I heard a couple of sports talk radio commentators declare athletes who tweet as the height of narcissism and a sign of a coming apocalypse. Sure Nate Robinson probably shouldn’t have tweeted about his being pulled over by the NYPD… while it happened but I would have thought that a couple of sports guys would be thrilled to have a channel for athletes to communicate directly with.

Narcissism aside, any chance to get behind the veneer of media training and prepared statements to hear what sports stars have to say in their own words (well their own 140 characters…) should be regarded as a god send. Twitter is a perfect platform for athletes to interact with fans and some of their best work comes when their guards are down. Authenticity like that can’t be faked it gives fans a much better sense what these stars are like than any glossy network produced profile might.

While most of the major sports have come down on Twitter use, it is a fantastic relationship building tool for their leagues and I suspect the marketers (not so much Corporate Communications) are secretly thrilled about it. Sure they would like to have greater control over the content but any forum for speaking to the fans that is initiated by the stars is pure gold. The lesson here for marketers is that your social media strategy needs to trust users to take the message and spread it throughout their community. Marketers need to learn to cede control and instead build relationships that move prospects from being merely interested to enthusiastic and ultimately advocates.

Maybe this is why the radio guys don’t like Twitter. It isn’t the narcissism but the ceding control to citizen (or in this case, athlete) journalists. Instead of placing professionals such as radio commentators at the top, social media eliminate the hierarchy, giving a more-or-less equal voice to all users. Or maybe they aren’t as interested in Alex Ovechkin’s pre-skate rituals as the fans are.

In the meantime let’s see if the major sports leagues can give up enough control to let us fans continue to get unfiltered access, both the good and the bad.

Here are a few of the most infamous athlete tweets:

Charlie Villanueva – tweets at half time of a tied game against the Celtics about having to step it up and play tougher. He puts his money where is mouth is and scores 11 of his 19 points in the second half to help Milwaukee get past Boston.

Kevin Love – tweets Coach Kevin McHale would not be back as coach of the Minnesota Timberwolves next season before the team officially announces it

Brian Ching – tweets that referees cheated his MLS club team out of a win while watching the game on TV. Ching was not playing because of U.S. national team duty for a Gold Cup match.