Football overload?

[MidwestSportsGuy]

Just a general question for folks who are far wiser than I: Does anyone else struggle with trying to avoid too much football copy/coverage? Our state playoffs are going on right now, with one local team left (two teams until Saturday), so we have a ton of coverage there. But I worry about overloading the front/section with too much football.

Case in point: For Sunday's paper, we had two local gamers and a sidebar, and I was petrified about playing another football story on the front. I settled for a story about a boxing trainer (actually a pretty cool read) when the Oklahoma-OSU game was a huge deal. And Goldberg had a solid piece on potential NFL MVPs, as well as a nice look at rookie NFL head coaches, but I stayed away from those two stories because I was worried about presenting too much football.

Is this right?

The NFL stories were nicely done, and the boxing/trainer story was a bit of a reach. But is football so unequivocally popular as to warrant the whole section front?

And does this even make sense? I'm tired, maybe a bit delirious, so if you'd like to tell me to eff off, I'd completely understand.

 

[greenlantern]

You go with what's most important. If it's all football, then it's all football.

 

[buckweaver]

You go with what's most important. If it's all football, then it's all football.

All depends on where you're at, what season it is, and what else you're dealing with. I know I've done a number of all-football fronts around this time of year.

 

[zebracoy]

Totally understand where you're coming from, because it can be difficult to balance all things out.

That being said, having, say, high school, college and NFL stories are enough, in my mind, to achieve that balance.

 

[2muchcoffeeman]

You go with what's most important. If it's all football, then it's all football.

All depends on where you're at, what season it is, and what else you're dealing with. I know I've done a number of all-football fronts around this time of year and I've hated every minute of it.

;D

 

[FileNotFound]

I've put together all-football fronts in November, and all-basketball fronts in March. It's all about what's important to your readers. I wouldn't throw an NBA or baseball winter meetings story on the front just to "balance" it if your readers care about neither.

 

[SF_Express]

Not knowing with you live, I'd still have to guess that big football was more important to your readership than a boxing trainer -- even (or maybe especially) if it's the "Angelo Dundee returns" story AP moved.

You don't do a cover with diversity as your No. 1 thought. You do it based on what readers are interested in. In many parts of the country, football, football, football is it this time of year.

 

[deskslave]

You run a story like the boxing trainer when there's nothing else going on. You run football when football's going on.

I often wanted to tell people who complained that we paid far too much attention to prep football and not enough to, say, cross-country or golf that if we based our newshole allocation on attendance, football would get every headline and cross-country and golf would get 4 inches of agate.

And that's the point. There were 60,000 people at the OU-OSU game, and there probably were another, what, 25,000? 50,000? who would have gone if they could. Prep football games in that part of the country attract thousands. And if you walked up to 100 people on the street and asked when was the last time they went to a boxing match ... let's just say you'd get some funny looks.

 

[silvercharm]

I don't think you can run too much about football, especially if there's a local tie. Doesn't matter if it's high school, college or NFL. It's football, and it drives the bus.

 

[spnited]

Sorry, midwest. No way the boxing feature or NFL wire pieces should have gone ahead of Okalhoma-Texas Tech in that part of the country.

 

[forever_town]

Too much football is never enough.

 

[Editude]

Choosing between/among wire pieces for the Sunday front? Is that the most relevant approach?

 

[crusoes]

As for football's popularity, I use the same yardstick with the pro and major college teams in our area. No matter if the high school hockey rink is sold out, there are still five times more people who care about the Red Wings more than any high school team. State tournaments are different, but regular season stuff gets smaller play or is pushed to inside pages where you can blow it up more.

 

[dargan]

I don't think you can run too much about football, especially if there's a local tie. Doesn't matter if it's high school, college or NFL. It's football, and it drives the bus.

Amen.

 

[Mark2010]

I share your concern. I really don't like single-sport fronts. I've done them (we all probably have), but I prefer to avoid them.

This is because I realize there is a percentage of readers who don't care about a certain sport, be it football, basketball, baseball,hockey, whatever. So I try to at least have one alternate story on the cover for the sake of those readers. The only exception would be if it's ALL local: such as 4 teams in the playoffs, etc.

But if I have 3 prep football stories, I'mnot going to round it out with a college or pro football story if I can help it. If it's going to be wire, I'd rather offer something a little different.

 

[buckweaver]

But if I have 3 prep football stories, I'mnot going to round it out with a college or pro football story if I can help it. If it's going to be wire, I'd rather offer something a little different.

If you have three prep football stories on the front, it's most likely, oh, Thursday, Friday or Saturday in the fall. And if you're in an area within proximity to a popular major-college football or NFL team ... it would probably behoove you not to ignore said team(s) in favor of "something different," if a majority of your readers are interested in that.

Let's not overthink this stuff.

 

[I Digress]

Why would you put anything but your best stories out front?

 

[MidwestSportsGuy]

If you have three prep football stories on the front, it's most likely, oh, Thursday, Friday or Saturday in the fall. And if you're in an area within proximity to a popular major-college football or NFL team ... it would probably behoove you not to ignore said team(s) in favor of "something different," if a majority of your readers are interested in that.

Definitely understand that, and tend to agree with it after reading the various posts here. Only thing is, my paper isn't that close to an NFL team or a Division I program. I used the Oklahoma-OSU game as more of an example of a national story that I suspect would have made more sense than AP's boxing trainer piece.

Regardless, it appears I overthought the situation. Thanks a bunch for all the responses.

 

[steveu]

Screw it. All baseball, all the time, 365 days a year.

No, no, no, just kidding. What everyone else said. You play to your strengths in the region. If it's football the readers crave, football they get. If you're in a mad college hoops region or NASCAR, you try to spread the front page sports out a bit. It's what the reader wants, which some companies are forgetting this week (oh hi, Gannett!)

 

[Mark2010]

Why would you put anything but your best stories out front?

The trick is determing what you believe are your "best stories".

There is a line of thought --- not without merit --- that game stories are typically overlooked in this day and age where virtually every game is televised and the internet provides immediate stats, analysis, etc. So by the time the paper hits the streets, the score is old news. So is it better to go with a feature, column, etc.? Interesting fodder for thought.

Some papers have even eliminated wire roundups of NBA, NHL, MLB, etc. because they just take up too much space and,again, those who care get their information from other sources.