"There's that initial reticence for some athletes to take you seriously"
About this Quote
It’s a polite sentence with a sharp edge: Guerrero names the wall before she names the room. “Initial reticence” is the kind of newsroom-safe phrasing that lets a speaker describe bias without sounding like they’re filing a grievance. The word choice matters. Reticence isn’t open hostility; it’s the slow, socially acceptable version of dismissal - the pause before respect, the careful measuring of whether you “count.”
Her intent is partly tactical. In sports media, credibility is treated like a credential you have to wear on your body, not just in your byline. By framing athletes’ skepticism as “initial,” she suggests the barrier can be crossed - but only after an extra proving period that others don’t endure. The subtext is gendered and power-aware: athletes are brands, and access is currency. If they don’t “take you seriously,” you don’t just lose an interview; you lose proximity to the story, the off-camera texture that makes reporting land.
Contextually, Guerrero’s career sits in a pipeline where women in sports coverage have been asked to perform two jobs at once: do the reporting and manage the audience’s assumptions about why they’re there. The line also quietly flips the usual hierarchy. Athletes may control the locker room, but journalists control the narrative. Her measured tone reads like someone who knows that saying “sexism” outright can trigger defensiveness, while naming the behavior can still expose it. The result is a compact diagnosis of how legitimacy gets gatekept - not through shouting, but through hesitation.
Her intent is partly tactical. In sports media, credibility is treated like a credential you have to wear on your body, not just in your byline. By framing athletes’ skepticism as “initial,” she suggests the barrier can be crossed - but only after an extra proving period that others don’t endure. The subtext is gendered and power-aware: athletes are brands, and access is currency. If they don’t “take you seriously,” you don’t just lose an interview; you lose proximity to the story, the off-camera texture that makes reporting land.
Contextually, Guerrero’s career sits in a pipeline where women in sports coverage have been asked to perform two jobs at once: do the reporting and manage the audience’s assumptions about why they’re there. The line also quietly flips the usual hierarchy. Athletes may control the locker room, but journalists control the narrative. Her measured tone reads like someone who knows that saying “sexism” outright can trigger defensiveness, while naming the behavior can still expose it. The result is a compact diagnosis of how legitimacy gets gatekept - not through shouting, but through hesitation.
Quote Details
| Topic | Coaching |
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