Alan Robinson

The other thing is: Are they really going to sweat a Royals-Mariners lead on a Tuesday night in August?

I can see them scrutinizing something major like an NFL playoff game, but otherwise it's what the guy/girl at the ballpark/arena sends in nearly all of the time. Remember this, too: The AP really does try to emphasize speed because that's what they hear from the client papers all the time. Give most papers a choice between a so-so lead at 10:30 or a better lead at 11, and I'll bet most of them will take the earlier one.

 

No argument here, that's what happens a lot. But the bigger the game/event/news story, the more editors get involved and writers can lose control of their stuff pretty quickly.

 

I hang out sometimes with one of my wife's friends' husbands. I like the guy a whole lot - he's super-nice, and he helped get me a jersey at a sweet price in December. He's also a Steelers fan, and when I was going back and forth on what jersey to get (I went with Adrian Peterson in purple), he wound up telling me, repeatedly over several conversations, that he was getting a "Ron" Woodson throwback. Should I correct him?

 

Tell him Woodson never retired a Steeler, in fact it's not even close. Much better choices out there like Stallworth or Shell.

 

Plenty of editing/rewriting takes place every night. A writer will be specifically assigned to baseball, for example, and he/she will handle all of the baseball ledes, optionals and roundups. There's plenty to clean up every night and, in my experience, it was actually far more unusual for a lede to go out as it was originally written.

 

agreed, then I go back and look at the later one if time permits

 

Minor changes? Yes, partly because the leads are in before the game ends and things change.

Major overhaul? Very rare.

 

Generally, it depends on 3 things:

1. Who is the AP writer? The better writers -- or those perceived by deskers and/or management types to be the better writers -- are edited less, especially on day-to-day game coverage and sports-news stories.

2. Which desker is it? Some simply feel the need to edit the crap out of every piece of copy that comes their way. Some edit little to nothing, especially in time-crunch situations. Some are in-between. Some only edit the crap out of copy if they historically don't trust a given writer (see No. 1 above). Some only edit heavily if time lets them.

3. How big is the event? As some mentioned earlier, the bigger the event the more likely the story will travel up the editing ladder and be heavily edited.

There you go, kids. Test on Friday.

 

So your stuff I read when I was in New Ulm and you were in Minneapolis was really written by Paula Froke under your byline? D-a-y-u-m, she's good.

 

C'man, man ... I was HUGE in New Ulm!

 

Everyone was huge in New Ulm... damn German food.

 

Robinson is apparently freelancing for nhl.com: http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=552261&cmpid=rss-robinson