ABSTRACT
The nature of television’s presentati and coverage of sporting events has undergone dramatic shifts in recent years. The presence of 24-hour-a-day sports channels and the development of sports-news channels were early markers of sea changes in sports television. More recently, the introduction of specialized magazines and web sites derived from televised sports, the “discovery” of women’s sports, the ascendancy of motor sports and wrestling, the “wars” over network contracts for sports coverage, and many other tremblings are manifestations of a ferment that is occurring in what has historically been one of the most tradition-bound genres of television. These dramatic changes all merit systematic study in their own right. They must be studies as phenomena that may well alter the way the “Sovereign Consumer” of the information age uses and enjoys sports.
