A question for beat writers - does this piss you off?

As a beat writer, I'm guessing most of you only get access after games like everyone else - via press conferences or open locker rooms.

However, does it tick you off when a national writer comes in (say from ESPN/ESPN.com or SI/SI.com) and the media relations people make sure he/she gets a 1-on-1 with a player or coach which you couldn't get? Or do you think this just part of the sports journalism food chain?

 

I've been on both sides of this.

I was always much more pissed when my access was infringed upon in order to help out the TV guys.

Bleep them.

 

Yes, that would piss me off.

It's happened a few times on my beat. I let the SID know it's bullshit. Then I move on.

 

you can't get 1-on-1s when you need them with guys on the team you cover?

 

Rarely. Half my job is college football, which practices the exact opposite of good media relations.

But yes, national writers often swoop in and get 1-on-1's. Andy Katz, for one, won't do any interview except a 1-on-1 from what I've seen. He feels he's too good for pool interviews, I assume.

 

This sort of thing has happened with Saban twice already.
After his hire, he sat down with three south Florida papers after the original presser in Tuscaloosa -- and no Bama media.
At the Bama-LSU game Tuesday night, he had a presser with the Louisiana media -- and no Bama media...

 

Pathetic, but I assume hardly surprising.

Good to know Nick is instantly endearing himself to the Bama media.

 

Is it normal in D-I sports to not get 1-on-1's with athletes? It seems like it would be hard to do feature stories if you have to do group interviews.

 

You must cover some kind of college football team there.

I think the most famous recent one was Bill Snyder keeping Michael Bishop away from all local media for a large part of the 1998 season - the local media, which had suffered for some 30 years through all those horrible games - only to let Bishop talk to Sports Illustrated in his office.

From a general standpoint...

TV guys are gonna get it because they need it - for camera interviews during the broadcasts. So little is ever said in those interviews - and some of it is staged - that I'm not sure what difference it really makes.

National print guys? Yeah, that's annoying.

 

At a certain school I cover, you only get interviews once a week at the presser. You request players, but there are other media who end up jumping in on your interview. You can't get 1-on-1 access. You only have 30 minutes to get 5 guys for your stuff the entire week. And then fans wonder where the copy is. And 1-on-1 with the coach is unheard of. It is either 20 people or nothing. Won't even take side questions 1-on-1 after the press conference. I stopped trying.

An in dpeth well thought out feature? Not going to happen. They don't care.

 

Saban's move was invented by Bill Parcells. Nothing's too good for the guys who covered him in his last job, but screw the guys at the current one. I had Bill do this to me, and use me to do it to the Jets' reporters. Weird. What's the point of manipulating people who know it's happening?

 

If this shit happens to you, don't bitch about it in the paper. Nobody cares but us. Seriously, you write this, the people reading are actually happy to know you got screwed over.

What I normally do in a situation like this is figure out some way to get back at them, such as file about a dozen FOI requests which I have absolutely no intention of using for anything. And make sure it's requests for shit that they'll have trouble finding -- an athletic budget from 1984, the salaries of the previous five coaches in all sports, etc. And slap an insane date on it, too.