Prep football help

Depends on where you are. There are no high schools with wifi in our area.

 

My method has always been a legal pad and play by play. For passing, I note completions, attempts and yards. For scoring plays, I note length of drive, time of score, key play with a few descriptive words, and PAT.
At the half, I sum it up. And hand-write, if I'm not in the box with the laptop, key play grafs and scoring play grafs.
If a back is looking like over 100 yards, I start keeping a running sum for the second half.
When the game is over, and I got some quotes, I search out a stat guy to compare numbers and then use his. Since they are generally pretty close and I don't really care anyway.
Then I jet to the nearest wi-fi hotspot. I will have written a graf or two in advance, like where the teams play next. Since I already have most of the story done, I fiddle with the lede, drop in quotes and some cumulative stats.
I can file 400 words in just a couple of minutes and that's all the desk wants anyway.

 

here in Dallas, most high schools do have internet connections, but I'm only able to receive email and not send any. I've never asked a tech why, but it happens at every game I cover. If you have a Treo with wireless email set up, it's a great backup...for me it's mostly my frontline.

 

very few high schools in my area have wireless. normally i just go to a hotel and send.

 

I have a Treo with PDANet which allows me to hook it up via a USB cable and use my Sprint Vision to get online. It's not the fastest connection in the world, but decent enough to file.

I've been pretty lucky with this site for finding hotspots, but checking for hotels near your game might be the best way.

http://www.jiwire.com/

 

I remember filing in the "old days." and by that, I mean six or seven years ago. You'd have to show up early and make sure the press box had a phone line. Then, you'd have to test it before the game to make sure it works.

If it didn't, you'd have to improvise -- and quit writing early to do so.

I've filed from convienience stores and coffee shops that were nice enough to let me use a phone line. Once, I filed from the guard station at a national guard armory, because I got lost leaving the stadium and couldn't find my hotel. (this was actually the first game I covered as a pro).

On at least one occasion, when the phone line at the stadium failed, I ended up renting a hotel room for 15 minutes -- full price -- to file.

That's one thing from the old days I don't miss. It amazes me that just a few years later, I'm able to file from an empty parking lot, so long as a building nearby has wireless.

 

Ah, the old days trying to make sure the phone line wasn't computerized, meaning it wouldn't work when you tried to dial out from your modem.

How technology has spared us all.

 

And then some.

I remember filing from a phone booth across from the high school in Williamsport, Pa., during a snowstorm, steadying a 16-pound Portabubble balanced on my knee with one hand and the telephone receiver with the other.

 

And don't forget trying to file on these, writing your story and seeing only three lines at a time.

Most of the papers I worked at, we had decent deadlines where all the reporters could get back to the office, write and help edit stories.

 

Did you get reimbursed for that one?

 

I'm guessing no.

 

things I used to carrry or have with me
* a small phone to see if I could get a direct line out
* a jack converter if the school had those extra big jacks
* 20 feet or so of phone cord
* a coupler with two female ends
* an extension cord
* an aol account to send on
* a power strip, if I was at a tournament
* laptop
* tape recorder
* extra tapes
* extra batteries
* headphones
* notebooks
* pens
* highlighters
* magic markers
* that crazy phone coupler thing I didn't know how to use
This was maybe 10 years ago.
Now it is a laptop, wireless card, two pens, one notebook and a digital tape recorder that hangs around my neck.