1. Welcome to SportsJournalists.com, a friendly forum for discussing all things sports and journalism.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register for a free account to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Access to private conversations with other members.
    • Fewer ads.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

School Sites

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by Thomas Goldkamp, Jun 19, 2012.

  1. Chris17

    Chris17 Member

    One big thing that was mentioned breifly, but glossed over..... recruiting. No matter how good the school site is, those same die-hard fans who want night-of coverage of things and only want the party line, they are the same fans who want the recruiting scoop. Colleges can't say a word on recruiting til signing day, which of course for some of these kids is up to two years after the news breaks.

    May not be super viable for newspapers, but as far as web coverage - there's a lot of interest out there in recruiting. School run sites will always be at a disadvantage there, and if you play your cards right (with great recruiting coverage), maybe you can get some of those die hards to call the real media site home.
     
  2. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Outstanding point...
     
  3. Armchair_QB

    Armchair_QB Well-Known Member

    Fellas, schools will never get to the point where they feel the need to cut off media access. People running newspapers will have killed off beat reporters long before it comes to that.

    Also, if you're running an athletic department in this day and age you want fans to come to your website for information first. It's not against the law to manage your own message. That doesn't mean a good reporter can't still do his job. The best stories are usually the ones you get without any help from the school.

    But as newspapers continue to shrink in staff size and print days and owners opt for the "young and cheap" hiring strategy it won't be long before a school website is putting out a better product than the local paper. That day is coming and my guess is the first place you'll see it will be in New Orleans or Alabama.
     
  4. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    The Redskins were the first team to regularly release news on its website. When they started doing that, people screamed and moaned about it.

    Now, it's pretty common with professional and college teams.

    With travel budgets going down almost every year, papers are going to need to find reasons why fans of said teams need to go to their sites. As someone pointed out, for colleges, recruiting may be the biggest reason.

    If I want Florida game coverage? Hell, I'd read Carter and Harry over the beat guys who cover UF.
     
  5. Alma

    Alma Well-Known Member

    Who do you think feeds the recruiting sites scoops? The 17-year-old kid?
     
  6. Alma

    Alma Well-Known Member

    The heartwarming tale of a gymnast who overcame the odds or a swimmer with a monkey heart? Yes. Sure.

    When they get dropped 38-0 by Alabama? You'll read them then, too? Did they say Will Muschamp laid a rotten egg when he hired Charlie Weis as a terrible one-year OC, revealing how little Muschamp knew about hiring a staff? Would you trust them to say that?

    I have friends who work on that side of the fence, in university PR. Wonderful folks. But I know what they do and what they don't do.
     
  7. Completely agree with all of that. Hell, I'd love to be able to write like Scott some day.

    But, as Alma pointed out, I totally disagree about preferring to read game coverage from Scott or Chris. Alma pointed out the reasons why better than I.
     
  8. Chris17

    Chris17 Member

    Yeah, absolutely. In my experience, more often than not, their parents. We also get tons from high school and AAU/club team/travel teams (whichever is applicable to that sport) coaches. I mean tons. Far more info from parents and kids, then coaches, than anything. Colleges - some will, but not nearly as often or as early as the kids (or parents or coaches) themselves.

    Think about it. What parent doesn't want to see their kids featured on whatverwebsite.com and listed as a 3-star athlete? What coach doesn't want their HS featured, or what AAU team doesn't want to boast their 6 Div I commitments featured? It's a big deal to these people who otherwise won't get the media coverage if they live in Chicagoland but committed to Texas A&M for basketball....
     
  9. On the recruiting end, the danger for those that make a living off recruiting reporting is that the schools control the people giving the scoops. That's a tricky proposition, because it's also beneficial for the school to have the recruiting sites getting those scoops. Mutually beneficial relationship. The day it ceases to be is the day recruiting reporting sites are going to find it much tougher. Kids, parents and high school coaches are much less likely to give accurate information about who is recruiting them, for very obvious reasons.

    Florida has tried to take advantage of recruiting on the school site every way it can without stepping over the NCAA lines. The UAA made a huge deal about its national signing day coverage for football this year, hailing it as the only place to get "official" information when the recruits sign. While that's true, it was way behind on reporting when those NLIs got in, because it had to cross the Ts and dot the Is with compliance.

    But I guarantee if it keeps pushing that line, the school's going to have secondary violations (who cares, right?). What happens when one of those school writers retweets a prospect or a commit who hasn't signed? Where does that fall in the rulebook?
     
  10. mediaguy

    mediaguy Well-Known Member

    I'm sure the university-employed beat writers are well aware of what they can and cannot write and retweet about recruits. You just have to stay away from it entirely until kids have signed letters of intent. Most sites now just try to get best signing-day coverage -- lots of video, comments from coaches hours before the media can get it, etc.
     
  11. Mark2010

    Mark2010 Active Member

    Just one more reason newspapers are struggling. When I want news, a score, stats, or even video I normally go first to the official site. That's true both for my own personal information and when I was putting out a sports section in print.

    With dwindling resources, papers are more dependent than ever on outside sources to get information --- whether it's a call from a high school coach or a game story from an SID.

    Honestly, do we really need a dozen different writers covering an Ohio State football game? I don't really think that we do and it seems universities and professional teams are realizing that.
     
  12. slappy4428

    slappy4428 Active Member

    Florida's baseball team lost to a MAC team. How the fuck can you put a positive spin on that?
     
Draft saved Draft deleted

Share This Page