Media guides

With four writers getting multiple media guides from multiple schools, we have a mess of them, as we like to say around here.

What's your general arrangement, if any, for hanging on to them after a season is over? I have space to build a small library and I'd like to figure out how to organize it so that the desk can find what it needs five minutes before deadline without a lot of hassle.

I was thinking about organizing them in alpha order by sport.

On our two main schools, I figure we keep at least one copy of every major-sport guide as far back as practical. On the other (10) league schools, maybe keep them for three years – and also hang on to at least one from before the size limits were imposed, especially in football, because a lot of historical info may have gotten pitched out since then.

Thoughts?

 

That's about what we do, along with other sports and major league yearbooks.

We keep everything from 6-7 years back for the local schools in case someone dies, is hired for a job or something like that.

Every so often you need a media guide from 2001 to check on some kid's weird stat. The time you need one and don't have it is when you'll wish for the sorted library.

 

many media guides (pro and college) are available online...would be worth the effort to download them on to disk and store them that way....that won't help you much for older copies...but will be a lot handier for you going forward....I carry around all the MLB guides on one disk...same with the NHL and NFL....

 

Personally, I find the printed versions to be much, much easier to use. And quicker. Storage is a pain, but it's still worth it to me.

 

I needed two Swiffers to clean up the mess we had in the corner where the guides had piled up. It's all much neater now, if nothing else.

 

Good call on storing one from before the size limits were imposed.

 

I have football media guides for Microvile Tech gong back to the late 1950s. An invaluable resource when an older player dies, etc., and a great source for stuff like, where that particular player ranked statistically all-time when he graduated, etc.

I'll never get rid of them as long as I'm employed there. Make room someplace and hold on to at least one from every year in every sport.

 

I'm going on my seventh year covering a prominent DI men's hoops program.

I've got to give major props to my predecessor on the beat, who had the foresight to put together a run of media guides going back to the early 1960s.

It's missing just one original, but I do have a photocopied replacement, and I believe I have a more complete run of them now than the school's Sports Information Department.

 

We store them by year, school/team.

 

In what fashion? Library style in bookcases?

 

Cases. And everything, in theory, gets moved up each year, and the oldest year's worth gets purged to the storage room.

 

I save whatever I think I'll need for the following year. Most of the time, though, I've got the guides at my house. So when I pack for my next move, some copies just don't make the cut.