Durham hit today?

[Moderator1]

More bad news, though I'm not certain of details on this one.
Someone?
Anyone?

[This is my username]

Mike Potter from sports. Half dozen in the newsroom total with 2-3 more reshuffled.

Mike covered the Hurricanes, the Bulls and N.C. Central.

[Sam Mills 51]

Proof that Paxton has found a backhoe and/or numerous shovels and somehow lowered the bar. Good freaking grief.

Mike was already doing a serious spackle job trying to juggle all those beats. Small wonder Frank Dascenzo got out of there ... he knew Paxton was slashing and burning.

Mike is one of most easygoing, unassuming people I had the good fortune to meet and I hope he lands on his feet in a hurry. That he deserved much better goes without saying.

[Tarheel316]

This is downright awful. Mike is a great guy who works his tail off. But I am not surprised because it's Paxton, the JRC of the South.

[SportsGuyBCK]

So who the heck is left in sports? It seemed that Mike was the only writer left after the previous slash-and-burns ...

[This is my username]

SE, UNC beat, Duke beat, preps beat and a desker.

[Fredrick]

Mike covered the Hurricanes, the Bulls and N.C. Central.

Aren't the Hurricanes still alive? And they can the beat guy?
Can you imagine replacing one guy ... how much that will make the others work and how much shittier the sports pages will be?
In its heydey, how many were in sports in this once fine sports section.

[Moderator1]

A desker?  A desker?  One?

[ondeadline]

Here's how they're listed on the Web site (college beats added by me):

SPORTS
Jack Daly Writer/Copy editor (UNC)
Jimmy DuPree Sports editor
Briana Gorman Preps reporter/Copy Editor
Matt Philpott Designer/copy editor
Bryan Strickland Sports reporter (Duke)
 

So the Durham paper has basically become like much smaller papers: Just about everybody works the desk. Duke beat writer Strickland appears to be the only one who doesn't work the desk. He'll probably be worked like  crazy picking up Potter's beats such as the Bulls and the Canes.

The interesting part will come when the football season starts, particularly if the Bulls make the playoffs. They'll have to get stringers to get everything covered. Never mind features during the week.

[Tarheel316]

Wow, they really are stretched thin, given all they have to cover. I wouldn't be surprised if they got the Canes fron AP now. That's the Paxton way. Frank retired at the right time and doesn't have to put up with Paxton's crap anymore.

[JKelly12]

I went from Paxton to MG last year. My seven months at MG have been so bad in so many ways, I almost forgot what Paxton was capable of. This is a sad reminder that they're still as evil as ever.

[bueller]

Durham's website today has an AP story on the Hurricanes and nothing on the Bulls, who are home.

I've always enjoyed my dealings with Mike. He always seemed to have 800 things on his plate, mainly because he did with all of those beats. I remember his amazement that the Durham paper wouldn't deliver to his new house because it was a quarter-mile inside Wake County.

[Luke_Knox]

Really sad to hear about Mike Potter ... he was incredibly helpful and gracious to a certain green college kid stringing the women's D-II hoops tournament for the N&O back in '02.  One of the kindest human beings I've met in the biz.  Here's hoping he lands on his feet, and that those left in Durham can keep their heads above water somehow.

[SCEditor]

I know everybody is understaffed, but how does a newspaper with two D-1 colleges, a D-2 college, a pro hockey team, a minor league baseball team and preps put out a paper with five total people in sports? That's insane.

[Kelly Tripucka]

This news really sickens me. Mike is good people -- and a solid reporter who worked his tail off for that paper.

It sickens me, but doesn't surprise me considering the parent company.

I guess they will be riding AP for Hurricanes coverage. Brilliant timing.

[BrianGriffin]

Here's what kills me. Where I am, the paper is still relatively healthy (relatively being the key word). I think people still pick us up and expect a decent product.

But what happens is you get places like Durham, where they've just gutted the quality of the product to the point where if folks from Durham move where I am, they've been "trained" to think the newspaper is going to be garbage. They've been broken of their newspaper habit before they get here.

So our circulation suffers as more people who move here (granted, it's not a HUGE transplant town) don't even think about reading a paper any more.

Thanks Paxton. And Gannett. And, well, take your pick...

[Kelly Tripucka]

Here's another thing: It's a business model other chains will point to. "Well, if Durham can do it in their market, we can do it here, too."

Ugh. I really do try to remain optimistic -- my paper is fairly healthy right now, too -- but news like this is soul-crushing.

[joe king]

I know everybody is understaffed, but how does a newspaper with two D-1 colleges, a D-2 college, a pro hockey team, a minor league baseball team and preps put out a paper with five total people in sports? That's insane.

Try three -- NC State is in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill triangle, too.

[Kelly Tripucka]

I know everybody is understaffed, but how does a newspaper with two D-1 colleges, a D-2 college, a pro hockey team, a minor league baseball team and preps put out a paper with five total people in sports? That's insane.

Try three -- NC State is in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill triangle, too.

According to a certain Boston Globe columnist, the Hurricanes play on the NC State campus.

[Jake_Taylor]

 I can't imagine how the Herald-Sun is going to cover much going forward because Mike used to run all over the Triangle covering just about everything. He's also one of the nicest guys in the business. I feel bad for those left there.

[AgatePage]

I know everybody is understaffed, but how does a newspaper with two D-1 colleges, a D-2 college, a pro hockey team, a minor league baseball team and preps put out a paper with five total people in sports? That's insane.

Try three -- NC State is in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill triangle, too.

Actually, Central is Division I now, too. That's four.

[Keystone]

Here's another thing: It's a business model other chains will point to. "Well, if Durham can do it in their market, we can do it here, too."

Ugh. I really do try to remain optimistic -- my paper is fairly healthy right now, too -- but news like this is soul-crushing.

That's what my former ME based his sports department cuts on when it hit the fan last month, and I was one of three full-timers to go. He was bragging to a new hire, a year previous, that he was "going to cut the fat" in the sports department. He said he wanted it to be "the average size" of sports departments are at similar sized papers.

What a tool.

[bueller]

I know everybody is understaffed, but how does a newspaper with two D-1 colleges, a D-2 college, a pro hockey team, a minor league baseball team and preps put out a paper with five total people in sports? That's insane.

Try three -- NC State is in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill triangle, too.

I don't think they even try to cover N.C. State.

Today's website again has AP from the Hurricanes and nothing on the homestanding Bulls.

[ondeadline]

They haven't had a writer assigned to the N.C. State beat since Paxton's first layoffs at the Herald-Sun in January 2005. I think they have covered State games sometimes, and obviously whenever it plays Duke or North Carolina.

That will be a busy crew of five with the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference finals and the ACC baseball tournament in Durham next week.

Times have changed, though. During the Canes' run to the 2002 finals, they sent a beat writer and a columnist on the road with the team in the playoffs. Now they don't have a columnist -- although those who remain sometimes write columns -- and it's highly unlikely they will send even one writer to Pittsburgh for the Eastern Conference finals games there. (Of course the Raleigh News and Observer went a few weeks late in the regular season when it wasn't sending a writer on the road with the Hurricanes.)

[podunk press]

With a staff that small, you are better off picking the sports that are truly important to your readers and punting everything else.

If you have a motivated staff of five, it's amazing what can be done. Smaller dailies have been overcoming the odds like that for years.