Do SIDs know anything?

The two main SIDs I deal with -- football and basketball -- don't really seem to know much more than I do about the team I cover. And I think, most of the time, they're not just playing dumb. I actually think the coaches I cover, especially the football coach, is so paranoid that he's afraid his SID is going to leak things like, "Ed Quickfoot may or may not have sprained his ankle last week," and that it will cause his team to lose games.

The basketball SID is so woefully unhelpful that I don't even bother asking him to help me get interviews anymore, much less go to him for gap-filling information. Soon, I expect a new tier in media relations that makes it so that SIDs never actually have to talk to anyone.

 

I rarely ever depended on SIDs for anything in the way of information on the team that would worthy of making it into print. I used them to arrange player interviews that I couldn't just do as hit-and-runs after practice, help me get credentialed home and away and to schedule time for me with the handful of coaches who did not want to be contacted directly by media.

Between HIPPA and the fact that any top 100 hoops coach or top 119 football can get them fired at any time, I can halfway understand why some SIDs are useless in the "I" portion of their job title.

 

Every SID is good except that new guy at VCU. Whomever he is!

 

It's like anything else.

There are terrific ones and there are crappy ones.

The good ones have autonomy, but then there are those under the control of the athletic director and/or specific coaches.

I am not in the game today, but I remember some of the guys in New England Like Ed Carpenter at BU and Jim Norman at URI. As a toung sports writer, they were both of great help to me -- and others.

 

I don't know. The ones I've dealt with recently have stunned me by the breadth of their knowledge of their teams, even going back a few years. One could tell the lacrosse players apart simply by the way they ran. She didn't even need to look at their numbers.

 

Paging Just_An_SID ... and some other bum who recently became one ...

It sounds as if you've run into a bad one or two. I've been lucky in that two different SID, both at Division II schools, were among the best guys I've ever dealt with, regardless of title, experience or anything else. Just super people.

And, like you, I've run into a couple that I'm pretty sure I knew more than they did. Which isn't good when one considers that I wasn't covering their schools and programs on a frequent basis.

 

a good SID can be an invaluable source. others not so much.

 

Yeah. That jerk!

I guess I'm spoiled by the SIDs I've dealt with at the university I cover. They've all treated me well and helped me with what I've needed.

 

He's a damn sight better than the foof who used to be the SE at Richmond...

 

I have a hard time believing there's a better group of SIDs in the country than the ones with whom I deal on my beat.

And no, they don't frequent this board...

 

What you really need is an SID of one sport who hates everything involved in another sport. That can really help. But overall, I'd definitely be extremely wary of depending on an SID for a fact involving the team you cover. I would always, always, always ask, because you never know. But particularly if it's something the SID would only think he/she would know. Like if an assistant is looking for another job. Everyone thinks their guy is staying.
I know people who have been burned on that.