The NYT and The Athletic

People are wondering about the hotel costs for 62 NBA writers. I’m wondering how they need 62 NBA writers. Sure put one in every market. Another dozen for national trends, columns, analytics, whatever. What are the next 20 writers providing that is so indispensable?.

 

I'm all for journalists being employed. But I would love to know how that count is justified on the NBA when there are some very successful college sports programs with a lot of compelling stories going unwritten. It's their business. Maybe they've run the numbers and have determined that this is the way to go. But it is interesting to say the least.
If they have 62 NBA writers, how many NFL writers do they have?

 

Plus, there are at least a few markets they don't even staff full time. The Suns made the Finals last in 2021 and they don't have a beat writer.

 

Gotta do those weekly mock drafts, you know...

 

Are we sure they have 62 NBA writers? We're kind of taking the word of one poster as gospel here, but admittedly, I don't even subscribe to The Athletic.

 

There's no fucking way.

 

This is like a movie in a Tweet with the twist ending you didn't really get until you'd rewound the tape!

 

I speak as something of an expert on attending conferences, having managed to attend conferences on five continents. Attendance at a desirable location is often far higher than one expects.

For example, last year the Athletic moved Nick Kosmider from the Nuggets to the Broncos because of staff turnover. Kosmider occasionally did a Nuggets story. I would guess in Denver and the other markets where there is no full-time beat writer there is someone who has the NBA team as a collateral responsibility and they are going. That gets you to 30.

Then there are the national writers, I don't know how many the National has but let's say 10. Then there are the NBA editors. For a conference like this you will probably get at least an associate managing editor or two, and maybe the editor in chief. So now attendance is getting close to 50.

Then there will be 15 people or so sitting in the back who have only a vague idea of the NBA is who managed to cop a free trip. I have never been to a conference in a desirable location where there were not a considerable number of strap hangers.

If an organization rally wants to limit attendance on conferences they need to start having them in place like Managua.

 

Of the ones I know on the list, only a couple cover the NBA exclusively. Lots of hybrid writers on there. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but many of these guys have higher priorities than their local NBA beats. They dabble, they don't live it for all 82 games.

The Athletic probably hasn't had dedicated NBA beats in each city since before the pandemic. Their dedicated Pacers guy was laid off several years ago.

 

Any word on what the continental breakfast is going to be at this Athletic powwow?