Journalist's Perspective Influences - Essay Example

Two news articles about this story appeared in the Tulsa World immediately after the event occurred, one by Rhett Morgan and one entitled “Kevin Durant’s life in a lockout.” These articles were similar in their focus on the strange way the NBA lockout has affected Kevin Durant and their relatively conversational tone, but differed in their point of view, with one telling the story from Overbey’s point of view and the other from Durant’s, and in their format, with the first being an in depth narrative and the second being a series of snippets putting the main story in context.

The first article, by Morgan, begins by detailing the process through which Durant got involved in the flag football game, including the exchange of twitter messages that Durant and Overbey sent to each other. It then goes on to describe the game itself, how many fans attended, how many touchdowns Durant threw and received and so on, before closing with a series of quotes by Overby about Durant’s amazing character, lauding what a humble and fun-loving person he was to come out to the flag football game. . Following this, it retells a large number of other activities that Durant has participated in since the NBA lockout began, including filming a movie, and playing pick-up basketball.

The overall tenor of this article is relatively impersonal; it attempts mostly to inform the reader about Durant’s activities during the NBA lockout. The first similarity that both focus on the idea that the NBA lockouts have put players in strange positions, including this one of Durant playing a touch football game against a group of college students. The first article touches on the NBA lockout through Durant’s twitter messages. By quoting the detail that Durant complained that he was “bored during the NBA lockout” before requesting something to do, it draws the reader’s attention to the fact that Durant would not have been willing to do this in all likelihood were it not for the lockout, a point the article reinforces by referencing the wiped out opening game of the Oklahoma City Thunder at the end of the article (Morgan).

The second article takes a more direct approach, talking directly about the fact that Durant playing flag football is a direct result of the lockout. For instance, the article opens saying that Durant has “plenty of free time” do to the lockout, and puts the story of flag-football along with a laundry list of other things Durant has been doing to pass the time since he is unable to play in the NBA (“Life in a Lockout”). Both articles make the lockout a central part of the story of Durant playing flag football.

The second major similarity that both of these articles share is the fact they have a relatively conversational tone for an article in a major news publication. The first article