Columnist - Richmond Times-Dispatch

As a long-time reader of the T-D, from what I've seen they've consistently made good hiring choices, for columnists and for beat writers. So someone down there must know what the heck they're doing and must be able to evaluate talent, and how that talent benefits their paper and meshes with the staff on hand.

(Now, having a VCU graduate as SE, not so sure about that move. But I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.)

 

No one gets fired from the TD. The guys stick together and do help each other. If the Michael encounters a problem, there will be people to guide him. Not the same can be said at other papers around the country.

 

Are you being serious?

 

Rey, yes I am serious. I think you do a helluva lot more grunt work covering preps than you do covering pros.

 

If you honestly think that's all there is to covering a pro beat, you would be devoured covering one. Quickly and thoroughly.

 

I'm curious, tell me more about what the beat entails.

 

So now people want to see this kid's clips? What are you gonna do with them, decide whether or not he's qualified for the job? Christ. He's already been deemed worthy of his position as Skins beat writer by people that know what the eff they're doing. Get over it.

 

Start with being on call 24/7. Add competition from everywhere -- other area papers, local TV and radio and all the national media (ESPN, Yahoo, the networks, etc.). There are few worse feelings as a beat guy than a national reporter swooping in to break a story regarding the team you're covering. Players get cut, traded, arrested and shot. The demotion of a starting guard to second string is news, and you've got to find out about it. Contract negotiations, holdouts, salary caps figures, which means dealing with team management, the union and agents -- the hard part there is figuring out whom to trust. By the way, you're doing this with access shrinking every day, so you'd better be working your butt off to cultivate sources, because you're going to need them.

And that's not even mentioning the whole free agency period -- who's your team after, who's being brought in to visit or work out, who on your team is headed elsewhere, and where are they going? -- and the month leading up to the draft. Oh, and is the coach and/or GM on the hot seat? That's a story every day for ... well, as long as it takes.

And the games aren't as easy as you seem to think. Instead of a 12-inch gamer in which some play-by-play is expected (most readers haven't seen the HS game), you've got pages worth of material to produce, from analysis to notes to various sidebars to columns and the gamer. And if you're relying on those typed quote sheets, you're going to miss an awful lot.

That's the quick synopsis off the top of my head. I'm sure there's quite a bit more that I'll think of later.


Edit: Sorry, Moddy, didn't see your post until I'd already put this up.