Texas A&M University's top-ranked baseball team appeared to change its policy regarding player interview availability after being called out by college sports reporter Sam Kahn Jr. of The Athletic.
"This is a first in my years of covering college sports," Kahn posted Saturday on social media. "Texas A&M baseball's media policy states that players won't be available for interviews after losses."
Kahn went on to ask, "Any reporters out there experience this elsewhere?"
As reported by Andrew Bucholtz of Awful Announcing and newsbreak.com, the A&M baseball media policies website has since removed the line “Note: players will not be available following a loss.”
"It’s not clear how long that language was previously in place or if it came from head coach Michael Earley (who took the job last summer) or from the athletic department," Bucholtz reported.
Kahn immediately followed up his initial post with a disclaimer. "I don't cover college baseball, but this was brought to my attention by someone on the local A&M beat. I don't know why A&M took this step. But it aligns with a trend I've seen in recent years of A&M offering less access (at least in football) than its counterparts."
The sentiment among those who responded to Kahn leaned into the idea that A&M was probably attempting to protect its players. While one opined that such a policy is no way to prepare athletes for the next level — meaning professional baseball, where availability is mandated win or lose — another seemed to think its wrong to force players into interview situations.
A&M won its first two games of the season this past weekend.
"There’s a long history of access debates in a variety of college sports," Bucholtz wrote. "Providing players for interviews only after a win would still be less restrictive than never providing players . But a policy of only conducting interviews at positive moments is particularly strange. It apparently drew enough criticism to be at least taken off the website, although it remains to be seen how many (if any) A&M players actually wind up being interviewed after losses."
