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Former WAER Broadcasters Address Race, Gay Rights, Business Issues in Sports

Chris Bolt/WAER News

Some former WAER Sportscasters having success on the largest stages of sports broadcasting shared their opinions Wednesday on topics ranging from race, to gay rights, and diversity.  ESPN Host and Play-by-Play broadcaster Anish Shroff, Comcast Sportsnet Houston Host and Reporter Howard Chen and KILT Houston Sports radio Host Nick Wright were part of“Making the Calls: The State of Diversity in Sports Media,”hosted by Syracuse University’s Newhouse School.

Shroff, a former WAER Sports Director, spoke about covering racial and controversial issues.  He says even though some people come to sports as an escape from serious issues, sports can also have a positive effect on social change.

“Jackie Robinson, when he broke baseball’s color barrier, that was before Brown V. Board of Education. Martin Luther King was a freshman in college at the time.  That was the first stone that was thrown in the Civil Rights Movement in a lot of ways.  That was before Rosa Parks gave up her seat on the bus.  Now we’re talking about Michael Sam coming out (as gay a football player).  All of a sudden sports has a chance to elevate certain national conversations.”

Howard Chen, a former WAER sports announcer, is now part of the Asian American Journalists Association.   He’s experienced the difficulty reporting on Houston sports teams when the Astros and Rockets hold ownership stakes in the station for which he works.

“If it’s an exclusive and it’s portraying those teams in a negative light, that’s not going to hit air.  It’s different at Comcast Sportsnet.  It’s not so much about breaking news; it’s kind of about brand extension so we do have to walk that line.”

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CSN Houston's Howard Chen recalls getting breaking news, but having to swallow it for business reasons.

Another panel examined diversity in sports media.  Nick Wright, a former Sports Talk Director here at WAER, recalls interacting with his listeners in Houston about controversial issues.  He disagrees with people who accuse him and other media of sensationalizing racial and other controversial social issues.  In fact he takes it as a kind of mission.

Credit Chris Bolt/WAER News
KILT Houston Sports Radio Host Nick Wright (R), along with former NFL Punter Chris Kluwe (L) and Neal Powless, Asst Director of the Native Student Program at Syracuse University were part of diversity in sports panel.

“(We must) make sure that if we see something that is unjust or unfair that we are bringing it up, because too often if you just let the women talk about women’s issues, and the gay people talk about gay issues, and the minorities talk about minority issues, then those people get typecast.” 

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Houston Sportsradio Host Nick Wright hears pushback from listeners who disagree with coverage of issues such as race and gay rights in sports.

Wright also finds it hypocritical for the National Football League to be considering a new penalty for people using the N-word on the field. 

“You’ve got 32 white billionaires deciding what black players can say to each other.  The NFL is thinking of making a rule outlawing a particular slur while one of its 32 teams is named, what I understand to be, the N-word for Native Americans.”

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Houston Sportsradio Host Nick Wright and former NFL Punter Chris Kluwe have strong opinions on why gay rights, and other bias issues, draw so much backlash.

The panel included former NFL Punter Chris Kluwe, who believes he lost his job for being an outspoken advocate for gay marriage.  He considers the discussions to be about human rights, while agreeing people in sports media have a responsibility to continue to address the topics. 

Chris Bolt, Ed.D. has proudly been covering the Central New York community and mentoring students for more than 30 years. His career in public media started as a student volunteer, then as a reporter/producer. He has been the news director for WAER since 1995. Dedicated to keeping local news coverage alive, Chris also has a passion for education, having trained, mentored and provided a platform for growth to more than a thousand students. Career highlights include having work appear on NPR, CBS, ABC and other news networks, winning numerous local and state journalism awards.