Opinion: News orgs need own sports diversity house in order before criticizing leagues

If you don't know the name Dr. Richard Lapchick, you should. He's spent decades examining the diversity issues in professional and college sports. However, his latest report is about the industry that covers those sports, and its conclusions raise a troubling question for the sports sections of newspapers and websites: Can we truly cover sports leagues, teams and players in an inclusive manner, if our own diversity house is in disarray?

That was a rhetorical question. The answer is no.

While some of this may seem insidery and eggheadedness, the racial and gender makeup of the people who cover sports has profound implications on what's stated and broadcast. What you watch, what you read, what you hear is often molded by people you may never see, but they are the decision-makers, and Lapchick's research shows these people are mostly white and male.

This study isn't the first of its kind, but it's the most thorough, and its message is clear. The study is a massive indictment of sports journalism and its glaring lack of racial and gender diversity.

Lapchick is the director of The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES) at the University of Central Florida. His report is titled "2021 Sports Media Racial and Gender Report Card: Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE)."

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The report used data collected from newspapers between May 2021 and August 2021. It includes an analysis of the racial breakdown of the sports editors, assistant sports editors, and columnists. In addition, the report card includes a racial and gender breakdown of the reporters, copy editors/designers, web specialists and upper management of the publication.

As the report notes Lisa Wilson, the editorial director at The Athletic and outgoing APSE president, oversaw the collection of data. "She played an instrumental role in collecting data from over 100+ newspapers and websites – a significant improvement from only 75 in the 2018 APSE Report," the report says. "A trailblazer, Wilson became the first Black or African-American female president in APSE history in 2020."

This was the report's main conclusion: "The Report shows the vast majority of people holding key positions on the major newspapers and media websites in the United States and Canada are white and male."

Some of the key findings include:

-79.2 percent of the sports editors were white.

-72.0 percent of the assistant sports editors were white.

-77.1 percent of the columnists were white.

-77.1 percent of the reporters were white.

-77.0 percent of the copy editors/designers were white.

-72.4 percent of web specialists were white.

-80.1 percent of upper management were white.

-83.3 percent of the sports editors were men.

-75.8 percent of the assistant sports editors were men.

-82.2 percent of the columnists were men.

-85.6 percent of the reporters were men.

-75.3 percent of the copy editors/designers were men.

-78.1 percent of web specialists were men.

-63.7 percent of upper management were men.

A few other key facts from the report:

-ESPN formed a substantial part of the totals for women in the sports editor and columnist categories. If ESPN were removed from the data entirely, the gender percentage for sports editors would decrease from 16.7 percent to 13.5 percent while columnists would decrease from 17.8 percent to 13.8 percent.

-ESPN formed a notable percentage of people of color in the sports editor, assistant sports editor and columnist categories. Without ESPN, the racial percentage for sports editors would decrease from 20.8 percent to 18.9 percent and assistant sports editors would decrease from 27.7 percent to 22.7 percent. Columnists would decrease from 22.9 percent to 18.1 percent.

-Out of all reported newspapers and websites, ESPN employed 25.0 percent (five of 20) of all the women sports editors.

This report is a disaster for the business, but if it wasn't for ESPN, it would be cataclysmic.

The question is why? The answer is simple because sports journalism has the same issues as other parts of society.

People don't always step outside of their comfort zone. Managers hire friends and people who look like them.

You see this particularly in the data about web specialists:

-White men held well over half of all web specialists positions with 59.0 percentage points, while white men and women combined held 72.4 percent of these positions.

-Women of color represented 8.6 percent of all web specialist positions.

-Black or African-American individuals represented 11.4 percent of all web specialist positions, while Hispanic/Latinx individuals comprised 14.3 percent.

Then there were these numbers about management:

-White males held over half of all upper management positions with 53.4 percentage points, while white individuals overall held a vast majority of these positions at 80.1 percentage points.

You have to be purposeful to be that bad at diversification.

It will get better when like other workplaces there's a concerted effort to make it better.

Until then, when it comes to diversity, sports journalism is failing.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Sports media outlets fail when it comes to racial, gender diversity