What will sports journalism look like in 10 years?

I don't think the basic gamer will disappear. I had one ME who was not sports oriented ask why we go to games after advancing it, like they do in the entertainment section. But, unlike the community play, there's a scoreboard. Unlike "Romeo and Juliet," it doesn't always end the same.

 

I predicted in the 1980s that U.S. newspapers would eventually morph into the style of Japanese comic books.

I'll stand by that here.

 

I think gamers will become less important and features will take priority. It's really the best way to deliver unique content.

It's not too difficult to put together a decent gamer, but feature writing takes more work to make it interesting, plus it gives journalists a chance to think outside the box.

And it is going to be for the best to focus more on local coverage, rather than trying to be all things to all people. Sure, one can argue hyperlocal hasn't resulted in a massive uptick in readers, but there are so many ways one can get national news and gamers that it's pointless to keep chasing people who have already made up their minds about how they'll get that national coverage.

 

Three more years for two papers in Philly but that could change quickly. As to what you can expect to see in your sports section, I think Mizzou called it right. Print editions will die out along with the baby boomers. I think you'll see a lot of digital media. Not good digital media, just more of it. The business is definitely in the toilet and someone has yanked the chain.

 

I never thought print would go away, but it will.

If you stopped printing a paper, how many people would your shop need and how big would the building be?

We still need news, but it will all be delivered on phones and pads in a few years.

 

I don't think "gamers" will disappear but transform into alt-form stories that look more like a notebook. It's happening now at places, and I think it feeds into the deteriorating attention span in society. Features might be the only traditional story telling by then. Everything else could fall into the quick-hitting snippets, which is kind of like Twitter. Just as long as we don't have to refer to people by their Twitter handles in print ... I mean cyberspace.

 

Everything old is new again. I am reading a collection of Damon Runyon's baseball writing, and evidently bored out of his skull one day, wrote an entire game story in one sentence paragraphs, not all directly related to the action, either -- in 1919. There wasn't even radio then and he was anticipating the concept of Twitter.

 

I earnestly wonder whether prep sports coverage will exist in 10 years.
Does anyone without participating children really care, and why should they?

 

In certain areas, prep sports coverage won't die any time soon.

My area being one of them.

Where KYSportsWriter and I work, preps is 90 percent -- maybe higher -- of what we do.

Although we're 40 miles south of Louisville, haven't covered the Kentucky Derby or the pre-week workouts in years. Haven't staffed a U of L home men's basketball or football game in four years. Same for UK 80 miles to the east.

Never covered any of the three MiLB teams within two hours (Louisville Bats, Lexington Legends, Bowling Green Hot Rods). When Cincinnati Bengals had training camp at Georgetown College, didn't even bother with them.

Our paper has never staffed a race at Kentucky Speedway and won't be going to Valhalla for any pro golf/Ryder Cup events any time soon.

But our preps coverage has grown by leaps and bounds.

Put UK or U of L Associated Press SEC or AAC gamer on page 3? No one cares. UK went to overtime at home Saturday and U of L knocked off a top-10 team on the road on a jumper with 2.2 seconds left and neither story made the front page because of prep basketball coverage and prep wrestling state championships.

Put a non-district girls' prep hoops gamer between a 6-10 team and a 8-8 squad on page 3 (with photo or two and linescore/boxscore) and people will call and complain that we didn't care about the game or didn't staff it.

Of course, not all papers are like us.

Justin Bieber could die of an overdose and it might be on page A4 of the A section. Obama could have a heart attack and it wouldn't make the A section front page if lives. If he dies, that MIGHT be enough to make our front page.

Local, local, local. No matter what.

Not that I totally agree with it, but that's what we're told to do.

 

I understand that strategizing.
But it has not rescued newspapers.
Thanks for the thoughful explanation.

 

I agree that it has not rescued newspapers. Not sure there is anything tried and true that can.

It's worked for us, though. Our expenditures went way down. The college conference tourneys, NCAA basketball tourney and bowl games cost us a ton of money in hindsight. And not a good return on investment.

Our readership has stayed steady. Sunday is up. We saved money by combining sports with classifieds, which was cost effective because of no color ink on back page and no more filler pages (can't have five-page standalone sports section).

And although we have several U of L and UK fans (and even WKU) in the area, as well as Bengals/Titans/Colts for NFL and Reds/Braves/Cubs/Cardinals for MLB, local readers haven't given us grief for not providing more coverage than standard AP stuff found on Yahoo! and ESPN and 90+ websites.

Preps is what we can offer that's different.

That being said, not sure how much a metro in Kentucky -- notably the Courier-Journal in Louisville and Herald-Leader in Lexington -- will deal with preps in 10 years. Of course, those two papers have different issues with more and more college-focused websites and publications springing up.

 

It's sad to me that it's not even about competing- capitalism with fervor- but making a measly profit margin.
What will happen to hyper-localization when high school football is litigated out of the society?
That could well be upon us in 10 years.