Salt Lake Tribune, winter sports/Olympics/MLS

http://www.journalismjobs.com/Job_Listing.cfm?JobID=1442449

The Salt Lake Tribune has an immediate opening for an experienced reporter to cover winter sports and the Olympics. Salt Lake City was home to the 2002 Winter Games and plays host to frequent World Cup-qualifying and World Cup events. Many Olympic athletes live and train in the area. The reporter we hire also will cover Major League Soccer and 2009 MLS champion Real Salt Lake.

As Utah’s leading news source, The Tribune sets the state’s news agenda across all beats, and provides resources and support to enable its staffers to perform at the highest level. Solid enterprise and investigative skills are essential, as is a commitment to multiplatform journalism.

The Tribune’s Sports section is a consistent APSE Top 10 section in its circulation category; most recently we earned APSE’s prestigious Triple Crown for daily, Sunday and Web excellence. Our expectations are high but so is our commitment to quality sports journalism.

To apply for the job, email a cover letter, resume, clips or links to work online, and social media handles to managing editor Lisa Carricaburu, lisac@sltrib.com.

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By "winter sports," do they mean skiing, figure skating, etc.?

 

boundforboston: Yes. Figure skating, skiing, luge, bobsled, etc., were all among the winter sports the previous writer, Michael C. Lewis, covered in his 19 years at the Tribune.

 

Also a preps job:

www.journalismjobs.com/Job_Listing.cfm?JobID=1442453

 

Seems like a decent place to work, although the pay would probably be bawls.

And I'd be single again, but probably carry a little more money. All solid things, until I remember I'd be in Utah. Toss-up?

 

Utah's a pretty decent place for winter sports. They get to take advantage of facilities built for the Olympics and host a number of world cup events.

Would be nice to cover something other than football and basketball.

 

When the paper had a prep writer opening two years ago, the ME told candidates they liked that they had to agree to accept $42,000 as salary BEFORE they would get an interview. (According to somebody with close ties in SLC, that was about $12,000 to $15,000 less than a few years earlier).

They also told candidates the job would be exclusively preps and they wouldn't proceed with an interview unless you understood that. So if you were a college beat guy or pro beat guy, they wanted you to do understand you would not be doing anything other than preps and it would absolutely not lead to covering colleges or pro sports.

So they ended up with a guy fresh out of college out of 185 candidates and he was doing Utah hoops a year later and recently got promoted to the NBA beat. So expect there to be no rhyme or reason if you choose to deal with these folks.

But expect to be underpaid and dread living in Utah! (ha ha)

 

Gutenberg,

100 percent of that post is dead wrong.

The preps job has been open twice in the last five years. In 2008, the guy who took that job made more than 42 a year. He also came into the job with preps and the Weber State beat. He was doing Utah Jazz sidebars instantly. As a signing bonus, he covered the 2008 Super Bowl in Phoenix.

This guy was promoted to Utah State the next year, and is now the Utah beat writer. Michael Anastasi made no bones about this: Everyone helps with every beat at the paper. Even the summer interns. No ME at the Tribune was going to tell people that they would be pigeonholed.

The guy two years later, Bill Oram, was not fresh out college. He was a cops reporter at the Portland Oregonian. He was promoted fast because he was damn good at what he did. A young effin stud, if you will. Another preps guy, Kyle Goon, was just promoted to Utah State. All within two years.

And Utah is one of the better places in america to live. Well, Salt Lake City, that is. Way more urban than given credit for.

 

I feel the need to weigh in, as well.

I'm the guy who was hired in 2010 for the job. While I can't address what other people were told during that process, my experience was significantly different from the one described by Gutenberg. There was no discussion of pay until I had a job offer. Instead of being told I could only do preps, I was informed I would have the opportunity to cover Utah, BYU and the Jazz and that I was expected to pitch enterprise on all beats. One thing then-Managing Editor Michael Anastasi told me at the time was that he wanted someone who was ambitious, but also understood the job they were hired to do. The standard was always described this way: "Just kick ass." Michael is gone, but I know our current management team subscribes to the same theory. If you do good work here, you will find opportunities to move on and up. I would hope that my path here (which I'm still struggling to comprehend) should be taken more as encouragement for those who consider applying. As for the other moves our paper has made recently, floridanewbie is correct. In our recent shakeup, three reporters moved up to bigger beats after our Jazz writer, Brian Smith, left to cover the Astros for the Houston Chronicle.

In my experience, editors here make an effort to put reporters in positions to be successful.

I'm happy to answer any questions folks may have on either of these jobs. PM me here or shoot me an email at boram@sltrib.com. I'd love to discuss the positions, living in Salt Lake (not the hell-hole some here seem to think it is, and I'm an out-of-stater) or anything else.

 

I had a couple phone interviews for the job when it came up in 2010. If I was in a position to move, I'd be sending my stuff again.

I talked to Michael during the interview process, he said to me exactly what broam mentioned. In fact, one of the aspects of the job that appealed to me was that Michael said he wanted somebody that could develop into a college/pro writer. I don't know anything about any of the staff there, but they seem to have a history of promoting from within, at least in the sports department.

We never discussed pay, but my interviews were fairly early in the process.

 

How come Gutenberg never has anything good to say about anyone and why is it his "facts" are widely refuted by people who know more about it than he does? Just wondering ...

 

I'm pumped about this chance, as an MLS reporter now in Mass. can you let me know how much RSL coverage the paper is looking for from this new reporter? And how much does the paper let you go explore ideas, stories and online storytelling mediums?

 

RSL is a big beat at the Tribune, probably fourth on the list behind the Jazz, Utes and BYU in that order overall. Over the summer, however, it takes center stage.

the RSL writer can expect advances and gamers to regularly make the front and be centerpieced. The RSL writer will be expected to produce regular enterprise as well. Management places a premium on features and enterprises, so the writer will have carte blance, creatively.

Also, the RSL writer will likely be expected to be the summer olympic writer as well. This is pretty much a big boy gig