ESPN college sites/hiring

The USC one isn't a new site; it looks like they just bought out and rebranded WeAreSC.com, which has been one of the top USC fan sites for some time. They were pretty heavily involved in ESPN 710's coverage of USC football games - their old editor Gary Paskowitz was a big part of their post-game coverage. In all, that's not a bad strategy - go after existing "fan" sites with strong, built-in fan bases rather than having to build it up from scratch.

 

I was just talking about the "who wants to work for ESPN anyway?" meme.

 

Gotcha. Just pointing out that considering the jobs specified on the thread, nobody in these positions will get to enjoy the campus much, it would seem.

(converted to English at 1:53 AM -- BG)

 

To me, that can only be a factor if you're on the level where you're choosing between similar paying jobs at ESPN and one or two of Sports Illustrated, Fox Sports, CBS Sports, Yahoo! Sports, Sporting News, The New York Times or USA Today. I'm hesitant to throw those last three in there, too, since it's not 1995.

 

I'm not denying that the money is probably better than some of these papers are paying (unless you don't mind paying your own benefits, which if you're single, cuts significantly into that pay increase).

If money is all you care about, then these jobs are outstanding. If producing meaningful work and moving up the ladder are high on your priority list, then it might not be for you. It wouldn't be for me.

And, yes, there are people who have left those jobs because they're not as good as they appear -- if you care about doing anything more than what you're initially signing on for.

 

I heard they were going to rebrand WeAreSC and hire a full-time USC beat writer in the process. Not sure if they did the latter.

 

I guess, Michael, and it's being somewhat repetitive of others, but I don't know how much turnover and "moving up" you can really expect when somebody's covering a major school for ESPN (and obviously, since I work for a competitor, I'm hardly saying they're the ultimate). But really, moving up ... to where? And how much movement is going on in this business right now? Unless I'm missing your point.

 

I am going to try to pre-qualify to apply for coveted the Cleveland State gig. But I might settle for the Case Western Reserve beat.

 

My point is that many writers see these jobs as entry points into ESPN, where presumably they'll do a good job and attempt to move up -- past the blogger/team-specific role and into a job like what Pat Forde has. There has been little to no moving up whatsoever, and years after these jobs began being offered -- and enthusiastically accepted -- most, if not all, of these writers are still in those original jobs and have mostly been forgotten within this massive corporate machine. No one is moving up, because they're not able to do substantive work; it's all feeding the beast and linking to other stories and writing short capsules. Which, again, is fine, if your goal is to be part -- albeit a very small part -- of the world's largest sports entity.

I just don't want people to think this is these are the foot-in-the-door jobs that'll lead to bigger things, as they're often are believed to be, because there's just no proof that this is true.

 

The cafeteria WAS pretty good. I forget what sandwich I got but they had chocolate-covered popcorn that was muy bien. And we were *thiiiiiiis* close to seeing Berman blow out a tire in the parking lot.

Based on that experience and that experience alone, I heartily endorse working at ESPN.

 

I think you have a point about the conference bloggers, but from what I understand they aren't really looking for the same thing from these hires. I could be wrong.

 

The Texas and USC sites are a bit more Rivals/Scout-style "fan site" than I expected.

I thought ESPN had tried that route a few years ago with a separate college network and was going to professionalize the approach a bit this time.

But this just looks like the same Rivals/Scout-style content, just with former newspaper reporters doing the writing.