May 09 2008
About Black Ball Sports
We are just getting started with Black Ball Sports. What I can tell you at this point is, that we intend to cover sports professionally, even though we aren’t professional journalists. I promise you though we are opinionated and passionate.
Co-Editor: Antonio Barrera
I’m a web developer at Princeton University Library. My co-editor, Kali McIver and I go back to 1994 when we met as freshman at Drexel University. While we are split on many sports subjects (I’m a Eagles fan, he’s a Redskins fan, enough said), we share a vision for this site. While there are many sports blogs, many of them are mean-spirited and quick to run with rumors or use unsubstantiated stories to turn a quick buck and become popular.
We strive to be different; we are just sports fans, who love the games and don’t want to constantly rehash the negative. (although I personally refuse to ever let Bill Belichek and MLB owners off the hook for the scandals which they either directly or indirectly participated in). We want to talk about sports in an informative way, which hopefully will spark interest in our readers without using trash to do so (there is a place for it, we just don’t want to be a part of it).
Additionally, both of us as African-Americans look at the lack of black sports writers and hope we can help inspire others to use their creative talents for something other than writing rap lyrics. While blog writing is certainly different then traditional media writing, it is another avenue by which young ones can break into sports writing. I personally look at writers such as John Smallwood, Steven A. Smith, Jason Whitlock, William Rhoden and Mike Wilbon as stalwarts who commonly have been the sole black sports writer either at their newspaper or even further in their city. While, I’ll never be them, hopefully I’ve learned enough from them to help author a quality sports blog.
