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Journalist’s Tradecontinually pull in opposite directions,a tug-of-war without end. Many womenleave the more arduous beats, if notthe profession completely, because theycan’t fight this battle any longer. Manyof my peers chose a route similar tomine, striving to write a column or domagazine work—jobs with more downtimefrom travel and night games, theenemies of normal life and families.AWSM’s forums give women achance to explore such issues and acceptwithout guilt career choices thatothers might not ever understand; mymother still wonders what went wrongbecause I left The New York Times forThe Philadelphia Inquirer. Nothingwent wrong. Everything went right,because I have more quality time withmy 11-year-old son, something muchmore important than location of mybyline at this stage of my life.Unfortunately, the complex issuesof today have not completely replacedthe other lingering issue: life on thesports beat for women reporters. Thedifficulties first faced by the pioneerfemale reporters who were literallybarred at the door still exist in somelatent forms. Still, press boxes too oftenremain a mostly male bastion. Thereare still pockets of resistance amongathletes despite the fact that leagueshave long-established access policiesthat allow for designated interviewtimes after cooling-off (read that disrobing)periods. Just this past spring,Reggie White, a former defensive linemanwith the Green Bay Packers, wrotein The Wall Street Journal that femalejournalists should not have access tothe locker rooms of male athletes.His article gained notoriety when itreached all the way to the NationalBasketball Association. New YorkKnicks guard Charlie Ward seeminglyquestioned the long-established policiesof one of the most traditionallyopen-minded leagues when he passedout copies of White’s comments to histeammates. Ward later denied he wascampaigning for a change in the NBA’saccess policies. Rather, he said, he felta need to discuss the issue during aplayers’ prayer meeting because, Wardsaid, as a Christian he felt uncomfortabledressing in front of any womanwho was not his wife.Ward, who has access to areas oflocker rooms that are off-limits to reportersand is also the beneficiary of allthose cooling-off post-game minutes,nonetheless fed a misconception asold as the issue of women in the lockerroomdebate. He attached a sexualconnotation to journalism assignments.(Sleeping with sources is no more thegoal than it should be an issue.) Theday the first reporter left the press boxto seek the raw emotions of athletesfollowing victories or defeats, lockerrooms ceased being just changingrooms and sanctuaries. Rather, clubhousesbecame a common groundwhere teams, players and the mediaconspire to sell a product, be it a game,a newspaper or a broadcast, by puttinga human face on sports.Women reporters, simply stated,want and demand the opportunity toreport on human dimensions of sportsjust as their male counterparts do. But,do women reporters bring a differentapproach, whether covering the WashingtonRedskins or the White House? Isevery affront gender-based or wouldthat politician, pitcher or big-screenstar be just as likely to blow off a maleas he would a female reporter? Arethere different rules for professionalconduct then those that apply to “TheBoys on the Bus?”Any attempt to supply absolute answersto such questions flirts with stereotyping,something that should beanathema to women who have had tofight such prejudices from the momentwe stepped into the clubhouse.That said, two subtle differences havealways fascinated me: the greater cooperationreceived from minority athletesand the good working relationshipsthat are often found amongreporters and the athletes’ wives.When I first began covering baseballI always assumed that the good rapportwith the Dave Winfields of the sportmight be because I was black. Toomany women of all hues have sincepointed out this greater degree of cooperation,leading me to suspect thatthis has less to do with my race. No onecould really explain this feeling untilthe former football great, Ronnie Lott,addressed the issue at the first AWSMconvention. Many black athletes commiseratedwith the female reporterswho covered them, Lott said, becauseblacks understood what it was like towalk into a room and be instantly hated.As for the wives of athletes, GretchenRandolph, wife of former Yankees secondbaseman Willie Randolph, oncedispelled the notion that players’ wiveswere all resentful of the women whocovered their husbands’ teams. Rather,she said, she found more understandingfor the players’ family and for herselfamong women. Men, she said,would call at all hours, often withoutapology, whereas women reporterswho called would often inquire as towhether they were disrupting dinneror apologize about the lateness of thehour. Most important, Gretchen said,were the questions about how she andher children were faring, an indicationthat they mattered to the reporter.Gretchen Randolph’s explanation saida lot about self-worth and how othersinfluence it.Just as girls growing up today canenvision themselves as world championsoccer stars so, too, more andmore aspire to sports writing jobs thatwere not imagined as possible by previousgenerations of women. But evenas they dream, the realities of this job—the travel, the constant deadlines, theunpredictable hours, and workplacedemands—continue to challenge thissecond tier of women pioneers. Theseissues might not make headlines, aslocker room access did, but they arethe same challenges women confronttoday in all professions. In fact, what issomewhat comforting is that unlikethe 1970’s, when our male colleaguesdidn’t wrestle with the issues we did,nowadays many of the men are searchingfor some of the same answers thatwe are in trying to balance family lifewith professional obligations.■Claire Smith, the mother of one son,joined The Philadelphia Inquirer asa sports columnist in 1998 aftercovering major-league baseball for17 years for The Hartford Courantand The New York Times.48 Nieman Reports / Fall 1999