A couple of weeks back, I posted on some of my various dealings with the media as a specialist in sport sociology. I’ve had a few more such experiences over the last few weeks, including two that appeared in Star Tribune stories over the weekend. The first was a fairly somber story in the Sunday Variety section on how sports can provide cover for sexual predators and abusers. That one was a fairly in-depth follow-up on the Penn State interviews I talked about a few weeks back. “Sport in America has always been celebrated for touting high ideals and making great contributions [to society]. Those ideals make it difficult for people in authority to acknowledge and deal with problems that show cracks in their integrity and honor–and that provides a cover for people who are corrupt to take advantage.” I don’t know that I actually said all that in exactly that fashion, but I was gratified to see that the writer had taken our conversation seriously enough not only to quote me but to use my contribution to help situate and frame the entire story.

The other media moment was a much lighter take in the Saturday paper on the challenges of being a fan of a losing team like the Vikings. I’ve had a lot of these kind of interviews in Minnesota over the past few months, so it wasn’t really  hard for me to comment on. But one aspect of the story did remind me of the challenges and risks of being quoted in the public record.

During the interview I told the reporter about a documentary in which I served as a talking head last year. It was called “Skol: The Documentary.” (“Skol, Vikings!” is one of the favorite cheers of fans of the local squad.) I told him how one quote from the documentary ended up being used out of contexts in the publicity materials: “…[Y]ou can change your wife or your religion more easily than you can change your football team.” (To watch the trailer, click the link above)… and, as you might be guessing, here’s how the reporter quoted me in this weekend’s paper: “There have been studies that show it’s easier to change a religion than a football team.”

That line got a lot of laughs from my colleagues and students, and I worried that they were laughing at me more than with me. Indeed, I quickly tried to explain that I thought the quote had been taken out of context–that even in the movie I had really been talking about European football (soccer) and quoting from research and writing out of Europe, and in the paper I was just relating an anecdote about the film.

And about the film, I needn’t have worried. When I finally saw the documentary, the full context of my quote was indeed used. Not only that, my interview was featured prominently throughout the documentary, spliced in to help audiences make sense of the various Vikings fans and fanatics that were the focus of the film. It was actually a fun and rewarding experience. I received great accolades from those in attendance at the “Skol!” premiere (and others since who have seen the film), and I actually feel that the editing of my various quotes and comments gave my thinking more structure, coherence, and focus that I probably exhibited in the interview itself. It just goes to show, you have to put yourself–and your knowledge out there. Occasionally, it won’t work to your advantage, but sometimes it’ll be really gratifying and you’ll feel very much like you’ve done your job.