Field Guide to Covering Sports. Joe Gisondi

of news, gossip, commentary, smart-ass remarks, along with content that a few critics derided as vulgar and obscene. Leitch has since departed, now writing columns and producing podcasts for Sports on Earth (along with the foreword for this book). Deadspin, meanwhile, continues to attract a large audience— about 10 million unique visitors a month during early 2017.

      Here’s a lesser-known fact about bloggers: The best of them are erudite, something they don’t always want others to know. They’re just as likely to mix in references to farts as Shakespeare, politics, or sports history, perhaps all in one paragraph. Even people who don’t immediately understand every esoteric reference can still follow along—sort of like listening to comedian Dennis Miller. Consider Bill Simmons, who turned his “The Boston Sports Guy” blog into a regular gig writing nontraditional blogs for ESPN that were extraordinarily longer than most others and that mixed sports and entertainment. He later created Grantland.com, conceived ESPN’s 30 for 30 documentaries, and now runs TheRinger.com, another sports entertainment website he developed. Blogging is a great way to learn craft and get exposure. (Heck, I received the contract for this book after blogging about sports journalism for a few years.)

      Every college newspaper should have a sports blog linked to the newspaper—and in addition, a regular sports podcast and perhaps a YouTube channel. You can start a blog on a site like WordPress in about five minutes. So what’s your excuse?

      Blogging is just another way to convey information for readers—and a way to help fledgling sports journalists improve writing, videotaping, editing, and observational skills.

      “Your powers of observation are doubled and tripled when you live-blog,” Associated Press baseball beat writer Ben Walker told The Poynter Institute. “You see things and look for things that you would not look for in a story. You might look at a situation in a different way.”³

      

      Sports Insider: On Starting Out

      New media literally landed me this job with USAHockey.com. I was a print reporter and moved into online, because that’s where a better paying job was. I work solely online now and do some random freelancing for print, but for the most part it’s all online. Magazines and newspapers are going to have to work hard to catch up, because I feel there are a lot of managers out there wanting to stick to a print formula in a digital world. If you’re just entering the field, diversify as much as possible.

      Cameron Eickmeyer, USAHockey.com

      Carving a Niche

      Niche is essential to blogging. Nobody’s covering Little League in your town? Volleyball coverage at your school is nearly nonexistent? Start a blog. Even if you have a small staff, you can start a blog that covers sports in general at your university, although it might be better to break out blogs for your most popular sports—usually football and basketball.

      Dan Woike, a sports writer for the Los Angeles Times who used to cover Southern Cal for Rivals.com, says his readers didn’t care as much what was happening in the rest of the college football world. They wanted info on their team, USC. So he didn’t focus on national or league issues unless he could localize how those issues affected Southern Cal athletics.

      If a softball pitcher from Arizona State got arrested, Woike could have blogged about how the arrest could affect the Trojans’ chances in a scheduled game. He wouldn’t have to write a straight news story saying that a top-rated team had lost its top player, because other media outlets would do that.

      Though blogs don’t have stringent deadlines, most professional journalists try to post something as soon as an event concludes, adding newer details after speaking with coaches and players in the locker room. This resembles an old process in which reporters used to file quick game stories for a newspaper’s first edition and then keep revising the story for later editions through the night.

      “You have to bring the latest information as soon as you get it,” says Greg Bedard, now a senior NFL writer for Sports Illustrated. “If a reader knows you have everything first, why would they go anywhere else?”

      The Associated Press still uses this process for all breaking news, which means the wire service may send out more than a dozen write-thrus (revised versions of one story) before an editor selects the latest possible one for newspaper publication. Readers see only that final choice. With blogs, in contrast, Internet surfers can watch as a story develops and changes.

      Tips for Blogging Sports

      Individual blog posts can range from one paragraph for notes and quick updates to 1,000-plus words for features and game stories. “Not being tied to a budgeted length allows for the story to grow more organically,” Woike says. “There are temptations to get wordy at times, but really, if there’s good information, there’s always room for it.”