Favorite lede you've written

As for leads I wish I had the ability to write, my favorite all-time is from the 1971 OU-Nebraska game.

"They can quit playing now, they have played the perfect game."

How many papers would let that in today?

 

For a gamer on the big area school losing in the first round of the baseball state playoffs:
On a slightly humid Thursday evening, Podunk High's baseball season fell apart like a summer romance on Labor Day.

A feature on a smaller than small town starting a youth baseball league in an effort to save its youth:
From the remains of an eight-year-old nightmare, good things will one day come.

 

I'm not sure I'd go that way in a gamer, but it has the makings for an awful nice sidebar.

 

This is my favorite lead that I never wrote.

HELL, Norway -- Despite what you may have heard, a snowball does stands a good chance here.

 

Another one I had that I thought was good came from a high school football playoff game. Our local school was ranked No. 1 in the state in the preseason and had made a surprising run to the state semifinals the year before. They lost a couple times in the regular season, but still won their division. Then they lost 55-54 in double overtime in the first round of the playoffs. The game was an absolute track meet, and was decided when the visitors blocked a PAT in the second OT and then scored the game-winning touchdown.
The lede:

It wasn't supposed to end like this.
Not in the cold and wind and mud, at the end of some bizarre video game that was played out on a real live football field, on a play that was supposed to be an easy afterthought.
The Podunk Possums were supposed to end this season celebrating a state championship in Capital City. Instead, they saw it end prematurely on their own field, in double overtime at the hands of Shelbyville, 55-54 Friday night.

 

Dude, do you like anything? What's wrong with that?

 

"The football gods..." is a god-awful cliche.

Not too crazy about this, either:

"some bizarre video game that was played out on a real live football field,"

It wasn't a video game (it might have seemed like a video game) and the field isn't "live". The field itself is an inanimate object.

 

Perhaps he had angered the football gods with his hubris.

 

Geez, you're cranky. I'm glad I don't work for you.

1) I'll concede "The football gods..." is a little cliched. But it seemed appropriate in that case. The coincidence of the rain starting just after two 0-9 teams kicked off, and ending just before they finished a 13-3 game that included a dozen fumbled snaps lent itself to that. Hell, I wanted to cry after watching that game.
2) In the video game lede, I was trying to convey a sense of hurt and confusion, a sense that everybody associated with this team was thinking, "What the hell just happened here? How did this happen? Holy shit." And that the game was wild and high-scoring. Just because it's not the literal definition of "video game" or "real" and "live" doesn't there's no value to the words.
And FWIW, the second story won first place for game stories in our state press association awards that year.

 

I don't know about you, but if I want to ready a boring game story, I turn to the AP. When I read a local rag, I want color, lively leads and a hook that makes me go "Ha! That guy is clever!"

 

How does relating it to a video game convey a sense of hurt and confusion?

Oh, and while I'm at it, "It wasn't supposed to end like this." is trite crap, too. Of course they didn't want it to end with a loss.

There is no sense of hurt and confusion. There are no players standing there saying, thinking "WTF just happened." There is you telling me it was like a bizarre video game, whatever that means.
And what's an "easy afterthought?"


I'm glad you don't work for me batman....you're a "real live" (oh, I forgot to mention that is redundant) arrogant little prick

 

No, of course they didn't want it to end with a loss. Duh. But for a team with a legitimate shot at a state title, it's not supposed to end with a first-round loss on their home field, either.
And the video game reference was an allusion to the 55-54 score. Both teams' offenses just went up and down the field all night -- like a game of Madden where nobody can play defense. In five words or less, on a tighter than normal deadline because the game took three hours, that was an easy way to convey that.

And you, sir, are a crusty old son of a bitch who probably makes your writers' lives hell. May God have mercy on their souls.