Dear dimwit on the phone

Damn two dimwits in 24 hours:

FB player: hey what time is it?
Me: quarter after 6
FB player: So that's 6:25?
Me: *facepalm*

 

We had a change in our sports coverage in Summer 2016 that eliminated one small school from our coverage area. This was one of our smallest schools that is one of the farthest away from the office. There was also maybe a handful of paper subscribers from that community, so staff decided it would be okay to cut them out, especially since we'd already cut them from tab coverage because we couldn't ever sell any ads down there.

We didn't really communicate that with them, but figured it wasn't a big deal. We wouldn't cover games at their school, but we decided we'd write a brief if they sent stats. Well, of course they were one of the very few schools that were pretty good about submitting results in multiple sports. Eventually, we stopped writing them, even though we still took their calls. Would've explained why if they asked, but no one did.

With a new season starting up, I decided to do something about it as the guy manning the phones most nights. When they called in to report stats from their game, I let them know they don't have to call because of the change in our coverage. The reactions couldn't have been more different.....football coach sounded excited that he wouldn't have to call us anymore, while the volleyball coach sounded like a sad puppy.

 

I had a similar reaction when I ended up having to drop coverage of the county north of me about four years ago. Football coaches basically said, "See ya!" The basketball coaches were disappointed.

The track coach from one of those schools still sends in results. The stuff from his cross country meet is in my inbox right now.

On the other hand, the daily south of here just made a decision to drop coverage of two in-county schools. One of them posted about it on Facebook and people are pissed.

 

Not to be too snarky, but if they're sending stuff in, why not publish it? I can understand not pursuing it, though.

 

Time is a big part of it. We probably could've done more though, you're right.

 

We had a high school on the outer, outer fringes of what was then a fairly wide coverage area that we quit covering sometime around 1990. Nevertheless, every Friday night during football season, that school's radio guy would call us with their results, and we'd get them in the Saturday paper. Later on, around 2008 or so, we contracted our area again and were going to cut out a little 2A school that was on the fringe of the coverage area. I vehemently pitched to keep covering them, because I had a feeling they were about to become really, really good, plus they played most of the schools that were in our area. They subsequently won five state championships over the next seven seasons and have produced a ridiculous amount of D-1 talent for a school that size.

 

The reason I was hired many years back shortly out of college was because we decided to cover two communities in neighboring counties that were sort of "in the middle" and didn't get any regular newspaper coverage. This included 3 high schools, so for my first year in the business I was the "beat guy" for the sports at those 3 schools, which I enjoyed.

But after about a year, they pulled the plug on that. Obviously, the massive amounts of subscribers they figured would come flocking never did (thankfully, there was so much to do in sports, I didn't lose my job...that time). But my SE at the time never notified anyone from those schools. We just sort of stopped reporting on them, and eventually the submissions dried out.

We still joke like that was handled how The Bobs let go of Milton in Office Space. We "fixed the glitch" and avoided any confrontation or contact whatsoever, though I did mention it to people from those areas if they asked. In hindsight I was young then, and today I would immediately notify the coaches and ADs in the area.

 

I try not to be a dick, but I can't fathom how people still call for these inquiries anymore. I guess maybe very old people, but we get some younger-sounding guy who always calls in and asks us to run down obscure, non-major PGA tournaments. Dude, we run results when we have space, but getting the first round of the John Deere Classic in there with the top 75 leaders isn't a priority.

I always want to say, "You obviously care and know way more about pro golf than I do. Why are you asking me?"

 

We'd get some guy who'd call in every once in a while wanting to know NHRA results. NHRA!

Something funny/annoying to come out of the ever-decreasing agate space was that we'd have to cut content, the SE would be 100% onboard with what got cut, someone would call to complain that such-and-such was missing from the paper, and the SE would ask us why it's not there.

 

Don't even know how to respond to this email from a swimming parent....

A little bit disappointed in coverage for breaking a school record, but maybe next time you’ll do better. ; ) there will be more swimmers breaking records…be ready…. ; )

 

Do better dammit!

 

New part-timer who's actually a senior in HS but taking college classes in town.

Maybe a month on the job, and has been yelled at by dimwits at games multiple times for stuff that's mostly out of her control. She's not the brightest tool in the shed, but still. Real cool, people....