Ongoing Story of Coach Abuse Is Being Ghosted. But a Washington Post Reporter Is on It.

PREVIOUSLY: March 13 Chicago Tribune op-ed, “Parents have the power to compel Congress to act to protect young athletes,” https://concussioninc.net/?p=15508; direct link: https://www.chicagotribune.com/2024/03/13/opinion-usa-swimming-coach-abuse-youth-sports-congress-reforms/

by Irvin Muchnick

It’s now eight months since the report of the congressional Commission on the State of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee proposed legislation to enact the first structural reforms of the American youth sports system in nearly half a century.

One of them would yank from the money-first Olympic movement control over grassroots programs in swimming and other sports. Let the elite athletes and their families chasing college athletic scholarships and gold medals underwrite their development without the subsidies provided by the millions of youngsters participating in extracurricular sports for extra-commercial values.

The other key recommendation would put the failing and flailing U.S. Center for SafeSport — the agency with jurisdiction over allegations of coach sexual abuse — under federal government funding and staffing, free of financial and other dependence on Olympic Committee entities, whose priorities are not the physical and psychological safety of youth athletes.

Up against the flag-waving hegemony of the Olympic brand, the fight for these changes promises to be a years-long slog. But it won’t even get off the starting block if no one covers it. And no one with any juice is really covering it.

The “newspaper of record,” the New York Times, didn’t even mention the findings of the blue-ribbon commission report when they were released last winter. (To make sure my aging eyes weren’t deceiving me, I did Google and other searches. Then I contacted a Times media spokesperson, who didn’t respond. Then I got confirmation of the Times ghosting from the commission itself.)

For its part, the Washington Post, like a few other major newspapers and the wire services, dropped a desultory paragraph or two on the commission’s 277-page report. The Post, of course, is a key resource for congressional staffers and other capital players.

A month and a half ago I received an unsolicited email from Rick Maese, a Post sports features writer. “I have not yet gotten my hands on a copy of Underwater,” my new book, Maese wrote, “so apologies for this relatively uninformed query. I’m wondering how much your research delved into the USOPC and the ways they’ve defended themselves against accusations, especially post-Nassar? I’m doing reporting around a case involving a speedskater. The USOPC is fighting tooth and nail, of course, which is only slightly unusual because post-Nassar, it seemed like they were trying to be more supportive of victims and survivors, at least publicly. So I guess I’m trying to see if there’s a pattern to their legal defense strategy and if there are other recent cases where they’ve dragged out the process and turned the screws on victims/plaintiffs.”

Nothing has happened since then. Maese didn’t return my reply messages until I told him I would be writing this post.

(In an aside of no import, Maese said he’s miffed: “As a professional courtesy, I would certainly never publicize a fellow journalist’s in-progress reporting without permission or reason.” Call us even: I have decades of experience at being big-footed by mainstream outlets whose coverage, more often than not, turns out to be “once over lightly.”)

On the purported speedskating focus of his upcoming story, I advised Maese to delve into the activism of the former speedskater Eva Rodansky, whose whistleblowing has been featured in this space for nearly ten years. See https://concussioninc.net/?p=15202. Among other things, Rodansky is largely responsible for the sacking of Michael Crowe as the head coach of Canadian speedskating, on the eve of the 2018 Winter Olympics and after Crowe had migrated from the U.S. team amidst allegations of sexual harassment of his athletes and corresponding bias in the selection of the Olympic squad.

Famously, Andy Gabel, the Hall of Fame speedskater and coach, has been sued for sexual abuse by one-time national champion Bridie Farrell.

Maese said “I’m not sure there’s a progress report to share” on his work. “I am still chipping away on my reporting. I typically juggle a handful of stories at a time.”