Front Office Fantasies
Cloth: 12/05/2023
About the Book
Front office executives have become high-profile commentators, movie and video game protagonists, and role models for a generation raised in the data-driven, financialized world of contemporary sports. Branden Buehler examines the media transformation of these once obscure management figures into esteemed experts and sporting idols.Moving from Moneyball and Football Manager to coverage of analytics gurus like Daryl Morey, Buehler shows how a fixation on managerial moves has taken hold across the entire sports media landscape. Buehler's chapter-by-chapter look at specific media forms illustrates different facets of the managerial craze while analyzing the related effects on what fans see, hear, and play. Throughout, Buehler explores the unsettling implications of exalting the management class and its logics, in the process arguing that sports media's managerial lionization serves as one of the clearest reflections of major material and ideological changes taking place across culture and society.
Insightful and timely, Front Office Fantasies reveals how sports media moved the action from the field to the executive suite.
About the Author
Branden Buehler is assistant professor of visual and sound media at Seton Hall University.Reviews
"“How do these new forms of sports consumption impact users’ perceptions of sport, athletes, and administrative roles?” is an excellent empirical research question. Different readers will benefit from reading this book and will likely be inspired to find different questions from it." --Journal of Sport Management"An achievement in sports media studies, but also more broadly an important piece of scholarly work for media studies and cultural studies writ large." --Media Industries
"Well written and extremely thorough in its overall review of managerial sports media, but more importantly, it may surprise readers by providing a much deeper dive into overall conversations about what it means to be human in the 21st century." --International Journal of Sport Communication
"Front Office Fantasies is a well-researched book filled with credible evidence and unforgettable real-world examples. . . . Buehler's book identifies current trends and offers compelling new insights and thought-provoking questions. These features make it an invaluable resource for academics, students, and any readers with an interest in the intersection of media and social studies in sport." --Journal of Sport History
"Front Office Fantasies offers an insightful analysis of the rising prominence of sports management and its portrayal across a variety of media platforms, such as film, television, digital content, video games, and fantasy sports." --Journal of Sports Media
"Front Office Fantasies is a work that does well to cover different types of sports media and the way that a managerial focus became incredibly prevalent in the last two decades. Buehler cleverly links this trend to broader ideologies and discourses around managerialism, financialization, and neoliberal approaches to society. . . . Scholars interested in critical approaches to sports media, how it evolves and how it relates to broader social issues, will find this a useful read." --idrottsforum.org
Blurbs
“In this sharply written and impressive book, Branden Buehler provides compelling new insights into the social, cultural, and visual consequences of sports media’s preoccupation with managerialism, financialization, and quantification. A vital and necessary work, this sophisticated account of managerial sports media is a must-read for all sports, film, and media scholars.”--Samantha N. Sheppard, author of Sporting Blackness: Race, Embodiment, and Critical Muscle Memory on Screen
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