights demonstra
tion in Washing-'
ton, D.C., on Sun-'
day. The
Register-Guard,
May 1.