Friday, January 22, 2016

Since When Is A Sponsorship Deal For The Indy 500 Breaking News?

Yesterday's news coverage was another example of the embarrassing prostitution of our local print and TV news organizations for anything related to sports. The owners of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway had snagged what is called a "presenting sponsorship" for a price tag of $5 million over three years. The taker of this sponsorship was Penn Grade Motor Oil.

The IMS had this big unveiling ceremony at which local TV stations were providing live coverage as "breaking news" and the headline got top billing at print news sites, including the Indianapolis Star and the IBJ. It's actually pretty pathetic that what is supposed to be such an iconic sporting event around the world could only snag $5 million over a three year period for a top billing sponsorship spot. The only media type to rain on their parade was WTHR's Bob Kravitz, who called it a bit of a sell-out, while begrudgingly acknowledging it was probably the right thing to do because $5 million is $5 million.

Here's a tip to this folks in the media. If you want to pretend to be a world class city, then start behaving like one. A sponsorship announcement for a motor sport racing event that's been in decline for decades is not breaking news that should lead off a local news broadcast. Any visitor to the city sitting in their hotel room watching this media cluster [blank] would immediately conclude we're nothing but a backwater franchise town.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

The news media is a joke. I chuckle each time I see the Indianapolis Star announce that its "Call for Action" hotline is open. When did newspapers start investigating consumer complaints? I also find it amusing that the "hotline" is apparently operated by octogenarians.

Anyway, my point is that these news outlets should be take their positions as the fourth estate seriously and inform taxpayers/voters about news that really matters!

Anonymous said...

I think PSLs at Stan Kroenke's new stadium are going for more than $5MM and there's going to be about 70,000 of those. LOL. If I was the Speedway or Indy tourism prostit, uh, officials, I'd be embarrassed by this. Their brand has no value.

Anonymous said...

Indianapolis hasn't had a strong media for several years. They parrot what the network does and rarely uncover fraud and abuse on a local level.

Flogger said...

If you go to the Star's Website today (fair warning have a barf bag near you) you have what amounts to a Real Estate ad about "Hot Property" ,13 country acts headed to some music center and then Sports, Sports, and more Sports.
Our McMega-Media has serious issue of hyping up the trivial.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I love how the Star is now in the business of selling overpriced real estate on behalf of realtors who are either too incompetent or too lazy to do it on their own.

Anonymous said...

Investigative journalism in Indianapolis is like Elvis...both have left the building.

Anonymous said...

They might just be providing cover for the legislator idiots who "invested" all those tax dollars into the Speedway on some specious grounds covering not much with their fig leaf talking points. So, it is yippy yi yo, groundlings, see what's cool because of our legislative acumen! It might surprise duh Star to discover (somehow) how many Hoosiers have never attended a 500 mile race.

Pete Boggs said...

It's somehow pathetic; like macaroni "art," proudly placed by parents on the refrigerator...

Anonymous said...

It's not a news story. I believe the premise for the write up is to ameliorate any misgivings among the public (Ma & Pa Hoosier Kettle)may harbor for the multimillions in taxpayer dollars given to IMS in recent years.