Wall Street Journal's new sports dealio off to rocky start

From something called the New York Observer: Before he even had one byline for the paper, Yankees beat reporter Jim Baumbach has left The Journal. He is returning to Newsday. "It's over. He made a decision. We're moving forward," said John Seeley, the editor of The Journal's Greater New York section.

From Loser: Anyone seen this section in the couple days it's been out? Loser would love a critique. Loser is very skeptical about its chances of making a dent in the NYC sports market.

http://www.observer.com/2010/media/reporter-jim-baumbach-flees-journal-return-newsday

 

The deadlines for the section are 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. I have no idea how you cover sports under those criteria. In New York or anyplace else.

 

I assume it'll be the same as the WSJ's current sports in the national edition. Long profiles and features plus short articles featuring the overuse of dodgy statistics to make forecasts.
Makes you wonder about the numbers in the financial news sections.,

 

It's like having chicken every day. And I don't care how great a feature is, when the Yankees are in the playoffs people are going to want to read about the game, or have the result drive the coverage. There's no way this section can compete with the NY Times, they have those strong features/enterprise and actual news.

And one last rant: Why have beat writers with those deadlines? Have a stable of good feature writers. Instead they've hired a staff of people who aren't from NY and have no sourcing. (Baumbach was the exception, there, and he's gone.)

I am puzzled by this section in many ways. But perhaps I will be surprised.

 

Loser: critiques, as requested:
http://www.observer.com/2010/media/michael-wolff-wsjs-new-york-section-confounding-and-preposterous
http://www.newser.com/off-the-grid/post/456/nyc-section-is-the-wsj-turning-in-its-grave.html?utm_source=otg&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20100504
http://www.observer.com/2010/media/journal%E2%80%99s-new-section-review

Baumbach's a good reporter. Must be real problems at WSJ.

Mediator: curious as to how you know the deadline times. are you a staffer there?

 

How big is the sports staff? I know some serious talent there.

 

If there is indeed serious talent there, it's not showing up in print. I saw two of the much-ballyhooed New York extras last week and was completely underwhelmed. Both had 2 pages of sports and not a single story that was even remotely unique.