Mixed Media /By Greg Connors
Bills’ writer walks fine line
When a sportswriter needs to track down Trent Edwards to get a comment for a story, he might stand waiting for the Bills quarterback to come off the field or out of the shower. When Chris Brown of Buffalobills. com needs Edwards, he can just slip a note into his locker.
Access has its advantages for the Bills’ manager of new media and publications.
Brown, 36, was a sports reporter for eight years on WGR Radio, then worked briefly for Empire Sports Network. He was hired by the Bills in 2006. He is the editor of Bills Digest, the team’s “official publication,” and is responsible for all written and video content on buffalobills.com, as well as serving as editor of the team yearbook. His blog, Inside the Bills, is the most-read feature on Buffalobills.com.
Brown acknowledges there are times when he has an easier time tracking down the players than do members of the news media but he says that is necessary due to the requirement that he post new content 365 days a year on the team’s Web site.
“There might be instances where we get more access to the team [than beat reporters], but otherwise [my access] is no different from any other members of the media,” Brown said by phone from One Bills Drive.
A journalist or broadcaster covering the team might envy Brown’s access, but there is a trade-off. Brown draws a paycheck from the Bills, so he can’t exactly be an independent voice in the way he writes about the team.
Brown says he walks a fine line. On the one hand, he’s not going to bite the hand that feeds him.
On the other hand, “I do not have to run what I put in the blog in front of anyone [for approval before publishing it],” he said. “I post pretty freely, but I’m not going to deny I’m not doing that without the best interest of the organization in mind.
“I will be critical, but I’ll also be fair.”
Brown said that the official writers for other NFL teams have to “run everything up the flagpole” before publishing their content.
“Some teams, about three or four [of them], don’t even provide a blog to their lead journalist,” he said. “So it’s nice to have that voice.”
Brown said getting access to Bills personnel for a story he’s writing is “probably a little easier” than that of a member of the news media, but not always.
“With Trent, what I’ll do is leave a note in his locker” asking for his input on a story, he said.
However, when Marshawn Lynch was keeping his distance from the media after his hit-and-run traffic incident in the spring, Brown said, Lynch wasn’t any more forthcoming with him than he was with any sportswriter.
“With coach Jauron, I regularly have to speak with him for Bills Digest, so we meet pretty regularly throughout the course of the year.”
Fantasy stats in play
CBS Interactive, which operates CBSSports.com, fired a pre-emptive strike this week at the NFL Players Association over the use of player statistics in fantasy games.
CBS filed a federal lawsuit in Minneapolis, asking the court to clarify whether CBS has to pay licensing fees to the union for the use of the players’ names and statistics. The NFLPA has been asking for such payments during negotiations with CBS over a range of licensing fees.
A CBS spokesman said the company does not comment on pending litigation.
A similar legal battle between Major League Baseball’s players’ union and a fantasy sports company in Missouri was decided earlier this year in favor of the fantasy firm.
This suit is worth keeping an eye on because if the NFLPA is able to collect licensing fees for the use of player stats, the world of free fantasy games is going to disappear faster than old “Chad Johnson” jerseys from a Bengals’ souvenir shop.
NFL games go online
The NFL has dipped its toes into live streaming video of games this year, beginning with Thursday night’s opener, the New York Giants’ 16-7 victory over the Washington Redskins.
Only prime-time games shown on NBC — primarily on Sunday evenings — will be streamed over the Internet, on nfl.com and nbcsports.com.
The league for several years has sold online streaming video subscriptions to overseas viewers, but this is a first in the United States. The NFL considers this a one-year experiment, and will be measuring the Web audience and TV ratings to see how one affects the other.
“Does it cannibalize, or is it incremental?” Brian Rolapp, the NFL’s senior vice president of media strategy and digital media, told the Wall Street Journal. “Does it make sense to use it to go out and build new products and new businesses?”
Major League Baseball has been successful selling paid subscriptions to MLB.TV, which streams out-of-market ballgames on demand. And live streaming of NCAA Tournament basketball games in March is a big online hit for cbssports.com, though that has the advantage of attracting a workday audience with games showing during the daytime.
Thursday night’s online presentation was interesting, but it wasn’t anything that would make someone abandon his television screen. There was “picture in picture” presentation, and a choice of four camera angles, but the broadcast would stop and start enough times that it became hard to watch.
Some fans whose work or family schedules conflict with watching NFL games on TV will no doubt like the convenience of the online option. With all the time-shifting features of TiVo and digital video recorders, will there really be much of an audience for online viewing in households that own a television?
I tube, YouTube
What better way to get in the mood for a new NFL season than watching some classic video clips?
Here are five recommendations:
• The Budweiser commercial featuring fictional Bills fans. (“Man, I can’t stand these Bills.”) It’s on YouTube (http://tinyurl.com/5to5yu).
• NBC News anchor emeritus Tom Brokaw closing an on-air tribute to Tim Russert by telling the country, “Go Bills.” Also on YouTube (http://tinyurl. com/5sf6ua).
• Exorcise those old demons with an ancient self-flagellation ritual and watch Ronnie Harmon (http://tinyurl.com/5mxhe4) drop that pass in the end zone against the Cleveland Browns in the 1989 playoffs.
• Sure, it’s the hated Raiders, but listen to the pure poetry of the late John Facenda reciting “The Autumn Wind [Is a Raider],” via YouTube (http://tinyurl.com/3an729).
• Saving the best for last: Check out the Pro Football Hall of Fame audio and video archive page (http://tinyurl. com/6qu8g8), featuring the Hall induction speeches of, among many others, Joe DeLamielleure, James Lofton and Thurman Thomas. Jim Kelly’s speech is not in the archive, but there are also speeches from Johnny Unitas, Reggie White, Bill Walsh and other NFL icons.
