Do You Want To Be Like Jason?

heck, i'm in serious job search mode, do you think i could get ap to move my resume on the wire?

 

I'm just really disappointed for this young man because the quality of it was so poor. It came across as a touch naive, as if no other professional journalist has tried to "reach out" to players like TO in the past. Maybe I'm the one being naive, but it's my experience that any prickly sports personality can be coaxed into letting their guard down if you're willing to keep it real.

Jon, if you're able to read this, I know you're young, just starting out. I know you were earnest. All the same, I hope this column was an assignment by some simple-minded editor at AP. I'd hate to think you're as arrogant and passively condescending as you were in that column.

BTW. Ralph Wiley, Ralph Wiley, Ralph Wiley! Jason's all fine and dandy, but aim for Ralph Wiley!

 

i realize that he's no embattled veteran but why do some keep referencing that the writer is young and just starting out. 26 years old and 3 years as an ap writer doesn't exactly qualify for the same kid gloves that you'd be willing to use with a fresh-out-of-college kid at the podunk press.

 

Couple of quick thoughts on this.

- I recall Linda Ellerbee (a name now long past for many of our younger members) got her big break when she mistakenly sent a personal letter out on the AP wire. It was very witty and brittle and smart and was seen by every editor in America. A couple months later she was on television.

- And this. As we're taking this young man to the woodhsed for not remembering Mr. Wiley, does it not strike anyone else that there's no mention of Red Smith or Jim Murray or any of the dozen other historic greats of our business? While I understand the young man's point in trying to specify the contribution he'd like to make, I'd remind him of this: The content of the work might or might not be about matters of race, but the quality of the work doesn't know color. The work is the work. Good is good. Better is better. Great is what you have to aim for to be good. Aim higher.

 

I certainly understand where you're coming from, but at the same time, I do think 26 is very young in this position. In my instance, 26 was 10 years ago. The difference between what I knew then and what I know now is vast. As I look back on it, those first four years out of college were like a second college education. There was a lot of "unlearning" to be done.

 

Well said.

 

Valid point. This work is excusable for an undergraduate college essay. It is not for a 26-year-old with 3 years of employment as an AP writer. I'm wondering if there might be some backstory on how this piece slipped past the editors and made to the wire.

 

and how he got his damn job!

 

I don't know Jonathan personally, but I have met him a few times and he seemed like a nice guy. The stuff he normally writes for sports is solid. Not sure what the deal is with the column though. It's seems sort of random for a paper to run.

 

this is it. i'm going to be a lurker from here on out. the bigotry and petty jealousy out-weighs the good stuff on this message board.

 

jason, honest question: where's the bigotry?

 

there isn't any bigotry. Sure, he's young and all, but someone should have stopped this column from being posted on the AP wire.
Maybe at some bi-weekly, this would have made it to press, but not the AP wire, IMO.