Horrid lede in SC paper

Early in my career, I worked with a copy chief who was by far the best I worked with during my career. We got him out at the bars one time for someone's going away party and one of the agate guys asked him what was the worst thing anyone had tried to get past the desk and he just sat there and held court and we all had tears rolling down our faces we were laughing so hard at some of the shit that experienced writers at a major metro had tried to get into the paper.

 

Plaschke wrote some beauts when he was younger.

Here's the thing: This is good for a laugh now, and it wasn't a great idea, but I generally find that the writers who try these kinds of things and fail when they're younger are the ones who wind up being pretty good at this. So in this case, I'm laughing with this guy, not at him. Hopefully, he'll learn.

He might read this site, but I won't name him, and I think he'll laugh if he recognizes himself (I hope). I had a writer once who wrote:

"Podunk High's loss to East Podunk on Friday night was akin to the sinking of the Titanic."

And I said, "Ernie, 1,200 people died on the Titanic."

And he said: "Oh. Well, how about the Hindenburg."

But here's the other thing. THIS WEEK I had a veteran guy reference the Hindenburg in a very passing way, and it fit, so I left it.

Which says ... what? Not sure.

 

A veteran writer at a stop early in my career was the staff workhorse and one of the nicest guys you'd ever meet. But he had a habit of trying to make every lead a play on words. Most were harmless, if not effective, and as a youngster I rarely rocked the boat. The glaring exception was the time a feature on UK receiver Craig Yeast was submitted with a lead about how the local team had to be wary of developing a Yeast infection.

 

I worked with a columnist who was kind of known for (at least by those at the paper) for alliteration in his ledes. Most of them were brilliant. I remember being in the office and reading one off a proof and saying, "Damn, he's good at that." and having the copy chief say, "Yeah, the ones that make it in are great. The ones that we cut out, not so much..."

 

Reminds me of the basketball scene in "Along Came Polly":

 

Stringer, writer, columnist, college writer, old dude putting out the retirement home newsletter, blogger, editor (what's dat???), gossip hound, whatever .... this is a fucking abomination.

 

stringer or not, the SE still looks at it before he puts it on the page, right? At some you have to put your foot down and say "there's no way I'm putting that in my section"

 

Except he was part of that staff. This isn't a young kid stringer. He was the columnist for that paper a few years ago.

Terry is a good writer, and by all accounts, a good guy. Don't know what he was thinking here.

We share copy with them - the opposing team was from our coverage area - and we changed the lede.

 

It would have worked better if he used Casey Anthony as the reference.

I am going to go staight to hell.

 

Somebody edited that story, right?

 

We should remember, that in '96 or '97, a Tennessee newspaper had a dude trying to play a practical joke on his boss while writing about HIGH SCHOOL FUCKING SOCCER.

I am not gonna name names. But, if memory serves, the nut graph (pun intended) went something like this:

*-"Heywood Jablowme sucks donkey (bleeps) and doesn't wipe the (EXPLETIVE DELETED) before practice. We keep him at the sweeper position so his sperm breath will keep opponents from penetrating toward the goal. Speaking of penetrating, he likes tall, red-headed guys. Told me to tell (LAZY DUDE SUPPOSED TO EDIT AND CATCH THIS STUFF) 'hello.'"

Uh, HELLO?

It went to court. The HS kid, a HS kid, got paid. His coach did to a point too. The writer, last I saw on a Tennessee journalism web site, was workin' in a record store.

I'm not sayin' I didn't pull some pranks back in the day .... but the '80s were a totally different time.

This ain't exactly the same deal, this Osama thing and a stringer, but I'd hate to be in that editor's shoes right now.

Matter of fact, I ain't that crazy about my own at the moment, but that's another story for another day ....

I'll wear sandals and make adjustments. It gets mighty hot on the border, anyway, this time of year.

*-more details came to mind after third cup of coffee ....

 

That guy's employment situation is obviously outdated J_M, as there are no more record stores.