AJ-C traveling with Thrashers on team plane?

To hell with that. No frequent flyer miles on team charters.

And I don't want to have to hang back while some star athlete gets rude with a flight attendant. I want to be the dick being rude to the flight attendants.

Flying now, with an occasional upgrade and those miles, only sort of feels like being on the clock. Flying on a team plane would feel 100 percent like being on the clock.

 

I've never understood the objection to this as long as your coverage doesn't change. If you stay a solid journalist and continue to do the same quality work you would do at home, what's the problem with making traveling a little bit easier, especially in these economic times?

 

It really makes you wonder why this newspaper has a print edition at all? I mean if newspapers like this one are not going to cover any of their teams adequately, why not just go all online. It'll be much easier to fake stories online with blogs et. all.

 

Why would anybody fly from Chicago to Milwaukee? If MLB teams have that on their schedule today, they bus it. Door-to-door, the bus trip is quicker than flying would be.

 

Silly me. I thought a few people on this board actually had ethics. Predictably, it's amateur hour.

Tough beans about the economy. Then don't travel. But the team you cover footing the bill for a portion of your travel — even if they're not directly doing it — is wrong on so many levels, even if your stories aren't compromised because of it. There's a line in the sand that you don't cross, and that is it. You travel with the team, you're at their mercy.

Those who don't see it are the ones wearing team-issued gear to work, cheering in press boxes and stuffing ham sandwiches from the press buffet in their coat pockets.

Putzes. You give sportswriting a bad name.

 

Did you read a different thread where everyone was enthusiastically hitching rides on team planes?

 

No, being wrong gives sportswriting a bad name. Screwing up the facts, going on an unhinged tirade in a column, being a jackass, and otherwise doing your job poorly gives sportswriting a bad name.

Think about it: Fans have no idea how we get to the events as it is. They already yell at us when we write something negative about the local team that we cover, because they think we're supposed to be fans too. So I wouldn't put it past them to assume that we're around the team 24/7, including travel.

So, if the stories aren't compromised, why is it wrong? You say it's wrong on so many levels - why? Detail what you specifically object to, instead of just casting out broad insults and assertions.

 

Georgia's MLS team.

 

I traveled on the Oakland A's plane twice last year coming back from the East Coast, because there was no other way to get back that night on a commercial flight. I paid what our hotel bill for that night would have been and the A's got some extra cash, and I saved a night on the road. I don't believe our coverage was compromised in any way, and we provided compensation for the flight.

Reporters also routinely fly with teams (at least in baseball) for overseas trips, often because there's no other way to finish reporting a spring story in, say, Phoenix, and then get to Tokyo in time to cover the team's arrival there unless you take the team flight. I know all the A's media were on the team plane to Japan two years ago for exactly that reason, and same with a trip to Hermosillo, Mexico, several years before that.

 

100 bucks and two stale ham sandwiches says you're not a sports writer.

 

Probably the Thrashers' take, too. Last time I saw one of their home games on television, there were numerous empty seats.

I've flown and bused with teams and had few problems. The major exception was being asked for a scouting report after covering a practice at nationals. The relationship soured within seconds. In fact, I have not traveled with them again. Then again, they are desirous enough of coverage they'd probably take me if I asked knowing I'm not a house man.

Someone said "just be a journalist." That hits pretty close to my experiences. Maintain integrity, do a little dancing in relationships, and it usually works out. At least it has for me.