Jane McManus

Feb 9, 2025 | janesports.substack.com | Jane McManus

This isn’t so much a question about watching the biggest annual sporting event in America, it’s about the exercise of power. One of the advantages of studying sports abroad is that you see these dynamics beyond the time and place where we experience sports in this country. You think the Super Bowl is the biggest sporting event in the World? Soccer fans around the world would beg to disagree. You think President Donald Trump is the first to exercise power through sports?

Feb 9, 2025 | open.substack.com | Casey Burgat |Jane McManus

My people, it’s Super Bowl Sunday! An escape from the relentless drumbeat of life and politics. Right? Right?!?!Thanks for reading Crash Course with Casey Burgat! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Not so much. Sports and politics have always been intertwined, whether we’re aware of it or not. Beyond the national anthem, if we pay attention, you’ll see politics—starting with the military flyover—peppered throughout the game today.

Nov 27, 2024 | janesports.substack.com | Jane McManus

When I got to BlueSky in 2023, I’d send up the occasional post like a lifeboat sending a desperate flare in dark skies above the ocean. Can anybody see this? Thanks for reading Jane’s Substack! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Maybe a few hours later, I’d check again to find out. That’s a challenge when you’re trying to have a conversation about Tommy DeVito and the weirdly sluggish Giants. The turning point came two weeks ago.

Nov 25, 2024 | janesports.substack.com | Jane McManus

Earlier this year I was knee deep in great sports writing. Triumph Publishing tapped me to be the next guest editor for The Year’s Best Sports Writing, and I was trying to read every link sent my way by colleagues and into the gmail inbox set up for submissions. My former colleague Richard Deitsch did the 2023 edition. I was part of his advisory committee, and I saw how seriously he took it. This is a venerable volume, edited by the likes of George Plimpton, Dick Schaap and Bud Collins.

Nov 19, 2024 | janesports.substack.com | Jane McManus

Then I saw the level of compensation for the role. Is there a better analogy for the way women’s sports are treated by the marketplace than offering those reporters the very lowest rung on the pay scale? A few caveats. That pay, starting at $60,000 is certainly in line with some of the other salaries there for entry level staff, but it is hardly enough to live on in a city like New York. Meanwhile, sports reporters covering the NFL, NBA or college football in big cities can earn twice that.