Question

The following passage contains a participial phrase.
Featured in many news stories, football players receive a lot of the public's attention. Through the media, athletes have a major platform to share their opinions.

The participial phrase Featured in many news stories functions as a(n) .

Answer 1

a participial phrase is a phrase that begins with a participle (think present participle, past participle, etc.) and serves to modify some other word in the sentence

I can't find any answer choices, but as a hint I will narrow it down to two phrases

Featured in many news stories
and
Through the media

^ between these two identify which one starts w/ a participle

now, as for the function, what is it modifying?