College Sports, Losing Seasons, and Image Repair Through Open Letters to Fans

College sports coaches and administrators can use open letters to repair images and weather crises, especially during losing seasons. Our rhetorical analysis uses Benoit’s typology of image repair to reveal three primary strategies attempted during losing seasons: evading responsibility, reducing offensiveness, and corrective action. We take note of how open letters distributed via electronic media channels widen the audience of such letters, but also, complicate issues of timing and of targeted audience analysis. We offer five implications for scholars and practitioners, including the importance of audience analysis, the value of corrective action, the ineffectiveness of attacking accusers, and the unique value of transcendence in sport communication image repair rhetoric.