A sportswriting first

Don't write "refused comment." It's unnecessarily adversarial. Just say declined. You asked if they wanted to comment, they said they didn't want to.

If you ask your 5-year-old to go to his room, then he might refuse.

Refuse is a loaded word. The person doesn't have to comment. They can say no, and it's just declining.

 

I always talk to the coach, if for nothing but a stroke of the ego.
But I almost always talk to one or two kids, as well, and often use them as the lead quote.
There's an earnestness to a quote from a high school kid, especially one not used to hitting the winning home run or running for the game-breaking touchdown. That's good - that new feeling leads to passion that the coach who has been around for 40 years and seen 35 running backs just like Joe Douchebag just cannot fake.

 

If you are not talking to coaches at all (except in instances like the OP's, where the refuse to talk to you), then you aren't doing your job.

Don't have to quote them in every story. Sometimes, they will give you insight that isn't quotable, but that is useful. Blowing off coaches just because "he never says anything" or "he's not that quotable" is a mistake, IMO.

Plus, I've found at the high school level, if you want coaches to call in weekly stats or what not, it helps that they know who you are.

 

If you don't waste 10 minutes trying to talk to the coach, you can spend it looking for a kid with something intelligible to say. I wouldn't say they are universally inarticulate. Some are, some aren't. Varies from kid to kid and school to school.

I'd go along with the suggestion that you meet with him in a non-interview, non-event setting and just discuss what you're doing and why, and how it is you hope he can contribute to it. You might get cooperation that you weren't before.

 

It's just high school sports.

I don't even put up with prick coaches who think they're fucking managing the Yankees or something. Usually my favorite thing to do is to make those kinds of coaches look like idiots.

I remember we had a local soccer coach who always called in and blamed his shitty team's losses on anything and everything he could think of. It was always the refs blowing calls, the field being in poor shape, the other team being dirty, key players being injured (I remember he once told me they had their 8 best players hurt, which is just a preposterous lie). He'd call after his miserable team would lose 7-1 and waste our fucking time with his whining.

So one night one of my colleagues just ran everything the guy said verbatim. Just quoted every excuse, every lie, every idiot comment and ran it in the paper. I loved it.

HS coaches are notorious for being pricks and liars. I'm all for running their jackass, idiot quotes in the paper. They wanna be pricks, then embarrass them in print.

With this coach who refused comment, I would've made it a point to say he refused comment. So what if it taints the kids' win. They can blame their idiot coach.

 

S-P and SCE probably have this one in the bag.

S-P's point about the coach not talking can easily be viewed as a blessing. While coaches usually have more diplomacy, a player typically won't have the coachspeak, PC, cliched, canned quote that a coach will typically spout.

Plus, as SCE added, some coaches aren't under a fraction of the pressure from the media that they are from parents. In softball, for example, if a dominant pitcher has been the talk of the team for two, three, even four years, the coach has heard and said everything dozens of times ... to the point that anything said about another player in a positive sense is a big, big bonus. A parent could be fed up with hearing about nothing but the pitcher and try to blame the coach. What's a coach to do in that case?

One more question about the coach: Is he being prickly or is he calmly declining comment. The media should be able to discern that difference and adjust accordingly. It's entirely possible the coach doesn't want to steal from what the players have done, combined with excessive parental pressure.

 

You quote coaches. If coach won't comment, you report that. Period. Fill in the blanks with the players. If you're like everyone else, your story length is getting shorter and shorter so one less quote isn't that big a deal. But by not calling the coach out on his behavior, you're condoning it. That simple. Never condone.

 

"Calling the coach out on his behavior" accomplshes absolutelty nothing and adds nothing to your story.
I'd bet no reders are reading the story and saying "Why isn't Coach Obnoxious quoted?"

Coach is a jerk? Ignore hm.

 

I'll agree in this instance. But, if the pattern persists, the reporter ought to stick up for himself. It might help him with future stories.

When I was first starting out in this business, and thus young and stupid, I once had a coach who refused to call me back for my weekly 5A football column. Everybody else in the district would return a phone call. He never would.

I'd make mention of it every now and then, if I happened to be writing about his team: "Coach So-And-So did not return calls."

Eventually, I probably started to get a little pissy. Probably too pissy. One week, I included a "quote" from him: ".......," Coach So-And-So said, then mentioned how it was the third time in four weeks he didn't return calls or something.

Totally stupid. Totally unprofessional. I'd never do it again.

But I'll be damned if Coach So-And-So didn't start returning phone calls.

My advice to the original poster: If you cover this team on a consistent basis, and you feel like you need this coach to cooperate at some point, I'd talk to someone. The coach, his supervisor, someone. Maybe you can come to an agreement.

Since this appears to be the last game of the season, you might not ever have to deal with this coach again, though, so I wouldn't sweat it for now.

 

I almost always get at least one comment from the coach, simply because most I've dealt with aren't hesitant to offer insight.

But getting a player is essential. More and more, they're getting a lot better at being media-savvy because of the age we live in and you'll find a lot of good gems, often from the second-tier guys and bench-riding players.

My general philosophy toward gamers is getting a coach comment and at least one player, two preferably, from the coverage area club.

The readership is often interested in what the coach has to say to get a feel for what he's thinking and his view on what went on, especially in preps. Players count, too, but it's coaches who catch most of the fire if a team is not performing well at the high school level.

At the college level or higher, readers are more interested in what players think or say instead of the coach, since greater blame and responsibility is placed upon the players at those levels.