Does your paper REALLY need a columnist

Mine needs more than one during football season. The rest of the year? Probably not.

 

I think two or three columnists for a big paper is ideal. On the other hand, at the Miami Herald these days, EVERYONE writes a column. Whether qualified or not.

 

Good discussion. I'm with the majority here -- a good columnist can enhance the product with a strong point of view -- but I find myself lately skipping past sports columns written off events.

I find, too often, that the columnist really doesn't have much to say about the game he/she just watched -- most are just nicely written features (see: Albom, Mitch). I'd much rather read a harder-edged column written about a topic or an issue, even if it's connected to a game or event.

 

Until a paper reaches a certain size threshold, it might not need a columnist. I've read too many columns in the sports sections of small papers that either weren't about sports or were some writer's opinion about an event the writer didn't attend. If your writers don't have anything to say that people want to read, don't waste the space. And small papers are usually understaffed anyway, so don't waste the time.

The rare exception is the witty, resourceful writer who just happens to work in a small market. (And I'd love it if some of you can post examples.)

But, If a big paper doesn't have at least a few good columnists and reporters who can occasionally write columns, those papers are just small-minded papers with larger circulations.

 

smaller circs can get away without having a columnist, but all papers need columns.

the mega shops should have as many columnists as they can properly use.

 

Cincinnati once had Tim Sullivan, Mark Purdy and Peter King all in the same building, as well as Lonnie Wheeler. Just a great staff and great guys. Mariotti and Daugherty were young kids cutting their teeth down the street at the Post during that era as well.

So my answer is, as long as you have a good columnist, yes, it does make a difference. But if you are a smaller place with one columnist who's a bad one, no, you're better off without one. I once worked at a place that had a veteran columnist -- one of the world's nicest people -- but nonetheless, he'd take a week of vacation, and come back and write six-eight columns in a row about his vacation, with a tag line at the end of each one along the lines of "Tomorrow -- the seagulls of Alaska." I kid you not. He was the executive sports editor, did not answer to sports editor or anyone on staff, and thus did as he pleased and his columns could never be edited, changed or held, until he was "retired."

 

One of the tiny weeklies around here has a sports writer who wrote an entire column about his fantasy football team. : Not about fantasy football in general but about how Clinton Portis and Chad Johnson really screwed up his chances in the playoffs ... blah, blah blah ...

 

Rial Cummings. Course he left Missoula a few weeks ago to go freelance in Seattle.

 

I think you're just reading bad columnists, if that's all you are getting from them.

 

Columnists are what stirs the pot. They get people talking. They inspire conversation and debates. They attract readers far more than boring gamers and sidebars.

We need 'em now more than ever.

 

It's kind of an interesting topic, too, for papers that thrive on prep sports coverage. Readers could really identify with a columnist there because of the community feel, and the fact that they might actually see them somewhere around town. But there are the questions: would a small paper hire a full-time columnist? would staff members be equipped to write good columns? Would they even have the time to write them, given that readers might not be getting the basic news anywhere else?
It would probably work the same way at my place - write them when you have the time, and the strong enough subject.

 

As a columnist, I applaud the vast wisdom of those who say we need columnists more than ever.