ABSTRACT
The effect of television upon sport has been a point of debate for over 30 years, some arguing that television has made sport, some that sport has been ruined, others merely content to bear witness to the unholy alliance. Johnson acknowledged a range of television-inspired changes: the introduction of commercial time-outs, the shift in PGA golf from match play to stroke play, the morning scheduling of West coast basketball to suit East coast television. But, he argued, one rarely heard these complaints from those within the game and he asserted that the thesis that television had marred sport was usually advanced by a bystander, and not by those within (Johnson 1971:61). Of course, those who live by the games might be thought to have a vested interest.
