Bill Conlin on the business

Quite a thread. I have thoughts about one of its subsets:

I haven't gone to a live sporting event since my son graduated from high school and was no longer on the golf team. He's a junior in college now, and I think I went to two of his matches. Before that, I went to some of my daughter's basketball games, even though she was pretty far down the bench. She's about to get her masters, so that was quite a while ago.

I don't enjoy live sporting events. I've been to hundreds in my life, both working and as a spectator, and I've seen some amazing things -- some as big as Doug Williams' Super Bowl, and some as niche as college track and field meets. But I no longer go, because I simply don't enjoy the experience. Don't love crowds, don't love the hassle, pretty much don't like any of it.

And I regret that the athlete-coach/writer relationship has become so adversarial. I think I would have been better off in the 1940s and '50s doing this job.

But make no mistake: The millions of people who care about these things are the reason I've had a relatively nice life and met so many cool people -- including here, I might say -- in my 31 years in the business. That's why I'm never going to blow off somebody in a bar who wants to talk about his team. It's not my favorite subject matter, but it comes with the territory of what I do.

I have nothing but affection -- it's not quite the right word, but it will do -- for sports fans and Fantasy players and all the rest of it. They've paid the bills for a long time. And in times like these, sports are one thing that people can still universally enjoy.

So to the people in this business who hate the people they cover and the people who read what they produce: Where would you be without them?

 

The thread dealt with Conlin's generalities. So I pitched in generalities -- pride in craft, ambition, perseverance -- that have served us well for hundreds of years. Without those, nothing else matters. Add those to sitting at the foot of the best reporter in your place (and studying his/her stuff untiil you see not only how the reporting was done but how it was organized and written), arranging private meetings with coaches to watch film (actually watching practices, learning how practice schedules are made), talking to parents' groups about what's important to them (it's too easy to forget what readers really want), networking with craft groups at every level, training in all the 21st century storytelling tools (video, photography, audio, design), continuing education at seminars some of which may be outside journalism, attending every speech in town given by anyone who's successful in any field (they all grow from the same fertile field of ambition)....
You get the idea. Live the craft. A hundred years ago, at a baseball school in Springfield, Illinois, the old scout Jack Rossiter told his group of kids, "The guy buried right over there, Abe Lincoln, he said, 'I will study and prepare myself, and when the time comes, I will be ready.'" Now, I have no idea if Lincoln ever said any such thing, but it made sense to me then and I'm still trying to be ready.

 

This is the original exchange that launched the spirited (and quite civil and constructive, I believe) debate:

WAYLON: The problem is finding somewhere to get paid to do so. I'm not sure if people are lamenting the death of the print medium so much as they are the revenue it brings in.

DAVE: Maybe I hang with the wrong people in the wrong places, but I've never met a newspaper person who got into the business for the money. Fewer opportunities now, for sure, than 20 yrs ago, but those who want it the most will find a way.

It rubbed me the wrong way, because to me at least, it was very reminiscent of what management has attempted to shove down employees' throats, the whole passive-aggressive, "There's more to life than money" mantra. Meanwhile, we have threads on here about reporters requiring food stamps to feed their families.

I thought I made a legitimate point - that in the current climate, it's becoming more and more difficult to do this as a living. And more and more difficult for media companies to finance great reporting. I didn't say that there should be an expectation of being independently wealthy as a daily newspaper journalist. Or doing it "for the money."

Is C.C. Sabathia less of a baseball player because he's making $160 million? A-Rod? Should we stop watching Kate Hudson's movies? Has Paul McCartney denigrated the Beatles' legacy by cashing in on his song writing skills, by turning an avocation into a vocation? Isn't that the American Dream?

I think young reporters hear all the time from managers that trying to make an honest living is somehow less than noble. They don't need to hear it from one of their own.

Now, obviously, we've gone a lot deeper into the subject since that original exchange. And I think a lot of the points you've made have been quite valid. But I just wanted to circle back to that real quick, as a reminder of where this all began.

 

Waylon
I have only one problem with what you've said -- in these sentences: "I think young reporters hear all the time from managers that trying to make an honest living is somehow less than noble. They don't need to hear it from one of their own."

I've never said making money is less than noble, that reporters ought to do it for the love of the game. Not once. I left the best job I ever had shortly after a managing editor told me, "Dave, there's psychic income here," to which I said, "Will that help me buy tomatoes?" Left for double my salary. But I was older and wiser by then. The sorry, happy truth is, for most of us, we got into this for the absolute fun of it, thoughts of money coming only later. Now, wiith the entire freakin' economy a train wreck, money probably ought to be a first thought -- but, y'know what, I bet college newspapers are still full of kids who'd choose entry-level pay at a metro newspaper over the better entry-level pay in the real, dull world. As an old-time Post copy editor told me for this book I'm doing, "The dirty little secret that management knows is that we'd do this for nothing. So they pay us as little more than nothing as they can get away with."

 

To be clear, I think you've added some much needed nuance to your original thoughts since then. And I'm kind of proud to have helped push you in that direction.

This is the site at its healthiest.

 

Jeebus.

Sounds like TSP.

 

And the flip side is that management for decades has made business decisions based on the belief that the reading public doesn't discern quality in journalism, a belief that has emboldened them to dilute their products by stretching resources too thin, not competing for the best talent, etc. Given the choice of providing a strong product or making short-sighted cuts to please shareholders has been a no-brainer for them each step of the way to the graveyard.

You can understand why the publishers acted in this ultimately suicidal manner. To a great extent, they're right. The public understands quality in the sports we cover, which is why sports leagues have probably our country's best examples of a meritocracies. But the public unfortunately has never demanded quality from our publishers.

So the very best people left the industry because they couldn't afford to stay. When the choice becomes some altruistic notion of nobility of journalism vs. looking your family members in the eyes, it's not a terribly difficult decision for most of us.

 

Sweet fancy Moses. I. Did. Not. Say. That.

People are getting defensive on this thread all over the place because of the logical fallacy of thinking that because someone said one thing they must necessarily mean another.

Let me be clear: I appreciate people who post here, some of whom use their real names, some of whom are anonymous to the board at large. There is tremendous value in both. Yes, you don't know if Pee Diddy and Don't Know Diddly know their ass from a hole in the ground unless they clearly demonstrate it. Their credibility comes from their ability to convey solid information.

That said, when you do know someone here is someone you respect, you should be allowed to express the opinion that, "Hey, I hope this guy sticks around despite the pissing matches" without people getting their panties in a wad that *gasp* you think that way.

Some people need to get a little less defensive on this thread.

 

Well, that's a bit harsh.
Some of the very best people left because they were forced to leave.
Some left because they could.
And some are still in it, and some even make a pretty nice living.
I think the the LA Times, Chi Tribune and NY Times, etc., were happy to pursue and publish quality journalism when they were making a lot of money. Now that money is lean, they've panicked and lost sight of why people were buying their product in the first place. I wouldn't say they never valued quality journalism.
I don't think your generalities hit the mark.

 

I just grabbed a few people who post under handles as an illustration. My assertion still stands: no one who aims to make or rebut a point in a serious, studied manner is intrinsically better or worse or more or less of value than anybody else.

 

My experience has been that, by and large, management barely knows shit.

That said, there still are plenty of us who do or would do this for next-to-nothing. It's when the bosses or beancounters treat us as if we're nothing, that's where they bring the whole thing down.

 

You're right. I was generalizing and there's some hyperbole there, too. I'd guesstimate about 5 percent of newspaper publishers value quality in equal proportion to the bottom line, including the NY Times, the LA Timers-Mirror papers (Newsday, Baltimore, Hartford, included) prior to their takeover by the Tribune Co.. I'm sure there are/were a lot of other small papers, too, that wanted to do provide good journalism but just didn't have the resources. My point is that, with the exception of the very top there hasn't been strong competition for journalists' services.