Recent articles just attempt to stir the pot

JOURNAL SPORTS WRITERS, could you please watch your language and maybe check your attitudes at the door when penning a UNM sports article?

Opening the paper on Nov. 24, the day of a Lobo double-header with back-toback games in football and basketball, I had my spirits thoroughly dampened. Two articles in particular certainly upset me. The last game of the football season, one in which numerous seniors were ending their playing tenure, was covered not with praise for the efforts of these young men in their years at UNM, but with the herald that UNM wanted to play “spoiler” to the bowl hopes of Wyoming. Really? That’s it? Such a negative motivation, and a very limited one.

Whatever happened to playing the game for sport, for pride or for the satisfaction of knowing you did a good job? Even if this was the opinion of a player, that’s what you chose to headline?

And then there is basketball. Yup, we lost to NMSU. Losses happen. Someone WILL lose. But over 14,000 fans showed up to watch and enjoy the sport. I could not believe the headline on the FRONT page was screaming about how it just could be that coach (Paul) Weir was setting a trend in which the Lobos lose early season games. Once again, I ask — Really? That’s all you can think of to highlight?

This is a shame and these two examples from the same day only spotlight the unfortunate way that writers today will do anything to make them appear worthy of notice and to justify their existence. If it takes being negative, skating on the edge of actual truth or if it smacks of sensationalism, well who cares? I say it’s another case of the ends justifying the means. And the ends involved here are the glorification of the writers and the stirring of the proverbial pot.