Last week, Will Leitch, the founder of the popular sports blog Deadspin, came to the University of Illinois Bookstore to hold a discussion and a signing session for his new book, “God Save the Fan.”

If you know anything about Leitch and Deadspin, then you know they are the anti-ESPN. They pride themselves on this fact with a motto of “Sports News without Access, Favor or Discretion.”

Not surprisingly, there was a whole section of Leitch’s book that was dedicated to highlighting the flaws of sports media with a strong – and by “strong” I mean “almost entire” – emphasis on ESPN.

During his Q & A session at the bookstore, Leitch was asked his opinion on ESPN and whether he thought the network would continue to grow and whether other forms of media (i.e. blogs) would take a similar approach to sports journalism.

I can only decipher that as meaning an avalanche of flashy graphics and a bombardment of “booyas.”

Leitch responded, saying ESPN owes much of its success to the absence of another major competitor on television and that he believes a real competitor will rise within the next 10 years.

While I generally share Leitch’s thoughts on ESPN, I don’t agree that there will be a suitable competitor within the next 10 years, the next 50 years or even the next 100 years because the mega-network has a stranglehold on sports journalism.

And we let ESPN have it.

The first reason is control. ESPN has complete control over the market and at this point, it seems too late to break into the game.

The boys at Bristol have all the advertisers, the talented writers and reporters and, most importantly, the youth of America.

The often-forced catch phrases, the hip highlight reels and the popularity contests like the disastrous individually centric “Who’s Now?” segment, all speak to a younger fan base that will continue tune in to the network whenever it needs its sports fix.

By appealing to the younger audience, ESPN guarantees itself a generation of “SportsCenter” addicts. What kind of new network can challenge ESPN when it already has the young viewers?

Then there is the issue of accountability.

Maybe you’ve seen the Chris Berman videos that have been circulating on the Internet where the ESPN “legend” is swearing like a drunken sailor and talking about how he took pills he purchased in Canada containing codeine – an opiate found in opium – so he could achieve a relaxing high before another laborious show with “amateurs.”

Or maybe you heard about the vodka-induced rampage involving ESPN’s “First Take” host Dana Jacobson at the “Mike and Mike Celebrity Roast,” where a flurry of curse words and anti-Notre Dame “jokes” – allegedly aimed at the big J.C. – were thrown around in front of … well, just about everyone who works for ESPN.

Leitch also tells a story in his book of how ESPN neglected to report on the now-infamous “Ron Mexico” story – a story in which former Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick was sued for giving a woman herpes and proceeded to be tested for the disease under the fake name “Ron Mexico” to avoid public scrutiny.

The network didn’t want to take any flak from the NFL for reporting a negative story on one of its star players.

Basically, ESPN, a network committed to sports journalism on a national level, reports only the stories that won’t anger the leagues while its on-air personalities are running around taking shots of vodka, getting high on codeine and cursing at Catholics and interns.

So why does this happen? Because we let it happen. Not because there is no other network to hold ESPN accountable for its actions but because we have nowhere else to turn to for sports news, and ESPN knows this.

Finally, there is the infamous ESPN blacklist, which basically contains writers or reporters who have voiced a negative opinion about the network, prohibiting them from ever appearing on ESPN.

The mere thought of an ESPN blacklist alone keeps writers and reporters from spreading less-than-favorable ideas about ESPN to the masses in hopes of someday being rewarded with an outrageous contract or national television exposure by Bristol.

I don’t want you to get the wrong idea from this column. I’m not calling for a boycott of ESPN and all its affiliates, but I am asking you, the average sports fan, to be more aware.

In the world of news, we get information from all kinds of sources and outlets, but in the world of sports news, we only seem to have one.

In any other business in the world, this would be considered a monopoly.

So are we really getting news or are we just getting its version?

Kyle Betts is a senior in Communications. He can be reached at [email protected]