Sports for Sale: Television, Money, and the Fans

Two faculty members at Boston University's College of Communication offer cautionary words about the inherent difficulties of presenting athletes on television, although they assert at the outset that sports broadcasting is the finest programming the tube can offer. However, they continue, the medium has changed the nature of play in some sports, as witness the addition of the two-minute warning in football and the suspension of play in basketball simply because it is time for a commercial. They see no remedy for this, since major sports are dependent on TV for their existence and TV needs sports for the vast revenues it brings in. Seldom has the interrelationship between money and television sports been as closely and as carefully examined as it is in this book. $30,000 ad/promo; author tour. (September)