Press Box ejections

Batman · Jan 10, 2017

TheHypnotoad said: ↑

Not quite a press box ejection, but ...

Five or six years ago, I was covering a boys swim meet at our main high school. The two teams shared a locker room, and while the meet was going on, one of the swimmers from the home team decided to pull a stupid-ass prank and take a dump on the floor of the locker room, then leave it there for the other team to find when they got back into the locker room. The home coach went into the locker room, saw what had happened and, completely unprompted, told me about it. Through some secondhand connections, I was able to get in touch with one of the kids from the road team, who told me that the kid who'd done it had also made some really inappropriate comments during the post-meet handshake line.

I got on-the-record comments from the coach and AD, and we ran a story on the incident.

Couple weeks later, I head back to the same pool for the team's Senior Day meet. As I'm taking my coat off, the woman who was the pool supervisor starts screaming at me to get out, telling me that my horrible, vicious reporting of a thing that happened and that the coach of the team flat out admitted had happened had embarrassed the swim program and that I wasn't allowed in the pool area anymore. I stepped into the hallway to call my editor and the athletic director to try and sort things out, and as I tried to get back into the pool, not only had the door been locked, but I saw through the windowpane in the door that she'd placed a trash can underneath the door handle to block me from apparently trying to kick the door in, SWAT style.

Eventually, between myself, my editor and the high school principal, we sorted things out and I got back in without having to break out the battering ram.
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If that didn't work, next call should've been to the fire marshall.

fossywriter8 · Jan 10, 2017

I was once told "No press in the press box" at a district track meet.

SnarkShark · Jan 10, 2017

fossywriter8 said: ↑

I was once told "No press in the press box" at a district track meet.
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That used to happen to me all the time. Coaches on both side booths, and announcer, stat guy, and scoreboard operator in small middle portion.

Sorry, no room for press in the press box.

SportsGuyBCK · Jan 11, 2017

SnarkShark said: ↑

That used to happen to me all the time. Coaches on both side booths, and announcer, stat guy, and scoreboard operator in small middle portion.

Sorry, no room for press in the press box.
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Sorry, no room for game story in our paper.

ChrisLong · Jan 11, 2017

I once told one of our prep guys to walk into the press box and say loudly: "Excuse me, all of you who are here in the PRESS box, raise your hand if you work in a building that actually has a PRESS." Then raise your own hand and see what happens.

MTM · Jan 11, 2017

ChrisLong said: ↑

I once told one of our prep guys to walk into the press box and say loudly: "Excuse me, all of you who are here in the PRESS box, raise your hand if you work in a building that actually has a PRESS." Then raise your own hand and see what happens.
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That's good Chris, except with newspaper companies selling their real estate, most of us no longer work in a building that has a press.

I haven't worked in a building with a press since 2001, being in bureaus and such.

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Press Box ejections

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