Taylor Rooks is a personality for Turner Sports and Bleacher Report. Here, in her own words, are her five goals:
1. I want to be an all-around interviewer.
What I mean by that is I want to reach a point where people don’t just know me as a sports interviewer, where people don’t say oh she interviews athletes and coaches and executives … I want people to see me as someone who has conversations with people who have something to say.
If that’s an athlete, great. If that’s a politician, great. If it’s an entertainer, great. If that’s just somebody who has an everyday job but they have something to say to the world, I want to be able to interview that person too. I want to speak to all people, not just a specific category of people.
A lot of that is on me reaching out to those people, and having a content vehicle that allows me to do that, but when I think of my favorite interviewers — Howard Stern, Oprah — their thing is they can talk to anyone. I want to do that.
Some people I want to interview: I got to interview Barack Obama, and that’s who I would’ve said. But, that was quick. I would love to have a long-form interview with him. Obviously, I’d have to throw in Michelle Obama as well.
Mariah Carey, I know that’s a random one, but she’s just lived such an interesting, lavish life. I read her book, and there were some things she didn’t really touch. Obviously, in your book, you don’t touch on the things that you don’t want to talk about. I would love to interview her.
Serena Williams, I know she’s obviously an athlete, but I’d love to interview her. Howard Stern is my favorite interviewer so I’d love to interview him. She’s unfortunately passed, but if I could interview anyone who is no longer with us I’d love to interview Princess Diana. And, Pam Oliver, who is a legend. Hopefully I can meet and later interview her.
2. Create a foundation or initiative for women in sports.
At first, I wanted it to be just for Black and Brown women, and I might have a branch of it that’s for that, but then I wanted it to be for all women. Right now there’s this idea that women in sports don’t get along, or that it’s incredibly catty, or everyone is out to get the other. In some ways, that’s probably true, but I think the majority of women want to see other women in this field win. We understand that a win for one of us is a win for all of us.
I don’t think there’s enough focus on the culture that’s created this idea that women are catty or whatever the case may be, because I don’t believe that to be true. I think the more that we can get women in sports together, and there’s more of a sisterhood and deeper innate understanding of each other — the more we can do what we can to improve that culture and hopefully the people who have created that culture do what they can to improve it too.
Everybody is trying to work hard and get what’s owed to them. You always hear Well, women in sports, but you never say Men in sports. You never say This man is a power hungry person [or it’s at least not said in a negative way]. That’s a very unfair burden on the women to carry. I don’t like it. I think women that are entering into the space are conditioned to think that’s true, because they hear it so much. I would like to have something that dispels the one-sidedness of the rumor.
3. I want to travel more and fluently learn a second language.
Throughout the pandemic, I started doing Duolingo to learn Spanish. Americans are one of the few countries that only know one language. Almost every other country it’s almost a necessity that they know another language, even if that language is English.
I would just like to expand my horizons in terms of culture and language and understanding that America is only a small section of the world, but so many times we feel like we’re the center of everything. That just isn’t true. I want to learn a new language, travel more, get more in-tune with other places and cultures and get into things like soccer. I want to stop thinking of things from such an American point of view.
4. This is a lifelong goal, but I really want to be a mom.
I’ve really wanted to be a mom my entire life, and there’s something so beautiful about raising a life and having this human being that is born out of love that you have this number one job — the biggest job you’ll have in the world, which is to nurture and protect and love this human. I definitely want to be a mom.
I want to have like five kids. I probably should’ve started by now if that’s the case (laughing). I want to be a mom. That’s my number one goal above everything.
5. I want to do more football.
Just being from Georgia, in the South, I grew up loving football. My dad played football. It was a football house. I love basketball — I love them both, but I just love football a little bit more.
I’ve gotten kind of sucked into doing mainly NBA, which is great and has led to so many amazing experiences, but I just wish I had more of a hand in football. I would love to be able to do more of that.
6. Bonus Goal: I would love to be a professor.
I want to teach journalism interviewing at the college level, just because I don’t love the way it is taught at universities. It’s taught in the way that the professors went through media, and media is so different now that I just think students would really benefit from having someone who came up in this new wave of journalism and social media and content creation. That’s the way it’s going.
It’s still obviously great to have these classes where everyone works as the producer one day, and the director, and the teleprompter. You go through all those things, and learn about investigative reporting. All that is so important. But that isn’t what a lot of young journalists want to do now, so being like a visiting professor at a school is something I would love to do one day.
Ryan Glasspiegel is a contributor for BSM. He has previously worked for Outkick, The Big Lead, and Sports Illustrated. In addition to covering the sports media business, Ryan creates promotional products for brands and companies including t-shirts, hats, hoodies, and various types of swag. For business inquiries email him at Glasspiegel.Ryan@gmail.com or find him on Twitter @sportsrapport.
