An open letter to Adam Rose and the LA Times

To: Adam Rose and the LA Times

I just read your announcement that the UCLA and USC blogs are merging, and that Adam Rose, who blogs about USC at All Things Trojan, will now be blogging about UCLA for the Times as well.

While I appreciate Rose’s effort to take on more work, and I appreciate that he came right out and said he was a USC alumnus, I seriously question the decision.

A blog written about any team is read mostly by fans of that team. I’m guessing USC fans make up most of All Things Trojans’ loyal readership, and UCLA fans made up most of What’s Bruin’s loyal readership. And as you a probably aware of, UCLA and USC has a bit of a rivalry. Generally, each school’s fans don’t like the other school’s sports teams. So I don’t see how it is beneficial to either fan base to combine the blogs and bloggers for the two schools.

I don’t see how it’s fair for the LA Times to give UCLA fans a blog about their team from a fan of their rival, while USC fans continue to get a blog about their team from a USC fan. I know Rose tried to defend this when he wrote:

The previous LA Times sports editor went to Notre Dame. After spending months in the trenches with several beat writers and columnists, I can assure you that we have no anti-USC or pro-Irish bias.

But being the sports editor and a UCLA blogger are two different things. The sports editor could argue that he’s not the one doing the writing and reporting — while Adam can’t say that. Rose is the one actually doing the interacting with the readers.

I hope that Rose and the Times really are looking for other voices and opinions like they say they are. UCLA bloggers shouldn’t be too hard to find. I am one myself and read them regularly — there are many great ones out there (much better than me).

Thanks for reading,

Gilbert, editor of Obscure Sports Quarterly