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Of everything you've written, what prompted the angriest responses?

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by tapintoamerica, Jun 24, 2008.

  1. In Exile

    In Exile Member

    Angered the white supremist crowd a few times writing about racism and anti-semitism. They're part of the the reason I have an unlisted phone number and a PO BOX.
     
  2. partain

    partain Member

    As a sophomore in college I wrote a preview column for the upcoming basketball season. This was after doing extensive interviews with both men's and women's coaches for preview stories. The women's coach talked a lot about their inexperience and how tough the conference was, etc. So I predicted a .500 finish for the team. The next day she was calling anyone and everyone (but me) in the journalism department looking to get me fired. Of course, my job as a sportswriter for the semester paid all of $250. She also told me I was too young to have an opinion--wonder what her players thought about that comment since they were the same age!

    All year she refused to talk with me. But I had fun with it. I'd walk up and stand just off camera while she was doing television interviews after games (no press conference for the women there) to get quotes.

    With my column hanging in their locker room all year, the team went on to win the Women's NIT. I though about writing a column calling them the 49th best team in the country (only 48 teams in the women's NCAA tourney back then), but my editor killed the idea. I guess I was lucky to get used to this type of stuff early in my career.
     
  3. Canuck Pappy

    Canuck Pappy Member

    Bingo! You write something controversial and nothing happens. You write something that could be looked at as a feel-good piece and all hell breaks out. It's hard to predict.
    In Canada it seems anytime I write about TV (CBC, Hockey Night in Canada, cable vs. satellite) it gets people fired up and want to start writing letters to the editor.
     
  4. pseudo

    pseudo Well-Known Member

    If you called it a good goal, not weird at all. Buffalo fans have to rank right up there with some of the more vociferous college fanbases. And if you mentioned snow, may God have mercy on your soul, because they won't. Trust me on this -- I'm one of them.

    What did you say your name was again? ;)

    Last year, a friend wrote a prep football gamer which mentioned a fake punt by a team with a two-touchdown lead late in the fourth quarter (they scored on the play). He merely reported the displeasure of the losing coaches and fans, but some of the winning team's fans decided he was doing everything but waving pompoms for the other side. He recounted a few of the more amusing e-mails to me, then added, "These are our readers."

    I told him I hoped I'd never written anything similar to those letters back in my young-and-stupid days ... but knowing what I was like, I probably had. So I apologized. Better (twenty years) late than never, no?
     
  5. Ben_Hecht

    Ben_Hecht Active Member


    That should be Pete Rose's next job.
     
  6. SavebyKeans

    SavebyKeans New Member

    I once wrote a sarcastic column that pro leagues should start all their final series games late at night to separate the real fans from the bandwagoners. Apparently the sarcasm was well hidden. Readers took it way too seriously and wrote long treatises online about why I'm an idiot. Of course, I'm an idiot for far different reasons.
     
  7. huntsie

    huntsie Active Member

    In addition to sports column, I write a family column in the Saturday edition. Wrote one a couple of years ago with the teachers working to rule and threatening strike action about how I thought teaching was more of a calling than a job; that it didn't seem right that the kids be held hostage; that my daughter wouldn't have a prom and that I, as her father, would be denied the experience of having her walk down the stairs in the perfect gown...and so on.
    Many...many teachers wrote indignant letters about how much they do without renumeration; how long they went to school; how selfless they are; how they train themselves to pee on the bell...it was if I had spit on the flag.

    Sportswise, most recently, the big local university cancelled its women's hockey program, leaving the AD to take the heat when it had come from higher up. I wrote a column calling on the president of the university to come out of hiding and justify the decision to the outraged masses.
    Best they could do was offer up an op-ed piece, ghostwritten for the vice-president academic, a woman I had never heard of until she had the letter ghost-written for her. She has since retired and got a nice parting gift from the AD in a suckup press conference.
     
  8. I wrote this innocuous little item about the Detroit Lions for a .com and got a few minor points wrong.
    GEEZ.
     
  9. Ben_Hecht

    Ben_Hecht Active Member

     
  10. copperpot

    copperpot Well-Known Member

    Bowling all-stars here ... go figure. Only time my phone manner was ever cited in my review.
     
  11. Cosmo

    Cosmo Well-Known Member

    Covered a local golf tournament two weekends ago. Every player I talked to griped about how much the second-round course sucked. I had members pulling me aside saying, "anonymous source, this course sucks my ass, and I'm a member here." I reported the player complaints and the fact that scoring had risen five strokes over the first round, and apparently the head pro took the entire story personally, as if I was ripping the course. He wrote my boss a letter, accusing me of "yellow journalism" and "biased reporting," wondering who had taught me my ethics. They accused me of purposefully trying to ruin their business.

    Yeah, I really didn't see that one coming.
     
  12. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Two I remember:

    -- Made a Barry Manilow crack in a column a long time ago, and got swamped by letters and phone calls from his seething female fans.

    -- Dropped a reference to "Gomer Pyle" in relation to the Marines in what I thought was an innocent and humorous way. Uh, no. Two nights later, I get roused from a sound sleep at 3 a.m., with an angry and scary-sounding guy growling on the other end about my lack of respect and how a real Marine ought to come over and show me what's what. I'm stammering something, half asleep, about how I didn't mean to offend anyone but he doesn't hear a word of it. Then he blurts out "Semper Fi!" and hangs up on me. I changed my phone number after that but probably should have moved, too.
     
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