Sports editor, Danville (Va.) Register & Bee

From JJobs.com: http://www.journalismjobs.com/Job_Listing.cfm?JobID=498292

The Danville Register & Bee is seeking a sports editor to lead a staff of three in covering auto racing, minor league baseball, local college athletics and high school and recreational sports. The auto racing tracks include Martinsville Speedway and Virginia International Raceway. The minor league baseball team is a rookie league affiliate of the Atlanta Braves. The local college includes a Division 3 program in football, basketball and baseball. Our high school teams consistently compete for state championships.

More specifically, the sports editor will supervise the sports reporting staff, develop news and feature content for online and print publication, write and assign stories, edit stories for content, design pages at least one night a week and oversee page design for all regular and special editions, and coordinate activities with news editors and the news copy desk. In addition, the sports editor will coordinate Website, intranet and convergence activities. A special emphasis will be placed on multimedia reporting, including video, audio and print-to-web and web-to-print components. You must be a well-rounded sports enthusiast, energetic, resourceful, possess excellent command of the language and good news judgment, understand the basics and importance of multimedia and be committed to balanced coverage of news and events with enterprise and analysis.

The Danville Register & Bee is a daily newspaper with an average daily circulation of 19,500 and 21,500 on Sundays. We are located in south central Virginia, on the border of North Carolina. The area is central to Greensboro, N.C., Raleigh, N.C., Roanoke, Va., and Richmond, Va.

Send cover letter, resume with salary history, five best clips and last three clips, plus page layout samples to Arnold Hendrix, editor, P.O. Box 331, Danville, VA 24543 or ahendrix@registerbee.com.

Web site: http://www.godanriver.com

 

I noticed they didn't list the ACC. :
But still, this should be a decent gig for a talented up-and-comer. You can even be the next Drew Wilson.

 

Since this is my soon-to-be-old job, I guess I'd be the expert as far as answering questions about this gig.

The pros: I truly enjoyed my time there. You get to work with some decent people, there's plenty of opportunities with the racing circuits that come through Martinsville and VIR, and there are at least one or two high school teams that get to the state title game a year and many more that go deep into the playoffs.

Cons: A lot of talk about doing things, less action on doing them (EDIT: Maybe this was a bit harsh. I'd imagine it's no different from any other paper). And don't hold your breath when it comes to replacing someone if they leave. Sometimes it takes months for approval, if they approve them at all. And the publisher in Lynchburg, who somehow has a say in which Danville jobs are approved to fill, often blocks the requests before they get to the top (We're a daily paper that hasn't and any photographers for six months. They just approved it so we can hire one last week). The ad also says you'll be designing once a week. Better make that three to five nights a week.

Also, the ad doesn't even mention that you'll be in charge of layout for the three Rockingham County (N.C.) papers in addition to Danville (Reidsville, Eden and Madison). Enjoy that headache when the SE of those community papers turns in his 6-inch "centerpieces" or calls to tell you he didn't stay at a game and the coach didn't call the result in, so just make the centerpiece a standalone photo on deadline. (EDIT: As it stands right now, we do have a staffer who is dedicated to layout these papers).

If anyone has any questions, I'll be happy to answer them on here or you can send me a PM.

 

I sense an avalanche of resumes flooding the office.

Or maybe it's my stomach churning. :-\

 

Nah, it's probably just the Ham's you ate last night.

 

Pro: Drew did a good job and is leaving you something good to work with; it's not like you have to clean up a train wreck.

Con: Media General

 

Media General is far from terrible. The purse strings are tightening but you can say the same thing about anywhere. Disclaimer: I have also worked for Ogden and JRC.

Also of note, another sports writer just left the department to go back to school. See Drew's earlier post regarding replacing people and holding your breath.

 

Sorry if this has already been discussed but where are you headed to Drew?

 

Drew is leaving to become the SID at Averett, the D3 college in town. In fact, he already started there. He's been good enough to hang around the office till we get the prep football tab finished.

So then it is my stomach churning.

<sigh.>

 

Wow! Doesn't seem like Drew painted a pretty picture for this gig.

 

Riddick, not saying it isn't a great gig. Just being honest with folks. If I hadn't gotten married this summer and wouldn't have had to worry about working an opposite schedule from my wife's, I'd still be there. I've had a handful of opportunities to leave for bigger papers, but I stayed partly because I enjoyed it there. In fact, had this SID gig not come up in town, I had planned to stay there for at least another year or two.

 

Boy, I feel like I killed this thread. I made some edits to my original post because after reading them, I feel like it came off a bit more harsh than I should have been. As I said before, I loved my time here and I'd recommend it to anyone trying to make the jump into management. It's a great place to learn, there's lots of freedom and the place has a rep for getting sports people to bigger and better things.