Shocking development in Philly!!

Sweet.

 

Shrug.

At least I'm honest about my mistake ...

 

WTF? who cares who bumps what? it's a freaking internet message board

 

The Trenton Times might not be much but it breaks its fair share of stories on Philly area sports. It keeps the Inky and Daily News aware of its presence perhaps more than the dailies that are closer in proximity.

 

The Times isn't as good as it was just a few years ago, but its far from being "complete and utter crap"

 

It was complete and utter crap a few years ago and has steadily gotten worse.

I think the interesting thing about the Times is the study in contrast between it and the Trentonian.
It is amazing that two papers can be so different and yet so bad at the same time. While the constant turnover in leadership has doomed the Trentonian, Brian Malone has really overstayed his welcome at the Times as he's been putting out the same stale newspaper for 1,000 years.

Of course, this is only my opinion, but I was a 30-year reader of the paper and reading Bus Saidt for 12 years is largely what inspired me to get into the business. There are a handful of terrific sports guys at the Times (namely Eckel and Nalbone) but the section has never been particularly inspired.

Harvey Yavener is still an irrelevant, crotchety crank. Is Craig Haley writing less or was it just my imagination? That's probably an improvement.

And yes the sports department is probably the best part of the paper. The Times has never covered Trenton very well; and by never I mean you can go back 30 or 40 or 50 years (as I have) and find that the paper never really had the pulse of the city. Of course the Times doesn't care about the city but it can't satisfy the suburban areas either (better served by the weekly Packet papers) and Burlco/Bucks papers.

In the context of resources and market, I'd say the Times is the second-worst paper in the state (behind only the "competition").

The Gannetturds are all better, sadly; the adjacent county rags (Bucks and Burlington Co.) are better. The Atlantic City Press is better. The Record is obviously better and even the Herald News, roughly the same circulation as the Times, is much, much better. Again, considering context/market/circulation, the sadsack Jersey Journal is a lot better and the Ledger is better.

Again this is just my opinion. I'd be delighted to hear what the TT does that's "good." Of course it's a great place to work, other than putting up with Haley (from what I've heard from all you guys over the years; personally I had no problems with him). Taking a part-time job at the Times is probably preferable to any full-time job at the Trentonian (duh).

 

You've named every rag in the state. The Times does a decent job and has improved. One thing is for sure, no one steps into their circulation area.

 

There's no such thing as "putting up with Haley". He's a good guy to work with. He's writing less because the buyouts/production merger The Times did with the Ledger has left The Times short on the sports desk so he's needed more in that capacity. Yav might be old (70s) but when he writes he's still relevant, even if the majority of what he writes about seems to be Rutgers football.

Over the years the newspaper has narrowed its focus from those outlying suburbs (in Burlington, Bucks and Hunterdon Counties) to Mercer County. It may or may not have the pulse of the city, but it covers the suburbs like Hamilton, Princeton, West Windsor, etc. better than the Trentonian. Only reason the Packet Papers might do a better job is because they can read the stories in The Times, then take an extra day or two to develop them before going to print since they only come out twice a week.

In terms of sports, the paper was dominant in high school sports coverage as recently as a few years ago. But last year, upper management made the decision to let all the part-timers go (which essentially was the entire high school staff) and outsource the gathering of results to the Dorf Feature Service (which handles the Star Ledger's high school sports) and do game coverage with the desk staff and stringers, thinking the quality of coverage would be the same that way as it would be with regular beat people.

I used to read the Herald News, I've read the Daily Record (Morristown) and The Times is in a class above them.

 

Joe, this has really hurt The Times and what was a very strong HS section

the people in Mountainside have no clue whether Steinert-Hopewell Valley is a big game, they have no clue when there's an upset or significant result, they're out of touch with Mercer County sports and readers can tell. there's no communication between Dorf and Trenton and it's clearly hurt the product

 

I know that, but unfortunately there's nothing The Times can do about it as this is the way the higher-ups outside of sports decided to go.

 

It's still a good solid paper.