For $40.....

This is what a newspaper wants from its HS stringers of Friday night for $40

1) tweets after every score
2) Post game audio from coach and player from each team.
3) Photos and video if possible
4) Then 250-300 words.

Uh, no thanks

 

I made twice that 30 years ago, covering two games a night - 12-14 inches each story, maybe take some round-up calls when I got back. Plus mileage.

 

I might do this if I was fresh out of college or still in college and needed clips - like maybe 3 to 5 times, just to have it for my applications and resume. Otherwise, that is well, well below minimum wage now. You might as well ask people to do it for free, because you're probably only going to get Friends of the Team and high school kids applying.

 

The audio from a player and coach from both teams is enough to make your head explode. After a football game? They better not care if I grab the first players I see regardless if they played! Seriously, it is such a pain to do this, especially if you need to get audio. I had an editor way back when who required player quotes from both teams if they were both local. Always so fun with freaking 15-year-olds who just lost to their rivals on the other side, not to mention the running to get them all. In this case, you'd almost need to set something up beforehand.

Throw everything else onto it, and definitely not worth it for $40. Simply how much an hour, forget effort, does this end up being for a stringer door to door for a football game? I bet less than $10 an hour.

The main stringing gig I ever had paid $50 a story, like 20 years ago so no social media or own images stuff, but it was that across the board, no matter if it was a six-inch preview you talked to the coach for 2 minutes or a 3-hour game. I usually justified it because there were enough of those 15-minute stories to counter the 3-hour ones.

 

I made that amount in the Chicago suburbs in the mid-1990s, for filing a gamer and box score. Considering all the additional shit they want now? No way.

 

It's been several years since I've covered high school football on a freelance basis, and I got paid $50 from a big paper a couple of hours up the road. I think after-score tweets were required only for the last year I worked.

 

For close to 20 years the Dallas Morning News paid $55 for 3 grafs and a boxscore. They basically live-stream games now, so it’s changed.

 

I'm an old cranky person now, but it would take me eons at first to figure out how to get audio and/or video and edit and upload appropriately. I am sure I could eventually do it efficiently, but for $40 on top of all that other stuff?

 

I think my best estimate for a high school game, door to door, is that it takes about 5-6 hours of work even if there's no real driving involved. If the game starts at 7, figure you leave the house at 6 to get there, park, get in the stadium and get settled 15 minutes before kickoff; three hours for the game and to get back to the office/home; and then an hour to write and edit photos (if necessary).
So $40 works out to about $7 or $8 an hour.

My publishers have asked me for years to find stringers to help with high school football. I've always told them I can't find any good writers I trust on deadline (which is true), but another part of it is that I'm embarrassed to offer them the $50 a game that I think is our current rate. I'd rather ask them to do it for free than offer them that pittance.
Thankfully, we have a couple of outstanding local photographers who do work for free.

 

I’m amazed there are still papers out there with a late enough deadline to wait for all that work.

7 pm game might end at … 9:15? If you’re lucky?

If you absolutely haul ass dead sprint between 2 coaches and 2 players who by definition aren’t close to one another and who you know are walking to the locker room or the bus you could wrap that in 20 minutes? (Gig is basically up time wise if you don’t get the coach or player before they enter the locker room.)

Everything breaks your way and you might be sitting down at a laptop at 9:40 with 300 words to write, photos to edit and audio and video to upload in, as was often the case in my experience, 15-20 minutes?

Ideally you’d have already picked a first half photo or three and have those sent or ready to during halftime (no water breaks for you, damn it!!) and maybe you’ve hacked out a graf or two already, but that’s all assuming you were able to find time and a place to sit down when you were also on the sideline for photos and video, and/or there was actually a seat in the press box for you.

All that stress for $40. Yikes.

Sometimes I miss the biz and that big-game rush but man I don’t miss the stress. I used to just go catatonic for 20-40 minutes after sending my last thing. Ugh.

 

One game Friday night kicked off at 7, last whistle at 10:25.
Ten. Twenty. Five.