Even bad NBA games get scores in the 80's and 90's and though American football may not have many scoring opportunities, you get multiple points for each score. It may seem like a small point but this quantity vs. quality preference seems to have further sociological consequences that explains coverage of news events beyond the world of sports. The coverage of the recent shootings in schoolyards is one example. Jonesboro, Arkansas has a high name recognition, but most people would draw a blank on Fayetteville, Tennessee. Only one child died in Fayetteville but five died in the Jonesboro school shooting.
Death caused by a child on a shooting spree is a tragic event in any case.
And Fayetteville is as good a place as Joneboro to figure out why a child would turn a gun on his classmates. Whether it is one child shot or three or five, the event is just as painful for the parents of the innocent young child. I don't know how many times I have seen supporters of Ken Starr measure the success of the Independent Counsel's investigations by the number of indictments issued to date. And I wonder what would happen if potential presidential candidate George Bush Jr.'s links with his brother Neil were examined. It doesn't matter that George Jr.'s only involvement may just be a family relationship to Neil, who was on Silverado's board of directors, if the number of indictments gets into those high double figures it can be made to look bad.