Preps Under Attack

No. What I mean is that more interest in sports is driven by fantasy sports than it had been in the past, thereby rendering the information you can get from the newspaper less relevant.

 

Pet peeve of mine, regardless of coverage: we need to stop calling it "preps." No one outside reporters who cover high schools and the newspapers for which they work call those schools "prep schools" any more. It's an archaic term, with the odd exception of a school that actually has the word "prep" in its name (Tampa Berkley Prep, for example) and there aren't many of those. Call them what everyone else calls them: high schools. The only reason they're still called "preps" by newspapers is that the word fits in a one-column sig.

 

We're page-view centric at our joint, and high school sports still has a place. But all sports can't be covered equally. It's football, football, football first. Then boys basketball. The rest have very little interest. Perhaps girls basketball rises above the also rans, but not by much. The rest can be covered with photos, for the most part, outside of the odd compelling feature or state track or wrestling.

 

Even though I used the term "preps" in my post, I agree. Our sports stylebook had an entry banning "preps" and specifying the use of "high schools" As was the case with so many things that made sense, it was a Craig Stanke edict.

 

Not to thread jack, but I cannot stand the use of "falls" for a loss. Unbelievable how many clumsy teams exist today. OK, carry on.

 

The Times once paid me $50 for a seven-inch wrestling story.
Long time ago indeed, lot of water under the bridge since then.
There's part of the power bill, or at least some beer and book money.
I can recall days when a paper would staff the probable next playoff opponent - sometimes many miles away - of the local football powerhouse.

 

bingo. more entertainment choices than ever. dont need to see fbs-johnny on the gridiron or future 6-foot-2 naia hoops star brendan hitting 12-foot jumpers for kicks. nearly everyone has every major league and big college game available at the click of a button. or can binge-watch just about anything else.

 

I even think it's reasonable to discuss, as a matter of ethics, whether run-of-the-mill high school sports played by 15- and 16-year-olds should be covered.

 

Should ... you've obviously been out of newspapers for a while.

If play-by-play of animal husbandry prompted someone to take out an ad, we'd cover it.

 

there are reporters who think you cover the kids like the pros. i wouldnt want to be the one asking a kid why he "choked" and ive heard that line of questioning.