1. Twitter and PEDs: Communication
Strategies for Managing Player
Transgressions in Baseball
Allison R. Levin, MA, JD
www.socialnetworkadvisors.com
@arl1102
allison.levin@gmail.com
2. Early History
Media and team had a mutually beneficial relationship
Drugs are not new
Alcohol abuse
“Greenies”
Cocaine
3. Modern History
Steroid Crisis of 1990s
Needed to recover from strike
Chicks dig the long ball
Commissioner turned a blind-eye
Media punished by teams
4. The Difference
Payers, organizations and the media use Twitter to disseminate important
information directly to the fans
The number of media outlets on Twitter puts pressure on reporters to be the first
to report a story
Speculation is common and players often have to deny or admit where they could
previously be silent
Baseball changed the rules!
5. 2013 PED Crisis
First year MLB collective bargaining agreement allowed for suspensions
Whole situation arose out of media
20 players were suspended
18 got minimum 15 game suspension
Ryan Braun got a 100 game suspension
Alex Rodriguez got a 211 game suspension
6. Role of Social Media
In the weeks leading up to the suspensions over 40 different players were
mentioned as being in the subpoenaed records
Teams were worried about maintaining support of fans
Legitimacy- a generalized perception or assumption that the actions of an entity are
desirable, proper or appropriate within some socially constructed system of norms,
values, beliefs and definitions” (Suchman, 1995, p. 574).
athletic organizations try to draft and promote athletes that match the norms of the
community in which they play
Players whose names were implicated were also worried about reputation
Fanaticism
Parasocial Relationships
7. Image Restoration
Benoit model
Used by PR professionals but not as
accepted by celebrity and sport
researchers
Many authors have found that
celebrities in the era of social media
have to do more
My current research suggests the
stronger the parasocial relationship
the more work that needs to be done
Denial
Simple Denial
Shifting the Blame
Evading of Responsibility
Provocation
Defeasibility
Accident
Good Intentions
Reducing Offensiveness of Event
Bolstering
Minimization
Differentiation
Transcendence
Attack Accuser
Compensation
Corrective Action
Mortification
8. Ryan Braun
Caught in 2012 but was not suspended due to a technicality
Face of a blue-collar team
He and his team worked together
Admission
Corrective Action
Authenticity
!8 other athletes followed his lead to some extent
Now the norm for athletic transgressions where there is no doubt of guilt
9. Alex Rodriguez
Multiple time offender
Invested in clinic
He and Yankees did not work together
AROD
Threatened lawsuits
Attacked MLB, Players Association and his GM on Twitter
Still has not actually admitted guilt
Yankees
Focused on Identity and the Yankees way
Made it clear AROD did not fit the “mold”
10. Aftermath
Of the 19 players who were implicated and effectively used Twitter and other
media outlets to show remorse
8 players will be represented in the All-Star Game
All have been accepted back to team and game
AROD
Yankees refused to pay bonuses for breaking hit and homerun milestones
Using sabermetric numbers he is one of the top 10 players in the AL
Not in all-star game
More debate about whether the PED crisis is different than the “steroid era”
11. Future Research
Building model to understand how team, players, media and organizations use
Twitter and other social media
Influencers
Parasocial relationships
Identification
Understanding the crisis of presumption predicted by early social media scholars
What trends and why?
When to respond?
Understanding how, when and why fans use Twitter
Editor's Notes
What I study-
Older study but really shows how relationships are changing
For example, it is now well known that Ty Cobb killed a man in 1921 in Detroit (King, 2011), but that story never reached the media or fans until 6 months after Cobb died in 1961. This was nearly 25 years after he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame,
Ruth often bedded women, was sued for paternity multiple times, was a known alcoholic who was often abusive, and routinely got into trouble throughout his playing career. Despite all of this, Creamer notes the organization and media shielded Ruth from outside scrutiny because he was a hero to the fans. In fact, Ruth was also elected to the Hall of Fame the same year as Ty Cobb.
Mickey Mantle, who was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1974, has a story similar to that of the Babe, and again, the Yankees organization hid most of his transgressions from the media and their fans until Mantle himself came clean in an April 18, 1994 issue of Sports Illustrated.
In light of these facts, the pressing question is why do players like Mantle, Ruth and Cobb who flaunted the rules of society get into the Hall of Fame and players like Dave Parker, Lee Mazzilli, Vida Blue and Keith Hernandez, who admitted to using greenies and have gone on to have successful coaching and reporting careers, while players who simply played during the steroid era are being blackballed?
Media changing- mcGwire found with androtesterine – andro in locker during the season he set hr record- AP writer took picture- it was banned by the IOC, NFL, NBA and most european sports organizations- Despite being able to say it was bought otc and legal- he and the Cardinals chose to attack the reporter- close locker room- Claimed that the report violated the locker room privilege. He and others were called to testify in front of Congress in 2005 and he refused to answer any questions as did most of the other players…one barry bonds is still be charged with perjury. Only in 2011- 12 years after he was accused did he admit the truth---when he came back to the Cardinals as a hitting coach. Admitted to both andro and illegal steroids
What made this crisis unique was the fact that the scandal emerged when the Miami Times published documents purporting to be records from a clinic called Biogenesis, run by Anthony Bosch
These documents claimed to enumerate all the MLB clients of Bosch and the PEDs they were given. This newspaper article was followed up by an ESPN expose that detailed all MLB players connected to the facility (Greenberg, 2013). As a result of the speculation and concern caused by these reports, Commissioner Selig subpoenaed Bosch’s records and with a deal for immunity, got his testimony to help suspend 20 major league players (Greenberg, 2013
Looked at Tweets from all accounts (team and player), ESPN and MLB---retroactive—so did not capture deleted tweets
New York Times, Wall-Street Journal and all local papers
January 2013-April 2014 --- suspensions came in July
In the context of baseball, we observe players getting team tattoos, becoming part of the community and learning the nuisances and rituals of the team and its fan base.
fan of a sports team; they link themselves to the social scene of the team that they root for because their culture and identity are intertwined with the identity of the team.
It is unlikely that a fan of a major sport would ever personally know an athlete they root for or develop a close personal relationship with the organizational leaders, yet many fans feel as if they know the players and team. They form a parasocial relationship as defined by Derrick, Gabriel, and Tippin (2008) as a situation where the “media persona becomes predictable, and fans come to believe that they know and understand the media persona
With social media and celebrities- authors suggest these steps are not enough- they have to demonstrate remorse in a believable fashion
Denial, or simply saying an accusation is not true. Given the nature of PEDs and the media’s inability to prove or disprove usage, one would expect to see many players accused of PEDs to first start with a stance of denial
evasion of responsibility. This strategy is used when a party claims their actions were a reasonable response to a provocation. A popular form of evading responsibility is defeasibility. In this case, one of the involved parties alleges a lack of information or control over the situation. Another type of evading responsibility that one would expect to see is when a party contends their action was performed with good intentions.
A third strategy is to reduce offensiveness. In this strategy the person or organization accused of wrongful actions can try to reduce the perceived offensiveness of the actions. When choosing to reduce offensiveness there are six tactics that an organization or individual may pursue: (1) bolster the audience’s positive feelings, (2) minimize negative feelings associated with the act, (3) distinguish the act from similar but more offensive acts, (4) try to place the act in a more favorable context, (5) attack the other party, or (6) offer compensation
The organization or individual may also employ corrective discourse strategies such as promising to correct the issue.
Fifth strategy is mortification, confessing fault, apologizing, and/or begging for forgiveness.
Next, when the suspensions where announced, Braun gave a more complete mortification in line with the elements Benoit identifies as essential, such as first sincerely apologizing for his actions, saying, “I know that over the last year and a half I made some serious mistakes, both in the information I failed to share during my arbitration hearing and the comments I made to the press afterwards” (Kepner, 2013). Next, he included what Benoit considers to be another vital element of mortification, an explanation of how and why the transgression occurred. This step is important because for the fan to accept the account they must not only understand the apology but also truly believe that the transgression will not be repeated. In Braun’s case, he explained, “Here is what happened during the latter part of the 2011 season, I was dealing with a nagging injury and I turned to products for a short period of time that I shouldn't have used. … and I compounded the situation by not admitting my mistakes immediately” (Kepner, 2013).
Now seeing videos as well
Ended up comprising and going to charity
Not hiding- admit and apologize
Many still believe that players of the steroid era should get in if not implicated- others say we don’t know
