On Saturday, May 6, I was in a Goodwill store in Santa Clarita (Canyon Country), California, and found myself in the book section. I was eyeing a 1988 book entitled Sports for Sale: Television, Money, and the Fans by David A. Klatell and Norman Marcus. I was intrigued by the predictions on the back of the book jacket.
So, in the interests of journalism, I spent the two bucks on the book, knowing that I would probably end up writing about these “provocative findings and conclusions,” some of which were spot-on, others of which were a little off. Plus, it appears that the authors were unable to anticipate one huge change in the future – hint: you’re using it to read these words right now, unless you’ve already quit reading this to search for NBA playoff highlight videos.
As is the case with post-mortems on failed predictions, my intent will not be to criticize those who made the flawed prediction, but to discern what circumstances led to the flawed prediction. (Not that Klatell would care what I think; he passed away last year.)
I’m not prepared to write about these predictions yet; as I write this, I’m only on page 10 of the book. But I can already see a number of the difficulties that the authors would encounter. Remember – this book was written in 1988. Back then, ABC Sports was still a very strong sports brand, and I don’t think that anyone could conceive of that brand disappearing entirely. Fox Sports did not even exist – heck, the Fox Broadcasting Company itself was only two years old.
But the most shocking indicator of the changes between 1988 and 2017 can be found in this passage, found on page 10.
On the other hand, we not only remember certain television images, we also recall where we were when we saw them, who was with us at the time, and how they made us feel. We remember Olga Korbut’s charm, O. J. Simpson’s grace, Muhammad Ali’s bag of tricks, Celtics’ pride, Mets’ arrogance, and Dodger Blue…
Those who remember O. J. Simpson today and, um, “remember certain television images” may not associate the word “grace” with him.
(And there have been plenty of other changes with the other personalities named. In 1998, Korbut’s country was Communist and the U.S. President had recently referred to it as an “evil empire.” And the Dodgers were fresh off winning a World Series – how many more World Series would the O’Malley-owned team win over the coming decades?)
This should be an interesting read, even if Kirkus Reviews panned the book when it was published. I predict that I’ll come back later with more thoughts as I read it.
tymshft 