Social Media and Sport Scandals

University of Missouri, UNC at Chapel Hill, Baylor, and University of Louisville. What do all of the schools have in common? Unfortunately all of these schools, along with many more, have been accused of some sort of sport related scandal in the past decade. Now if I had to list all of the schools that have had some sort of scandal it would take up this whole post. I chose these specific schools because these scandals blew up on social media when they came out. When it comes to athletic scandals I feel like they all originate on social media, twitter or Facebook seem to be the two most popular platforms for news reporters to release information on to. Before social media blew up and became so popular we found out some athletic scandals through newspaper articles, but with the increase in technology, reporters initially release a preview of their article on a social platform. The same goes with individual athletes who may post something on their social media accounts, which will continue to get shared over and over again by fans. The later example of individual athletes is a dangerous game as we get into the subject of athlete activism, which will be discussed in a later post. But 36.5% of 18-24 year old sport fans follow their favorite athlete on social media- this age group is one of the most social media active age groups there is. This graph below shows the age groups that follow their favorite athlete on social media, so if that athlete were to be caught in a scandal, it is bad news for that athletes social media accounts.

For this week I want to focus more on college athletic scandals and how they spread so quickly. Specifically I am going to look at the University of Missouri athletic tutor scandal and how I have observed it on social media the past few weeks. This scandal is very unique in the fact that the tutor would only talk about what happened via Social media. This scandal started in late 2016, Yolanda Kumar (an athletics tutor) announced on her Facebook account that she committed academic fraud, and Mizzou athletic director Jim Sterk announced his department had started an investigation hours later. Kumar previously told a reporter that she was particularly placed to help football and men’s basketball players. When contacted by The Star, a local news station on Monday, Kumar said she would only reveal information via her Twitter account. I thought this was most interesting, I think Kumar was smart enough to realize if she really wanted public attention to this case, she had to start it and finish it all on social media. Below is the tweet she sent out to communicate to the public about the scandal.

In April 2018, Kumar, who once offered to sell details about this academic fraud case, tweeted a photo of a letter Sterk sent her. The letter confirmed that Kumar “provided impermissible academic benefits to enrolled student-athletes.” The letter also told Kumar she could no longer be associated with the MU athletic department. The names of all of the athletes was never released as the goes against FERPA, but the investigation started immediately and only one specific football player received punishment. After investigation the NCAA recently released their punishments for the university athletic department as a whole (see below).

The NCAA posted the punishment on Jan. 31 2019

After these infractions were placed on the school, several coaches and other athletic staff members went to social media to voice their opinions about the intensity of this punishment. The schools athletic department did announce that they have started working on the appeal process but this could take months.

I think this whole scandal is a great example to show just how important and how big of an impact social media has in the sport industry. One simple Facebook post about a couple unspecified athletes has created an investigation and the NCAA giving the whole athletic department infractions. This is not the only athletic investigation surrounded by social media-UNC paper classes scandal was a prominent conversation on social media, Louisville's basketball team hiring strippers for recruiting visits was also all over social media platforms. One simple action on social media that indicates something suspicious about an athlete or athletic team can make a tremendous impact.