Few Washington Wizards Articles I've Writte

[Simon]

Will,

Let me give you a few pieces of advice. I started venturing around these parts when I was your age or so. I'm 20 now so I've been in your shoes.

I know that you want to cover the Wizards/Nats/every big team out there. That's what the pros do but take a second and breathe. I've covered NHL/MLB. High school kids when you're in high school are a lot more fun. I **** my pants walking into a MLB clubhouse and saw a player chew out a reporter. It's fun to watch but I wouldn't want to do it on a daily basis when you're that age.

I've formed more great relationships with people I covered in my own high school and/or on the high school level. Learn how to OWN your high school. Learn to develop sources who trust you so much that you don't even have to go searching for stories any more(you should, of course) My senior year, people came to ME with stories/scoops. I could sit in on any film session I wanted to. I developed a great reporter/athlete relationship with everyone except the athletic director who still to this day calls me "Scoop". Trust me, there are stories in your high school that Jones and jgmacg drool over. You can connect with those sources because you're their age. My No. 1 goal(AP Style...check it) while covering my high school was NEVER to get beat by another newspaper...weekly, daily, buttfloss weekly, NO ONE. NO ONE comes in MY SCHOOL and out reports ME. Cocky? maybe. But it was a goal. Pretty sure I accomplished it.

That being said...I did too much work in high school. I freelanced for way too many papers. I didn't sit down and read enough. I didn't focus on the grammar like I should have. I didn't focus on the AP Style like I should have. READ EVERYTHING, just not sports. There's other things you're interested in. READ THEM. I loved space when I was kid, I picked up Jones book and read it in two days. The best sports writers are those who borrow from other literature and bring it to sports. If you're not reading things and say "WOW, I wish I could write like that an I want to" or "Damn I SUCK!" then you're reading the wrong things.

Step 1: Listen to Jones and jcmacg. There's a lot of fools/bums on this board but these two are not. I've annoyed a lot of people on this board but I've apologized. You ran off Jones...not good buddy. I was 14 once too. I thought I knew everything. You don't. Not even close. Don't act like you understand these forums. Don't act like you know what's left from right..ask questions. Act like you're dumb, even if you're not. Be HUMBLE.

Step 2 Go buy "Writing for Story" by Jon Franklin. It's not about sports. It's about writing features and the natural order of great stories. Any ?s send them to me.

Step 3: Go buy an AP Style Guide. Read a page a day. That's what I do. Put your last name in Sharpie on the front in BIG ASS bold letters. Meet your bible.

Step 4: OWN your high school. Report in your high school. Find the great stories that exist in every high school, pitch them to your weekly newspaper, a daily, anything. Meet reporters in your coverage area. Give them the extra scoops you can't fit in the high school newspaper. Talk to everyone in the press box at the games you cover. Kiss anyones ass you can. Go to sporting events...talk to people. Parents. Boosters. Refs. the money taker. REPORTERS. Everyone has a story.

If you don't get pulled out of class at least twice and chewed out for something you wrote in the paper, you're not turning enough stones over. Write hard news, write long features that take a month to write, write columns about your school(not national, EVERYTHING that goes in your paper should be HIGH SCHOOL RELATED)

Step 5: Enjoy high school, dammit.

Much Love,

Simon

 

[Chad Conant]

Will,

Read a major paper and one that's not a major, too. You'll often find the quality of writing by some sports people at smaller places to be just as good as some at majors.

I learned more about this profession by reading other people than almost anything else. I went to one of the most repected journalism schools in the country and learned more just by reading and observing than four years in Scripps Hall.

And listen to the people here. The people who come here care about their craft and want to see it stay relevant and of high quality. If they didn't, they wouldn't be here.

And by the way, I checked. Your age doesn't appear until late in this thread.

 

[friend of the friendless]

Master Will,

Just seeing this for the first time. Apologies for arriving late. I'm seconding Mr Simon's suggestions.

Maybe your goal is to write about the NBA but, as you noted, access is an issue. Start with what you have access to. That's not to say "start small" or "have modest ambitions." High school sports might have seemed a marginal beat back in the day, but it's hardly that now. (Given the Bullets'-Wizards' fortunes for awful stretches, high school might have been richer turf, but I digress.) You actually have some advantages reporting high school as a high schooler--no one is going to be intimidated by you and it will be easier to win the trust of your peers. You're embedded. If it's just ball that you want to do rather than the panaroma of high school sports, fine, focus on that. In reporting at the high school level you'll end up making contacts with players who'll move on to college, maybe coaches who'll do the same or at the very least recruiters. That will serve you well in almost no time--players in college will always remember you as the one who was there first. And you'll get them before they develop filters and an array of safe quotes--not just access but the best access anyone will ever get. Have a look at The Last Shot by Darcy Frey and The Jump by Ian O'Conner, a great and a very good book about high school ball. Blog, phone in scores to the area paper, write for your high school paper, whatever.

Don't take any of this as a discouragement or personal criticism.

YHS, etc