Let's try this again: Hey AP!

Speaking of AP requests, do we have a latest line for tomorrow? I would have thought if the gamblers were going to take a holiday it would be, say, Christmas.

 

Isn't there a Web site you can go to directly for that? I seem to recall at our place they have to do that from time to time.

 

This is exactly my second week doing agate part-time. I wouldn't know. Anyone? Bueller?

Bueller?

 

Our Vegas line moves on McClatchy, not AP, but this is the Web site associated with whoever does the lines we get.

http://www.nss.net

 

I now have an AP question, not a complaint. With golf agate, what's up with those numbers in parentheses next to the players' names?

 

FedEx Cup points

I had to delete them. With the money, the line doesn't fit my column.

 

OK, you've got a 28-7 game. You are the AP writer, so it must be explained at some point that you're ALWAYS on somebody's deadline. Why would you move 5 inches 10 minutes after the game, a 28-7 game? Wouldn't you have enough in your laptop to give us, say, 12 inches and let us get the page out?

 

And there it is -- well, 11.90 inches.

 

Yup, and the page, she is gone. Voila.

But the fact remains, NOBODY is going to be satisfied with 5" on a bowl game. Don't even bother.

 

Unless you're compiling a college FB notebook and just including it in that.

Not saying we do, but I could see it.

 

I suppose.

 

I posed a similar question to the AP guy in my state. Here's what he said:

They're firing out 3-4 graf stories at the final buzzer to get the Internet covered and to fill the needs of those members who want nothing more than a capsule.

Many times, he said, he has the entire story written by the final horn, but the desk in NY wants the first 4 grafs first because it takes less time to read-and-ship a 4-inch story and then read the rest of the story, than it does to read the entire 500-word story and ship it in one take.