When the American people think of women in sports, they think of ice skating, field hockey and diving. People do not recognize that women have the potential to play any sport that a man can play, with equal skill, if not better. Right now in some part of America, there is a women who aspires to play hockey for the New York Rangers, but what she does not realize is that the media will not give a positive backing to her effort. This negative coverage will shatter her dream within a matter of seconds.

Women today have found the intensity that drives people to play sports. One of the most recent electrifying events that shows women expressing their love for the game, regardless of which game, is when Brandi Chastain tore her jersey off after the United States women's soccer team won the Women's World Cup final. After this incredible display of victory, the media put Ms. Chastain's face all over the world. She was a featu

With all of the frenzy comes the birth of something that has been tied to sports since the beginning. Heroes. The youth of America has dreamed of the day that they will be able to step up to the plate at Shea Stadium, stand next to the Green Monster, or hover over the line of scrimmage. Men have always had sports heroes of the same sex to look up to. There is not a man alive who at one point in their life has not pretended like his was hitting a homerun off Roger Clemens or catching a pass thrown by Joe Montana. Now women have the opportunity to score on a pass from Mia Hamm or run next to Jackie Joyner-Kersey. These women have provided themselves as positive role models for the youth of today.

Other sports teams that were scheduled to sign network deals include the Women's Professional Hockey League (WPHL) the National Soccer Alliance (NSA) and the Women's Pro Fastpitch (WPF). The WPHL was scheduled to start in the winter of 1999 with four teams in Quebec, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. This league was to start with a 2.5 million dollar budget. There were twenty players with signed letters of intent, six of which were Olympians. The tickets were priced at five dollars a piece and the maximum salary for a player was $21,000. This league never took of and the networks dismissed then completely. The NHL is now working on starting on plans for a women's league.

The women who come out and play this sport are there for the reason that is lacking within sports today. This reason is why sports originated in the first place. Athletes participate in sports for one reason - the love of the game. Within professional sports today, the love of the game has been lost. We see that players are no longer on the playing field for the feeling of victory, but are out there for the seven figure pay check that they receive for dedicating half of the year to their sport. This is the beauty that is captured by the media. The media covers the purity that women's sports still holds. Women participate in sports for the love of the game, not because they will bring home millions of dollars doing it.

Coverage of another female athlete, Laila Ali, was due to reasons other than ripping off her shirt. The reason that Ali was covered was due to the fact that she is a legacy. She is a the daughter of the famous Muhammed Ali. Laila, 22, started to box and try to follow the famous foot steps of her famous father. The media coverage of this up and coming female boxer is phenomenal. In her first fight, Laila "Madam Butterfly" Ali, knocked out her opponent, April Fowler, in thirty-one seconds. The main focus of her fame is in direct relation with the fame of her father and his reign of her famous father.

Throughout time women have gone through a lot within the world of sports. In 1999, Newsweek, published an article outlining the "Leaps and Bounds" the women have overcome to be where they are today. The events outlined in this article include dates which have made history such as in 1920 when the first woman co

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Approximate Word count = 2057
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)