By now you’ve heard about and perhaps seen the Erin Andrews nude videos that caught fire on the net last Friday. Since then, a whirlwind of speculation and media frenzy unlike anything we’ve ever witnessed for a sideline reporter. Top stories on Foxnews.com and Yahoo.com prove this is much more than just a celebrity nip-slip; America is curious to see how Ms. Andrews will rebound, and what the outcome of this situation will be.

Think of the scene during Anchorman where Veronica Corningstone is fighting Ron Burgundy. All the women in the newsroom are pulling for Veronica because she is the first one to join the boys club of broadcasting. For years, sports reporting has been a male dominated venue with gentlemen like Craig Sager roaming the sidelines for the story. Women joined the club, but none as mainstream or attractive as Erin Andrews.

She’s now fighting not only for her own reputation and justice, but the legitimacy of good looking female sports reporters in the future. She has the chance to normalize the presence of attractive women on the sidelines of games, doing a legitimate job. Up until this point, blogs, and everyone but ESPN and other reputable news outlets, treated her job as a joke and her body like an object. Can she break down this barrier so that in 10 years a good looking girl can be on the sidelines of an NFL game who is liked for her reporting skills and not her outfits and hairstyles? I for one hope she does.

The next year will be very interesting, both from a legal perspective, and to see how Erin handles all of this. The best possible case would be a quick and minimally litigious settlement. Keeping the case out of the news is the best thing for her career. She needs to get back on the sidelines of college football and basketball this fall/winter and step up her game even more. The key will be not to change her approach, not to change what she believes in. If she wants to wear a nice outfit, she should feel she can without the scrutiny of the media referencing this incident.

What’s the worst case? Lets just say we wouldn’t be seeing Ms. Andrews covering sports on ESPN anymore. Lets hope instead she finds the justice she deserves and accomplishes everything she sets out to do. The rest of the pieces will fall into place.