The best phone call/compliment you ever received

I once spoke to a player's grandfather for a feature, and he mailed me a handwritten note. I'm a young guy, so e-mails are mostly all I know. I thought it was awesome. His handwriting looked like calligraphy, too, so that made it even better. The guy spoke slowly, and it wouldn't surprise me if writing was a chore, too. I really appreciated it and hope the guy lived long enough to see how well his grandson turned out (I wouldn't know ... it was on a past beat).

 

I wrote a long feature once on a team that had lost 27 games in a row. My aunt, who was in her 70s and cares about football like I care about "American Idol," told me that she had reservations about reading a story about a team so bad, even when written by her nephew. "But you know," she said, "it was really good. It was really interesting." From her, very high praise.

That was 10 years ago. It still brings a smile to my face to think of it.

 

In one of my earliest gigs, I was a cops/courthouse reporter for a small rural daily where it seemed like I was writing about a child molesting case every other day. One day I had to write about a case involving a teacher and his inappropriate conduct with a female student. I included some info that was in the court papers that didn't make it into court, somehow. Thankfully the publisher and editor backed me up, especially when the rotten little cocksucker came to the office threatening to sue me, blah blah blah.
A couple days later I get a letter from the mother of the girl, who I of course didn't name in the story. She was so grateful for what I did for her daughter and the other girls at school who had to put up with this creep, etc. That helped a crappy week turn out a little bit better.
I never heard from the teacher again, thankfully.

 

Got this one in my email box over the weekend:

"Just a note to let you know that I think the Podunk Press sports page is the best that I can recall in my 60 plus years of reading the that page.. Keep up the good work."

Had a guy out with the flu all week, so that was nice.

 

Mr 99,

I wouldn't let the guy see that email when he comes back to work.

YD&OHS etc

 

That's the problem with those stories.

 

Had a caller once tell me she only subscribed to the paper because she enjoyed reading my stories. I said, aw thanks mom and hung up the phone.

 

Ace, I know that, and is why I am hesitant to write any more of them. it was big news of the player coming back to the team, so we had to write it, but maybe should have done less. hindsight is 20-20

 

Doing the story still may be the right call. I'd just keep the BS detector going full throttle.

The fact that some ne'er-do-well is back with the team is now. Just doesn't mean you have to completely buy his story.

Some of the most charming, quotable athletes/figures are real skunks.

 

Who did H Weldin Neff take that week?

 

Former Indiana basketball player Bracey Wright left me this voicemail: "Man, you need to shut the fuck up."

 

I'd take any instance of Indiana basketball being mad at you as a victory, Carl.

Another thing I was proud of: I tend to write less about Xs and Os and "inside baseball" stuff, than I do about "here's what happened, and here's what it means" when I'm covering a team. My style has drawn criticism from football-dad types who want to read about their kid's perfect execution of the Cover 2, but I really feel those types of hard-core sports fans are in the minority when it comes to local coverage.

I've received a lot of feedback from non-traditional sports fans that my writing is very inviting for those who usually can't get past the play-by-play and technical speak. I'm proud that I can draw more people into sports, and that they don't feel intimidated by their lack of knowledge, because they know I'll explain things. I even had a woman with no sports-playing children tell me she started following the local teams to read my stuff.