Media Training: A Coach’s Playbook for the Media Game

by: Kevin Long
President, MVP Sports Media Training
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If you don’t know what media training is, you are not alone. However, in the next five years, every team in major and mid-major collegiate and professional sports will include media training as part of their preparation for the season – or wishing they had. High school coaches who want to prepare their student-athletes will also embrace this cutting-edge trend as a life skill they need to pass on to their players to be successful in sports and in the real world.

So, what is media training?

It is not training for reporters or a Journalism 101 course as the name implies. Instead, media training prepares you for interviews with reporters by learning: how to protect and project a positive image; how to be on offense, using poise and strategy to get across your message; how to play defense, answering the questions you want to answer, the way you want to; how reporters operate and what they are looking for; how to control an interview; how to be comfortable in front of the camera or when speaking to a print reporter; and, how to remain positive and avoid controversy when answering a reporter’s questions. It is an insurance policy to protect you and your athletes from saying things you shouldn’t or didn’t mean to say to the media.

Like anything in sports, the more a skill is practiced, the better you and your team will be at handling the pressure when the cameras are rolling and the questions are coming from reporters.

Who already does media training and how can it help coaches, players and their schools?

Many teams in a variety of sports do media training, from perennial top 20 powers to mid-major programs. The best recent example is the George Mason men’s basketball team. Coach Jim Larranaga can tell you about his Patriots’ run to the Final Four and the media circus that followed their every move. He would also tell you it wasn’t an accident or luck that helped his team shine in the spotlight. In addition to having good kids with great personalities, he had the foresight to do media training for his team in January, well before any invitations to Cinderella’s ball were earned, and well before many of his players had ever spoken to a reporter. He prepared them for the national spotlight on the court and at the press podium.

As the NCAA tournament unfolded, even seasoned and respected national sports reporters were impressed with his Patriots’ performance. There were almost no mistakes. They had never seen a group of athletes under the pressure of national spotlight for the first time, perform so well. Even expensive public relations firms would say that you can’t buy that kind of good press, and it reflected positively on George Mason University as an institution.

The performance of Coach Larranaga and his players in the press room even surpassed their memorable run on the court. It was tantamount to three weeks of priceless advertising for George Mason – even most avid sports fans didn’t know the school was located in Fairfax, Virginia, until they beat Connecticut to go to the Final Four. The players came across as well-spoken, positive, on-point, clear and confident. These were the very skills they were taught during media training. They became media darlings in March because they did media training in January.

During George Mason’s training, assistant coach Scott Cherry, who played for Coach Dean Smith at University of North Carolina, said that Coach Smith made them do media training every year. Coach Smith is a basketball legend and few would argue with his approach or the resulting successes on and off the court.

Why is media training important?

Specifically, in the case of George Mason, there has been a positive direct financial impact for the school from memorabilia, ticket sales and disbursements from the NCAA directly linked to their success on the court and at the podium. The exact impact in dollars and cents could probably be derived by a phalanx of Ivy League economic and statistics academics, but the overwhelming consensus is that it was a coup for George Mason as a university, which will likely see increased enrollment, interest from more and better athletes looking to enter their athletics programs and improvements across the board as a result of a day of media training in January and three weeks of stellar basketball in March.

Generally, with the parity in all collegiate sports and the massive cable, satellite and TV revenues that are coming into schools, conferences, professional teams and leagues -- and now even high school programs -- it is clear sports are a big business. You can watch almost any team play nearly every game no matter where you are. Add in the 24 hour sports news networks, almost complete coverage of collegiate and professional sports, and there is almost nothing that happens in the world of sports that can’t be reported by the media in real-time. Learning to play the media game well is becoming as important as wins and loses.

Many major collegiate programs, professional organizations, and certainly professional athletes and coaches with endorsements, conduct media training on a regular basis. Why? Because they are protecting their investment. For college programs, the image of the coach, program and school are at the mercy of 18-21 year-old athletes from diverse educational and social backgrounds. Coaches and athletic departments rely on the image projected by these athletes to attract new recruits and to generate alumni/booster donations and support. Without the benefit of media training, that’s a lot to expect from teenagers who are also worrying about playing time, classes and the normal pressures of becoming adults.

High school coaches and athletes need to be concerned about their image. The type of person they are perceived to be can impact the decision of collegiate recruiters, and can make the difference between getting the scholarship to the school they wanted to go to versus the one they may end up at if they are viewed to have an image problem.

Simply put, there is too much at risk to face experienced reporters without practice and instruction. High school and collegiate teams practice officially for at least a month before the season begins in most sports, and realistically athletes practice year round. Practicing to face the media is just as important if they want to successfully protect and project a positive image, and coaches need to dedicate at least some time to developing this skill if they want their programs to be one of the best.

Coaches and their teams need to be as prepared to face the media as they would be to face their next opponent. In today’s society, with the internet, cell phone cameras and 24/7 sports broadcasts, coaches and athletes are more vulnerable than ever. A case in point is Matt Leinhart, the 2004 Heisman Trophy winner, who was captured by a cell phone camera in some unflattering photos at a Heisman after-party. Those photos ended up on the internet the very next day.

If the term “media training” isn’t part of your coaching vocabulary, it should be. No matter the sport, whether coaching men or women, from high school to professional, “media training” is a term that every coach in America will need to become familiar with in the near future. It is also a life skill all coaches and players now need in order to be successful in sports and in life.

Kevin Long is President of MVP Sports Media Training. He has conducted hundreds of media training sessions with athletes, coaches, politicians, law enforcement and military officials around the world. Kevin can be reached at: kevin@sportsmediatraining.com. To find out more about sports media training visit: www.sportsmediatraining.com.

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