How to write a gamer...

...if you're a Hall of Famer who's seen more baseball games than Vin Scully (not true, but you get my drift), and want to vent. Saw this on Buster Olney's blog: Hal McCoy tees off on the Reds.

http://www.daytondailynews.com/s/content/oh/story/sports/pro/reds/2008/08/24/ddn082508spredsweb.html

 

His story on Oswalt beating them last year was equally as impressive.

Only disappointing thing were the minor typos a copy editor should have picked up.

 

Yeah, it was entertaining. One thing that stuck out to me was that I'm guessing he's talking about Nick Massett when he says Nick Massek.

 

This is the kind of gamer I have always advocated by beat guys -- seriously. Since about 1980. It's what we pay beat guys for.

Not everyone has agreed, of course.

And while this has been said, and probably written, before, this line, placed where it was, made me laugh:

As far as the game goes, it was the Reds falling out of an ugly tree and hitting every branch on the way to the ground.

 

That was my favorite line, SF.

 

Good god is that an old joke, and it was totally unnecessary. Show, don't tell, right? Let the reader evaluate the fact that the Reds made five errors, surrendered nine walks and struck out 14 times.

Sorry guys, I know it's Hal McCoy, but this wasn't great. Sufficient perhaps, but not great.

 

On a side note, am I to believe a young pitcher on a club managed by Dusty Baker might have injured his arm?

 

That's just impossible. Dusty demands you take that back.

 

I don't think they pay Hal McCoy to just show. Readers want him to tell. (Almost) Anyone can write down what happens.

 

Show, don't tell, is an old wives myth. To paraphrase a very prolific author I know, I'm telling a fucking story, not acting it out. That would be showing.

The tree line is funny.

 

If I'm copy editing, that tree line isn't making it past my desk.

It's called editorializing, son.

 

If you're a decent beat guy at all, you'd better be smartly and judiciously editorializing in most stories or you're really selling short your readers, and your paper, both of which could easily go to AP to get the facts. You were there. You've been there since spring training (in some cases for decades gone by), you've talked to those involved before and after the fact, and before and after every fact the entire season. Use that. Be a writer.