WWE Presence On ESPN Under Increasing Scrutiny, Ed Ferrara On Wrestling Writing

- At The National Sports Journalism Center's website, Michael Bradley has an editorial about ESPN's seemingly sudden adoption of WrestleMania as a legitimate sports event deserving of their coverage. It's also, to an extent, a reaction to Richard Deitsch's Sports Illustrated article about how this all came about.

Bradley's argument, overall, is that while it's not out of line for ESPN to give WWE coverage, covering it like it's a legitimate sporting event creates ethical issues if it was done solely to get more eyeballs on the network and its related properties. In a key passage, he writes:

"Forging alliances with legitimate leagues is one thing. Trying to build an audience by making something that isn't real sport seem more legitimate is far more cynical and potentially explosive. First comes the WWE. Then come full highlights of the Globetrotters' next game. After all, that team has fans all around the world."

Bradley also adds that "It's fun to talk about Lesnar and his fellow rasslers, but it's not journalism," but it's not clear if he means that it's not sports journalism or that he feels pro wrestling coverage inherently can't be journalism.

- The Asbury Park Press has an article about former independent wrestler and WWE/WCW/sitcom writer Ed Ferrara holding a screenwriting seminar this weekend as part of the inaugural Asbury Park Music in Film Festival in New Jersey. Ferrara, who happens to teach creative writing for entertainment at WWE-affiliated Full Sail University (home of NXT tapings), spoke about how he's motivated by the increasing number of opportunities for prospective TV writers.

"Right now, we're kind of in a golden age of television, There is tons of original programming on. These days, we have Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and they all need content producers."

As wrestling goes, he feels his strength as a writer compared to previous pro wrestling bookers/creative staff was crafting more complex characters:

"We brought a complexity to it, We were trying to bring shades of gray into the proceedings instead of it being just black and white. It made it more palatable to a broader audience. We made the good guys flawed and the bad guys charismatic."