League of Fans' Sports Forum

Benita Fitzgerald Mosley won the gold medal for the United States in the 100 meter hurdles at the 1984 Olympic Games.  She also was on the 1980 American Olympic team and was an alternate on the 1988 squad.  As a collegian at the University of Tennessee, Fitzgerald Mosley was a 15-time All-American.

Following her athletic career, she embarked on a career in sports marketing and administration, holding executive positions with the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee, USA Track & Field and Laureus Sport for Good Foundation USA.  Benita is currently Vice President, Community & Impact for League Apps and President of Fund Play.  Much of her current work centers around increasing sports opportunities for young people, especially those from underserved communities.

During this episode, we cover several topics, including the 50th anniversary of Title IX, the challenges left in the quest for gender equity in sports, the changes in the Olympic movement through the years, and current youth sports issues.

In this League of Fans Sports Forum episode, we explore new ways to be a fan in the year 2022 with baseball and culture writer Craig Calcaterra, author of a new book called "Rethinking Fandom: How to Beat the Sports-Industrial Complex at Its Own Game."  Craig is also the writer and editor of a popular baseball, news, and culture newsletter called "Cup of Coffee."  In this discussion, we get into why and how pro sports team owners and executives regularly exploit the often blind loyalty of their fan base and identify some of the ways the sports-industrial complex acts against the interests of fans.  We also chat about how sports fans of particular teams act similarly to supporters of political parties.  Toward the end, Craig talks about how to take some of the power away from SportsWorld's barons and become a sports fan on "your own terms."  If you take his advice in this regard you might find that you are enjoying sports a lot more.

Pedro Moura is a national baseball writer for Fox Sports.  He previously covered the Los Angeles Dodgers for The Athletic.  His new book is titled "How to Beat a Broken Game: The Rise of the Dodgers in a League on the Brink."  During this podcast episode, we'll discuss how and why the game of baseball is broken, what factors caused it, and offer a few thoughts on how to "fix" a great game.  The focus will be on analytics; the good and bad.  Analytics have not only infiltrated the game of baseball, to a large degree they have taken over the sport.  Analytics have been good for baseball operations people in terms of providing evaluation and strategy development tools.  On the other hand, they've been bad for business operations people because they've lessened the fan experience and hurt the game as an entertainment product.  As an industry, baseball is challenged today to find ways to balance the positive impact of analytics as a strategic baseball tool with the negative impact they have had on fan enjoyment.  

In this episode we chat with long-time youth, high school and college basketball coach Jim Huber.  Jim is Director of Coach & Curriculum Development for Breakthrough Basketball (breakthroughbasketball.com).  He's won many championships as a coach and developed over 50 collegiate players and 10 professional players.  But more importantly, he has focused on impacting the lives of his players by developing life skills and character through sport.  Jim takes a holistic approach to coaching and discusses the importance of moving beyond the physical and positively addressing the mental, emotional and spiritual aspects of the young athletes he coaches.  We start off with a discussion of the dangers of early sport specialization.

This week's guest is Anika Orrock, author and illustrator of "The Incredible Women of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League."

For many, the AAGPBL was brought to light by the movie "A League of Their Own," directed by Penny Marshall and starring Tom Hanks, Geena Davis and Madonna.  "A League of Their Own" was entertaining, funny and told the story of an important moment in female sports history in this country.  The movie was a box office success, becoming the highest grossing baseball movie of all-time.  But that's Hollywood, the true story of the AAGPBL is equally as fascinating as the movie, and Orrock's wonderful book truly captures the spirit of the pioneering ladies who played baseball in this league.

Our conversation ranges from a discussion of the hoops these ladies had to jump through in order to play the game they loved, including having to attend charm school, take beauty lessons and where skirts while playing, to a chat about the long-term impact and legacy of the AAGPFL women when it comes to advancing sports opportunities for girls and women.

Those who like baseball and inspiring stories about underdogs in sports should enjoy listening to Orrock's tales of the AAGPBL.

On June 23, 2022, we will be celebrating the 50th anniversary of Title IX, the landmark federal civil rights legislation which prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or other education program that receives funding from the federal government. We'll talk about the progress female athletes have made since Title IX's passage but also the hurdles that remain before we arrive at true equal opportunity for both genders in sports in the United States.

We then move into a provocative discussion about the controversy surrounding transgender female swimmer Lia Thomas.  Thomas has made the transition from biological male to transgender female and is a member of the University of Pennsylvania's women's swimming team.  Since making her transition, Thomas has dominated women's swimming events.  Some of her teammates have complained that she has unfair physical advantages -- derived from going through male puberty -- and that she's taking a roster spot for Ivy League and NCAA swim meets that should go to a biological female.  The issue has spurred passionate debate on both sides.  We talk with Nancy about the need for everyone involved to act in good will in order to find a "middle way" solution that is both fair and inclusive.

Robert Lipsyte was a long-time sports reporter and columnist for the New York Times.  He later served as the ombudsman for ESPN and is the author of more than 20 books.  One of Lipsyte's best-selling teen-age novels, "One Fat Summer," was recently made into a film with Donald Sutherland called "Measure of a Man."

We chat about Lipsyte's amazing career and some of the athletes he covered and got to know well, like Muhammad Ali, as well as his relationships with fellow sports journalists like Bob Costas and Howard Cosell.  We also dig into a wide variety of sports issues, from the new NIL era in college sports, to football and brain trauma, to pro sports involvement in China, to the increased attention given to the mental health of athletes in recent years.

Andrew Maraniss is a great storyteller.  He writes sports books but not your stereotypical odes to star athletes.  His books, while easy to read, have depth.  They educate you and make you think about various socio-cultural issues, from a historical perspective as well as how they continue to impact society today.

His first book, "Strong Inside," was a biography of Perry Wallace, the first Black basketball player in the SEC.  His second book, "Games of Deception," is the story of the first U.S. men's basketball team at the 1936 Olympics in Nazi Germany.  His most recent book, "Singled Out," is a biography of Glenn Burke, the first openly gay Major League Baseball player and inventor of the high five.  It was recently named one of the 100 Best Baseball Books Ever Written by Esquire Magazine.

In this episode, we chat about all three books, including interesting stories he came across in putting each book together, but we focus on "Singled Out" and Glenn Burke's life before, during, and after his MLB career with the Los Angeles Dodgers and Oakland A's.  

I think you'll enjoy listening to Maraniss, a good guy with some important stories to share.

In this episode, we talk with Dr. Tim Rice, the lead faculty member for the Sport and Performance Psychology program at the University of Arizona Global Campus.  Dr. Rice is a long-time coach who transitioned into the field of sports psychology.  He has been in higher education for nearly 20 years at colleges and universities across the nation.  He is also a consultant with Basketball Ireland, the FIBA governing body for basketball in Ireland, as well as with Admirals Basketball Academy in the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine in Eastern Europe.

Our discussion centers around the growth of sports psychology at all levels of sport.  We talk about the positive impact that the number of high profile athletes (Michael Phelps, Kevin Love, Naomi Osaka, Simone Biles, etc.) who have opened up about their mental health struggles has had in changing the "just suck it up" narrative when it comes to psychological challenges in sports.  The importance of everyone involved in sports -- athletes, coaches, trainers, physicians and parents -- caring for the whole athlete, mind and body, is emphasized.  In addition, we talked about the need for increasing awareness of the mental health challenges coaches have to deal with in a high-pressure profession.  We close with ways to find psychologists and counselors in the field of sports and what to look for in sports psychology education programs.

In this episode, we chat with Gary McCoy, an innovative strength, conditioning and high performance coach who has worked in many capacities throughout his career, including with several Major League Baseball (MLB) organizations.  He's an Australian native who serves as head of performance for Team Australia's baseball program.  He's also currently Vice President of Performance for Kinetyx Sciences USA, a data-based movement technology company.

Our focus is the injury pandemic in baseball, what's causing it and how it can be fixed.  We start off with McCoy's experience with a Taiwanese professional baseball team and how he helped the team drop from an average of 32 soft tissue injuries a year to eight in his first season with the team and an amazing zero soft tissue injuries by his fourth season.

McCoy's strength, conditioning and performance philosophies and theories often go against the grain when it comes to the norms in his field.  However, he has the numbers to support his data-driven approach.  McCoy believes 80% of baseball injuries are preventable.  His reasons underlying that belief make for compelling listening.