Gannett papers using AI for high school football

We has a basketball coach who sat by the phone at Crickets Lounge

 

That's actually...not a terrible idea? I mean, it's not GOOD, per se, but it shows a little bit of foresight. I would think you'll get more SEO hits for "Duke Target Johnny Slapdick Scores 57 For Podunk High In Rout of Podunk Tech" than a routine recap.

 

I think it's more along the lines of reporting the latest cycle of commits, de-commits, campus visits and all the other recruiting bullshit that people eat up but doesn't mean a damn thing because a mercurial 17-year-old changed his mind 10 minutes after the reporter talked to him.

 

Sure, but it's going to get eyeballs and following Johnny Slapdick's recruiting tango actually provides some benefit to the writer. The kid will probably ferret the scoop to one of the big national recruiting writers #CrossThreadingAgain but the writer will benefit from building relationships with the coaches and everyone else on the periphery. It's a smidge better than listicles or whatever other shitty form of gamer Gannett is focused on this week.

 

I can confirm this. In the last year every directive was to do as many lists (top 15 RBs, QBs, etc.) and recruiting stories as possible. To be honest they did return pretty good analytics, even for the small hyper local markets I was in.

 

I know when the big QB recruit from here committed the other week, he announced on the local rag's website. And I have to think it's because they went the extra mile in establishing a relationship.

 

When I had access to numbers at Patch around 2010ish, this tracks with that. Meaning, a profile on a stellar athlete would almost always do well. A game story would do OK if it was a popular sport and the team won. If the team lost - even in like a championship game - the numbers would be awful.

 

"We only cover you if you win."

 

At my next-to-last stop, the desk had two directives on Friday nights. Make sure we provided our area scores to AP in a timely manner, and under no circumstances were we to give scores if the Atlanta Journal-Constitution called. Big brain logic.

 

Recruiting is where local papers can still make a ripple. People eat that stuff up.

 

I was 16 years old, fielding calls on a Friday night and Rusty Miller of the Ohio AP called me for scores. After giving them he asked me for my social security number.

“Did the Associated Press just steal my identity?”

“Means you’re gonna get paid, idiot.”

 

I have this vision of your SS# accidently hitting the wire along with the scores.