Damn! Ridder actually replied to my email!

I got good and pissed off this past Saturday when I opened the Observer's Sports Page to find that, not only were the Panthers buried in the back of the section, the only 'new' it had was, of course, centered around Michael Vick. After months of bitching to my wife, I finally sent Peter Ridder (Chairman and Publisher) an email and cc'd the Observer Sports department.

Will it make a difference? Probably not....but it surprised the hell out of me that he even replied to the email. If enough people complain, you never know.... At the very least, maybe they can move Scott Fowler to the Home Living section.

Here's the transcript:

Mr. Ridder,

No, Panther coverage was actually pretty good today. However, on most Sundays/game days, the coverage is lax to say the least. The rest of the week it is dismal, at best.

I understand that there are certainly other sports/sporting events that happen during the course of an NFL season that merit space in the sports page. However, my contention remains that, overall, the Observer's coverage of the Carolina Panthers has considerable room for improvement. A quick look online at other NFL-city papers would suggest that there should be more to the Panthers during the week than a quick blurb with an injury update.

Thank you for your response, Mr. Ridder. Again, I sincerely hope to see The Observer improve its Panther coverage....

Regards,
Jim xxxxxxx
____________________
www.jimmargraphics.com



On Dec 5, 2005, at 9:00 AM, Ridder, Peter wrote:

Jim,
Did you think the Observer underplayed today's Panther coverage? Not every day will we have a great deal of Panther coverage. With college basketball and college football on Saturday most Panther coverage will be game day on Sunday and of course the Monday after the game.
Peter Ridder
-----Original Message-----
From: xxxxxxx [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Saturday, December 03, 2005 5:10 PM
To: [email protected]
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Charlotte Observer Sports section

Mr Ridder,

I am emailing you in regards to the Charlotte Observer's sports section. After months of debating whether or not to write, I can not put it off any longer.

The Carolina Panthers get such little coverage it is pathetic, bordering on ridiculous. The Panthers have arguably their biggest game tomorrow against the Atlanta Falcons. What does the Observer do? They have an article about Michael Vick (for the second straight day), followed by a couple of lines about the Panther's injury update. AND THIS WAS BURIED AT THE BACK OF THE SPORTS PAGE! We, Charlotte, have a PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL TEAM, a good one at that, and all we merit the day before a HUGE GAME is a couple of minimum blurbs? This is absolutely horrendous.

I have lived in Miami and New Orleans. Both city papers, The Miami Herald and Times-Picayune, covered their respective teams easily two-three times more than the Observer does the Panthers....and that was during the off-season!

I do not know if there is a rift between the team and the Observer, but whatever it is, the fans of the Panthers should not suffer because of it. My wife and I have a weekly subscription to the Observer, and I would say that 85% of the reason for us having it is to keep up with the Panthers. We will reassess our need for continuing our subscription at the end of the season.

With the resources that are available to the Observer, I sincerely hope that the Panther's coverage is severely upgraded.

Regards,
Jim xxxxxxx
____________________
www.jimmargraphics.com

 

Yeah, I got an Email from him when I was bitching about the liberal bias on the editorial page a couple of years ago.

 

Curious, did he give you an answer with substance, or just empty rhetoric?

 

He was less of an ass than Ed Williams (I think that's his name), who tried to tell me that the Observer had no liberal bias because they got complaints from both conservatives and liberals. I don't remember exactly what he said, but the general feeling was that he was diplomatic and yet basically said nothing at all.

 

So the latter. Figured as much.

 

um, it's an editorial page. would you bitch if it had a conservative bias? it's supposed to take a side. they might not label it liberal, but it probably leans that way most of the time. but that's just it, it's an opinion. same as those on the Viewpoint page. Does Cal Thomas have too much of a conservative bias? Yup. How about the Chicago Tribune or San Diego Union Tribune? Their editorials are mostly conservative (heck in chicago, so is the Sun-Times. And look at what way the city and state leaned in the past few prez elex).

now if the liberalism, or conservatism (ahem, Fox News), or communism showed up in news stories, complain about that.

but hey, what do i know?

as for panthers coverage being at the back of a section, sometimes, and i'm not saying it happens this way all the time, but the coverage is forced back there by ad sales and ad stacks. it's something the newsroom can ask to change but really it's out of their hands. some advertisers pay to be close to the front (say page 3); others pay to be close to or on pages with panthers coverage. can ads move? depends on the advertiser. the sports dept. can only work with what they're given. there are plenty of other factors influencing how the section works out.

i don't think coverage has dwindled. in fact, with the playoffs looming, expect it to pick up at some point soon (tho given some recent cutbacks, the space might come from other sports).

just my 2 centavos.

now, how about them bears?

 

Apparently nothing, so you might want to shut the hell up. (clue: because something features editorials and therefore opinions doesn't mean it should have a consistent, extreme bias, especially if it's completely out of touch with the majority readership)

Take your centavos back to Mexico.

 

Yeah, he sort of had a pompous tone, but I give him credit for actually replying.

I'm sure that it had nothing to do with it, but we had pretty decent coverage today.

Again, at the very least, I would settle for no more Fowler articles. Let him go back to writing about some guy who made a tennis court in his corn field....