'Watch the $$%#% game'

[DietCoke]

Chris Jones' advice to young sports writers:

http://sonofboldventure.blogspot.com/2011/02/press-box-rules.html

I’ve watched sportswriters surf the Web, email, text, download music, listen to music, play games, watch movies, talk on the phone, talk to each other, make origami frogs and cranes, design and build a perpetual motion machine, sleep, doze, nap, catch forty winks, cut their fingernails, not cut their fingernails for years, and eat a whiffy homemade sandwich filled with what I’m pretty sure was cat food. Every now and then, you should remember that there’s a game going on, in front of you, and you need to be watching it

Also some outstanding material on what made Buster Olney a great beat writer:

That guy was born for the beat. ... He knew his stuff because he watched the game. Nobody watched the game like Buster. He kept a meticulous playbook, which he would carefully monitor for patterns, signs, and the smallest tells. He kept pitching charts. He looked for those little details that might form the heart of a great narrative three months down the road. He planned. He reported as though he were covering city hall.

I love the advice about being "meticulous." I'm meticulous to a fault, but there is nothing but nothing like always being prepared and organized. Plus, it gives you an edge over about 95 percent of reporters, most of whom are in 24-a-day crisis mode.

 

[Moderator1]

You cannot be meticulous to a fault. Being meticulous is a good thing.

I first thought this was a tribute to spnited!! One of the things he'd say.

 

[DietCoke]

You cannot be meticulous to a fault. Being meticulous is a good thing.

I first thought this was a tribute to spnited!! One of the things he'd say.

Appropriately enough, the blog entry is dedicated to spnited.

 

[Sam Mills 51]

Apparently, S-P rubbed off on Moddy. Or the other way around.

Being meticulous separates the good ones from the great ones. Also known as "attention to detail" throughout Corporate America.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

He makes a good point, but I know some great beat writers who barely watch a second of the game.

Of course there is a big difference between taking calls from agents and GMs and texting your girlfriend.

 

[BTExpress]

One thing I wish Jones would have added:

Don't go to the locker room to get "quotes." And don't stop a coach or player walking off the field to get a "quote."

Go there to get information, much of it, if you write well, you will not even have to quote.

 

[old_tony]

One thing I wish Jones would have added:

Don't go to the locker room to get "quotes." And don't stop a coach or player walking off the field to get a "quote."

Go there to get information, much of it, if you write well, you will not even have to quote.

This is a fantastic point. I think we lapse into the lazy language of just using the expression "get quotes," but the only reason to be talking to the players/coaches/agents/GMs/owners is "get information."

Sometimes the information is great and the quote is crappy, if you know what I mean. Those are cases where the really good reporters know how to write the "so-and-so said," lines without quote marks.

 

[HejiraHenry]

I went to a college basketball game on Saturday afternoon and left the laptop in the trunk. (I was on sidebar duty and headed back to the office to write after it was over.) I got a lot more out of it without having the distraction of tweeting and blogging as things were rolling along.

 

[nate41]

I agree, the few times I've had to run a chat during a game, I've found it kind of distracting.

In regards to quotes, read this in a piece about Sam Pompei, a former hockey writer in Springfield who recently passed.

Writers could learn from Sam’s suggestions. He always said that quotes were supposed to supplement a story, make it stronger, not to try and make it the whole story as some are guilty these days. And he used to get particularly annoyed when other writers would babble on during post-game interviews about how someone played, wanting to show off their knowledge to the coach or player. “I know how the goalie played, I just needed the coach to say it (for a quote),” Sam would say.

One of my favorite techniques is to ask the player who made a key play in the game to break it down. Sometimes I get nothing, but I've gotten a few good ones.

The guy who got the winning goal in a shootout said how he altered his usual approach because he and the goalie played and practiced together for three years. And the girl who sank late free throws said she closed her eyes and pretended to be in the backyard with her dad shooting them as a kid.

 

[SoCalDude]

I used to take over a hockey beat at midseason. Found out the person in my seat was supposed to tell all the other writers what happened on the ice.
Seriously, it seemed as though I was the only one watching the freaking game. I was the only one who knew who got the second assist before they announced it, the only one who knew which defenseman ****ed up or which winger was late on the backcheck and hung his defenseman out to dry.
WATCH THE GAME!!!

 

[Batman]

Why watch the game when the game story is obsolete?
[/21stCenturyJournalismProfessor]

 

[mediaguy]

Really enjoyed that list. Very funny, very true.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

I covered a MLS game and there were six reporters in the press box. I went to the bathroom and as I did, someone scored. I came back and asked who had scored and none of the other five reporters in there had any idea.

 

[Ice9]

Another thing I wished Jones would have touched on: don't show up dressed like a homeless guy. Look respectable.

 

[buckweaver]

Another thing I wished Jones would have touched on: don't show up dressed like a homeless guy. Look respectable.

Read it again. Those are Rules 5 and 6.

 

[Alma]

Pretty good advice. My thoughts:

*The longer you're on a beat, the less you have to "watch" the game. Patterns become easier to pick up. You learn what counts, what doesn't. You don't usually kill yourself watching the getaway day game if you're covering the visitor and they've already won the first two games of the series. You know the visitor probably wants to get the **** outta there and isn't going to play a five-hour game to prove a point. Likewise, you don't hit up the manager with WTF questions about why the bats went cold. Let the radio jocks pore over every Sunday mistake (and they will, sure as ****).

*You still need to know when to turn on the antenna because something special is happening. I could never be one of those guys who wandered around too much early in a game. I actually wanted to see patterns emerge first. If it was a 40-point game kind of night, I wanted to have paid attention to the opening movement of the symphony, so to speak. I didn't want to be the guy who sat down and said "boy, McGee's got 13 already, huh?" Beginning were important to me.

*Pick out some small, offhand detail of the game - not before or after - to bury in the story, like an extra treat. How a guy crisply came off consecutive screens for back-to-back three pointers. Describe a good touchdown run with an extra detail. Maybe a single to start a three-run inning ricocheted of the rubber. Maybe a guy got caught looking at a strike that literally split the plate in half. Just something.

*Don't overeat. Boy, is that a simple piece advice, but I've seen people do it. Eat only one of anything. One cookie. One hot dog. One slice of pizza. It can affect your whole attitude and writing ability, sitting there with a giant loaf of food on your stomach.

*Practice how to hold your recorder, yet still write legible notes, quickly yet not be some person whose notebook is sticking two inches from some person's face. And, yes, this takes some practice. Maybe one or two times. Practice on a lover or a buddy or a parent or something. Do not leave one of your information gathering tools - the notebook - in the pocket just because you couldn't figure how to hold both at the same time. And, unless you're recording it for audio purposes to put on the Web, keep the recorder low, out of sight. It only has to be good enough for you to hear.

*Learn how to punctuate your quotes. In other words, how sources/players/coaches emphasize certain words. Others disagree with me, but I think it's worth listening for a potential dash or semicolon. Or understanding the difference between a compound sentence, and two completely different sentences, the second of which starts with "And." I'd battle with copy desk on that last one, by the way.

*Think about how you word questions.

 

[Pilot]

I used to take over a hockey beat at midseason. Found out the person in my seat was supposed to tell all the other writers what happened on the ice.
Seriously, it seemed as though I was the only one watching the freaking game. I was the only one who knew who got the second assist before they announced it, the only one who knew which defenseman ****ed up or which winger was late on the backcheck and hung his defenseman out to dry.
WATCH THE GAME!!!

In their defense, I can watch a goal be scored in hockey right in front of me and not have any idea how it happened.

 

[bigbadeagle]

I got so used to one coach's playcalling when he was at another school, I was in the stands with a buddy of mine, who was a season ticket holder for that team. Coach's team was making a last-minute drive for a potential winning TD. My buddy asked me, "What's he going to call? What's he going to call?" I think I got the last four plays in a row pegged. The defense didn't, but it didn't matter. Incomplete pass on fourth down ended it.
But I got that from watching intently, even at practice, for a couple of years a decade earlier.

 

[BillyT]

I used to take over a hockey beat at midseason. Found out the person in my seat was supposed to tell all the other writers what happened on the ice.
Seriously, it seemed as though I was the only one watching the freaking game. I was the only one who knew who got the second assist before they announced it, the only one who knew which defenseman ****ed up or which winger was late on the backcheck and hung his defenseman out to dry.
WATCH THE GAME!!!

In their defense, I can watch a goal be scored in hockey right in front of me and not have any idea how it happened.

Thank you, Pilot. I thought the only one who had that issue.

 

[nate41]

+1. Although I've gotten better. But it still seems I'll be writing down a big hit or penalty...and they'll score as I'm frantically trying to get it all down.