Two types of sports news I don't want to read

I love watching sports and reading about sports. I think a lot about sports. Heck, for most of my newspaper career, I was a sports writer.

Sports and journalism. But there are two sports journalism trends that I dislike.

They're apparently important, but I don't care about them. And what better way to spout my dislike than here? In a column that's not on a sports page!

The first is the business side of sports, which is to sports journalism what vegetables are to meals: Important, but not enjoyable.

Sports business matters. It's important. I should care, in the same way I should want to eat asparagus and broccoli and spinach. Sometimes I like hearing about the business side of sports (in the same way that I occasionally enjoy spinach). But most of the time? I'd rather have the meat and bread and skip to the dessert.

I don't want to read or hear much about sports TV ratings. Or salary caps. Don't expect me to read about negotiations between players unions and ownership groups. I don't care about what cities are awarded future Super Bowls or Final Fours or World Cups. I'm not interested when college leagues merge or break apart.

I don't care.

TV ratings don't matter to me, as long as the games I want to watch are available. Union negotiations don't matter to me until there's a lockout. Super Bowl sites and college leagues merging don't matter to me at all, because I watch games from my couch and can't keep track of what schools are in which leagues.

Sports business is important, but it's boring. Tell me about the games.

Another type of sports reporting is also boring, but it's much more problematic: gambling.

Turn on a sports event now and it's almost impossible to avoid advertising from the big sports gambling sites. They have daily fantasy leagues. They sponsor games. They have contracts with leagues. You can't avoid them.

Turn on sports-talk radio and it's more of the same. Point spreads. Over-under numbers. Who covered. Sports-talk radio is a bastion for long-form commercials for gambling businesses that pretend to be talk shows.

I don't care about the point spreads. I don't even care about the inevitable two or three times a year that something weird happens at the end of a game and a big Nevada casino suffers a big loss or win. Sometimes a team scores on the wrong basket at the buzzer in basketball. Sometimes an NFL team gives up a safety late in a game, so it doesn't cover the spread. Stuff like that.

Do I care that a casino lost $200,000 or $2 million or $20 million? No. That's their business. It doesn't matter to me.

Do I care if an NBA team covered the spread? No. I care who won the game.

Look, I'm not trying to tell people not to cover sports business or gambling stories. Go ahead and cover it (although realize that the full embrace of gambling is probably making it easier for some people to experience financial ruin).

But as much as I like sports, don't expect me to read articles on labor negotiations or TV ratings or point spreads or casino losses.

Tell me about the games and the athletes and the fun. Tell me about sports.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.