SOCIAL media has brought with it an entirely new dimension of real time access to, and involvement in, sportspersons’ professional and personal lives. Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and blogging has become a part and parcel of every athletes’ life. This has its positives, with each sportsperson being given an opportunity to remain larger than life, yet accessible to the extent that the fans and critics alike can know in real time what an athlete feels and does about current affairs. But, it’s in this semi-surreal world of half reality and part theatrics that athletes discover their die-hard fan base, and above all, usually meet their Waterloo.
No doubt, the pros of being social media savvy are numerous – global outreach, international fan base, interactive and personalized relationships with a diverse fan base, and the opportunity to initiate social and cultural revolutions with social media for those athletes who transcend the field of play. In many ways, athletes – sheltered and stifled throughout their professional career lives, could find Twitter and Facebook a convenient outlet for thought sharing and provoking interaction without necessarily compromising their own privacy.
Some take it to a different level altogether. John Elway, a former Superbowl winning Quarterback for the U.S.’s National Football League (“NFL”) team the Denver Broncos is now a front-office high level executive with the same team. He has revolutionized front office decision making through Twitter, with a management style that literally allows stakeholders (the fans) to be involved with every aspect of decision-making via tweets and other social media outlets. This has been a remarkable success thus far. Similarly, Lance Armstrong’s charitable venture ‘Livestrong’ – the battle against cancer immortalized through the yellow rubber wrist bands, owes much of its global outreach to social media initiatives.
To a certain extent, Youtube gives athletes a chance to be discovered, and to upload their so-called ‘greatest hits’ onto a social platform that is viewed across the world – Kimbo Slice, a mixed martial arts fighter owed his immense popularity to a huge fan following for his street fight videos on Youtube.
Blogs are another way for athletes to share their thoughts and experiences, often with very positive results. Blogs are not time-intensive, nor limited by territorial constraints-either for the writer or for the reader. These make blogs an effective outlet for athletes to share and impart.
There are however, many cons as well. Without a PR agent or publicist in the middle, young sportspersons often make beginners mistakes – ones that can’t be withdrawn or reversed. Act in haste, repent at the speed of light. Issues include the invasion of privacy and very little control over the use of the athletes’ intellectual property or personal thoughts. Also, too much proximity is never a good thing. It can be a reputation buster, especially with out of context comments, videos, photographs, or blogs making their rounds. The war of words especially on Twitter becomes something that gets out of control, and becoming trigger happy over social media is the easiest pit in which one could fall. Not to discount the rumor mills that abound and manufacture gossip faster than a pound of flesh can be shaved off a sacrificial lamb.
Even in the Indian context, there are numerous social media-related incidents. The IPL especially has been exposed to the dangers of social media – between the chirps and the blogs, the league might actually consider a crackdown on the use of social media by all stakeholders. Take the Chirpgate incident for example – the one which turned the IPL on its head, and almost scuttled the league as we know it. Not to forget the recent Tweety-Sylvester banter during the Warne-Dixit pleasantry exchange in IPL IV. Factor in last year’s so-called ‘game-changer’ – the fake IPL player and his blog, and not to be left behind, this year’s Gabriella Pasqualotto firing incident, where her ‘naughty’ posts left many cricketers and rule-makers within the league in ‘knots’ of anxiety, and one can say that social media in the IPL has touched each stakeholder – ‘virtually’, of course.
Across the world, the list of those who’ve had their fingers burnt is endless. Three of this generations’ greatest athletes have had to suffer in many ways due to their impulsive social media acts or omissions – arguably the greatest swimmer of all time, Michael Phelps; the much-maligned, but multi-dimensional and uber talented basketball star- LeBron James; and, the best pound for pound fighter, the undefeated boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr. The repercussions are severe – besides the defamation and slander implications, athletes stand to lose their endorsements, sponsorships, places in their respective teams, and also can lose favor with the powers that be. In some extreme circumstances, players’ careers may go south. NFL player Rashard Mendenhall’s tweeting his distaste at the celebrations following Osama bin Laden’s death sparked a national outrage.
There seems to be a trend here – the ones who use the effects of social media to their advantage are those who are in management or charity-related initiatives, but the athletes themselves often fall prey to the temptation of impulse. So, if an athlete allows himself or herself to say what’s really on his/her mind: often less than golden words at the spur of the moment, he/she is chastised or lauded based on the moment and the thought.
From the perspective of athletes’ agents, managers, publicists, or public relations representatives, there is limited upside (if any), for the client to have direct contact with the fan base. Remember, these are young, highly creative and highly pressured individuals who have been thrust into the global spotlight. More often than not, they are ill-advised, poorly mentored and manipulated by ‘near and dear ones’ – with the end result being that they replicate the ‘deer in the headlights’ syndrome when the media and fickle fan-base hangs them out to dry. LeBron James is the prime and perfect example of the waxing and waning that a superstar basks in or endures, in the public eye – one ‘Decision’ or status update at a time.
So, when witnessing the globalizing and marketing of phenomena, all the stakeholders in the domain should be aware of the basic repercussions, and do a cost-benefit analysis of the pecuniary externalities that come with these economic (ir)rationales. Before social media becomes the playground of anti-social elements, and results in the star athletes reverting back to their asocial personas, we should introspect. On how we as observers could cut these athletes some slack. And how each athlete from a young age must be given compulsory training in ‘social media’ education, to protect and educate the young superstars who try and live normal lives, but are shouldered with the burden of setting examples. This is often at an age when they themselves are the most impressionable. That’s a bitter pill to swallow especially when your each move is scrutinized by at least a million star-struck individuals who gasp in awe at the players’ athletic prowess, but pucker their lips in indignation when these demi-gods try to be human (off the field of play, of course.) After all, this isn’t the Truman Show, and these individuals who perform at the highest echelons of sporting excellence, aren’t actors.
Laud the Elways and Armstrongs of the world, and spare a thought for those who act on impulse. Even the best of the best do on occasion fail on the field. Perhaps we should be less quick to judge these sometimes flawed genii when they fail to set the gold standard off the field as well.
