Can experience make up for a degree?

Oh yeah, one thing I'm definitely good at is falling on my sword...

 

COP,

I don't think that folks are suggesting that you will get a sports writing job and decided to quit. I think they are suggesting that you might get a sports writing job and have the paper fold or be laid off.

And that has happened to a lot of people on this board alone.

 

Exactly. And the OP seems to think that there is some kind of nobility in not being prepared if and when that moment comes. There's not. Just wait until you have a wife and kids.

 

No, I get that, Ace. I didn't mean quit from a particular job. I mean quit the industry altogether if I get laid off or something.

And Dick, you know what, if all I could get is covering Bumbledorf vs Bum-Dumb Tech, I'd still do it. It's sports. I read a thread just now about how covering Little League sucks. I've been getting Little League assignments from a small newspaper nearby recently, the Fort Bend Herald. I'll take it. I get to go watch sports and then write about it. I can't think of too much better.

Btw, I live with my fiancee. I know what you're saying. But I just want to reiterate, that I am going to back and finish. It's going to happen. Just not at this moment.

 

Hey, the Fort Bend Herald. I hope you are covering my nephew's team really well. He works just as hard as the good players.

Good luck.

 

For the record, plenty of people get burned out on pro and college sports, as well. So my point wasn't that preps is a lesser animal or anything like that as much as it was that what seems shiny and exciting and a worthwhile life pursuit now can become more repetitive than you think.

 

I've just done a few games. Different teams.

Plus it's All-Stars, so aren't they all good players?

 

Doesn't living with your fiance hinder you finishing your degree at Houston Baptist as well, at least until you get married?

From your posts, you love seem to love sports more than the writing part. Have you considered news? A lot more opportunity to cover news then sports. You could always go back to sports, or at least try, while getting paid to write news. How many papers have you applied to?

Unfortunately, you should have had the contacts to land a job already. If you've done all this work in a major media market, there has to be someone you worked for that's clued in on openings that aren't widely known.

 

Well, the thing is that something has always built on something else.

It was my work with the tv studio that lead to the newspaper. It was the newspaper faculty adviser that knew someone at the radio station. It was because of my internship at the radio station that the Aeros picked me up. It was someone at the Aeros that told me about the stringer work with the AP.

 

And it could lead you to a sports writing job. Like others have stated, a degree doesn't matter to some, but it makes the world of difference to others.

The answer to your original post is maybe. Nothing more to really say.

 

Finish, the degree.

 

Hahahahahahaha. Can't argue with that.