What would you be doing...

[CentralIllinoisan]

Porn star.

Fixed

I'd be in shorts though.

Aren't you supposed to be naked?

Excuse me, do these effectively hide my thunder?

 

[PaperDoll]

I'd be a social worker or counseling psychologist.

I was accepted to Boston University's School of Social Work out of college, but deferred for a year to see how "the sports thing" panned out. Needless to say, I haven't gone back to school yet -- and it's been a decade. :

I've been thinking about changing careers quite a bit lately. I probably wouldn't make much more money, and good jobs aren't much easier to find than in journalism. I'd be closer to my ultimate goal of trying to save the world, but I might wind up even more miserable because I'd have more serious problems to bring home from work with me.

 

[Cadet]

I would either be an FBI agent or a Title IX lawyer.

I agree with the initial poster who said there are several skills that journalists and detectives have in common.

 

[buckweaver]

This might come off a little cocky, and I hope it doesn't. It's just the way it is.

When I was in my pre-teens, early teens, I was a prodigy of sorts. They wanted me to skip sixth grade, and we said no. And educators kept trying to guide me into some sort of higher calling, like medicine, teaching, law.

All that, and the first time I was in a newspaper office around deadline, I knew what I was going to do.

So pretty soon, the educational system stopped trying to fast-track me. Too much, in fact; they basically ignored me for a few years while some others caught up to me or passed me.

Anyway, what's this got to do with the original question? The answer is, if I hadn't wanted to be a sportswriter, I probably would have been in one of those high-end professions -- medicine, law, etc. -- and not nearly as happy.

"It ain't bragging if it's true" -- Dizzy Dean

And for the record, I could tell pretty much that same story, although mine was third grade, not sixth.

 

[Chi City 81]

I'd want to win a bunch of fantasy sports leagues. I hear those guys do great with the ladies.

 

[joe]

Drinking. Oh, wait ...

 

[spup1122]

I think you got that covered, Joe!.

 

[PhilaYank36]

I would either be an FBI agent or a Title IX lawyer.

I agree with the initial poster who said there are several skills that journalists and detectives have in common.

Thank you, ma'am. Just the facts.

 

[farmerjerome]

I'd probably be in retail, since I quit the biz for and got a job in retail.

Anything but working with food.

 

[2muchcoffeeman]

Porn star.

Fixed

Now that you mention it, BYH does have some of the same characteristics as Ron Jeremy.
They're both um .... yeah .... well .... um ..... men?

 

[kingcreole]

I would have started my own youth club soccer team, maybe coached soccer collegiately.

But I coached a select team of junior high kids while in college and absolutely loved it. I even got a 'D' coaching license and had tentatively planned on getting a 'C' license before I took my first job three weeks after graduating. So I probably would have started a youth soccer club.

 

[GimpyScribe]

Well, I'm not one but I always wanted to be a sports journalist: you get into games free, interview big stars, get autographs, hang out with interesting people on the road, get laid a lot.

If I wasn't a journalist, I'd DEFINITELY be an analrapist.