Baseball coverage, how are we doing?

Great points and well said. You know, as I reflect on all the posts in here (including mine) I really start to wonder beyond whether a team or individual was covered by the paper and to whom that really matters. A friend of mine posted this on facebook the other day:

"No public recognitions, awards or newspaper articles to announce, just wanted to say how proud I am of all three of my boys. The wonderful young men they have become and their father for being a great role model. I am blessed!"

made me really think about to whom the articles are important. Great way for mom and dad to "keep score" but is it really that big a deal to the kids?

When someone performs like Preston has, absolutely and congrats to him on that tremendous season.

Falcon, you are right, they all work hard, they all prepare and they all play their guts out on the field and whether that is in the paper or not really shouldn't be the issue. They don't play to get in the paper. They play because they love playing. It is us as parents who look for the fulfillment from seeing them in the paper.

 

Whether or not they do a good job or not is an opinion. I'm just glad that the stories of these young men get written at all. The EJ does do several stories a week. Would I like to see more, yes.

From what I have seen, when the teams from Charlotte get beat, not much can be found out about it in the Observer. AK get's beat early by "W"...Crickets. Prov gets beat by "W"....Crickets.(OK, that was early in the season with lots of other sports going on). Catholic gets beat in the 3rd round of the playoffs...crickets. Not many teams left playing at this point. Where's the story?

 

Pirates, Hough baseball was on the front page, with photos, for both regional games and we had baseball on front page for every previous round except the first.

 

Very welcome

 

I'm not sure which county you're in, but you need to understand that almost all papers in NC only cover their county teams. There are a few that venture across county lines -- Charlotte Observer, Raleigh News & Observer among them -- but for smaller papers it's much easier to provide the kind of detailed coverage you crave. There are fewer teams.

In Salisbury, for instance, those guys do a great job, but high school is their top priority. There isn't a Bobcats or Panthers or major college or the heavy focus on NASCAR that we have to have. The objectives are a little different. They also don't have near the number of schools to cover, so it's easier to spread the coverage around to everyone.

In Charlotte, we try to get to as many schools as we can. We simply can't cover 38 schools across 8 spring sports in a three month period. It's impossible. That's why we do the Roundups and Gamedays and other lists, it's an easy way to give "love" to a lot of people quickly.

And within trying to cover those 38 local schools, we also have nearly 100 more outside of Charlotte that want to be covered. Recently, as Charlotteans have migrated to western Union and Iredell Counties (near the Lake), those people want us to cover Lake Norman and Cuthbertson and Marvin Ridge and Weddington as though they are Charlotte schools.

On a given night, we may have 20 baseball games in Charlotte between Charlotte teams. It's tough to choose to cover Weddington at Marvin Ridge and skip West Charlotte vs. North Meck. Do you get that?

So what I've tried to do is cover those outlying schools when there are crossover games and write some of the more compelling features when I can (I recently did Lexi Davis of Porter Ridge softball and did Cuthbertson basketball star Shelton Mitchell and I did one on a basketball star at Sun Valley).

We cannot cover out of Charlotte counties the way the local paper in those counties will. Just can't do it. I think what the Observer does is give better national coverage, better regional coverage, better pro and college and NASCAR coverage than the local papers do. In high schools, we try to pop in, kind of like a mini Sports Illustrated, and shine a big light on the stars in those communities. I'll try to do that more often. I missed a good story on Corey Seager obviously. But y'all can help me. My email is below. Let me know when there's a great kid/story bubbling.

Promise, if it's good, I'll go visit that person(s) and blow it out the best way I know how.

 

First, the story your mother in law saw was about the Cary Green Hope soccer team which was playing Hough in the finals. My big boss, Gary Schwab, is also sports editor for the Raleigh News and Observer. With Raleigh covering Green Hope and us covering Hough, everyone thought it would be neat to educate each others' readership about these two phenomenal teams. Green Hope was No. 1 in the nation. Hough No. 2. I know national polls are, well, crap shoots, but it's not often around here you get that.

You will find a lot of newspapers do that kind of thing when two big college or pro teams are meeting in a big game (and mayors often make bets).

On the police scanner comment, I understand where it may feel that way. But we are in the news business and it is a business. Do you think people "click" or read bad stories more or great human interest? Look at our lists of the top 5 hit stories in our different sections that are in the print version everyday. Read those and remember this "we are a business."

You mention that Weddington beat a local team and didn't see a blurb in the paper. Sometimes yes. We almost always have the score and the score by innings and what not, so there is a record. It's online too (http://www.charlotteobserver.com/prepstats). But on a given Spring sports night, there are just so many things going on, it's hard to touch on them all.

A lot of times there will be a big upset and people will email and say "We upset the No. 5 team in the Sweet 16 and y'all didn't cover it."

Step back and think about it. For us to have a reporter at No. 5 Charlotte Catholic at Garinger, and a photographer (which people ALWAYS want), we have to plan for that. We have to allow the space, assign a reporter, etc. I don't have a crystal ball. I have no idea that Catholic (just used as an example) is going to play poorly or Garinger is going to play out of its collective mind and pull off an upset for the ages.

I may be off that evening. Who knows? I guess right a lot of times on games we should be at. I guess wrong a lot of times, too. Bottom line? I guess. And also I'm trying to spread coverage around, across sports and teams in the spring. So I do the roundup to try to hit the "obvious" games and hit upsets. But also, too often teams don't report to us or report after deadline. Unfortunately when some of these upsets happen, the favored team always seems to be the home team and we don't get any information.

People always assume we know. We don't.

You say a lot of teams lost early this year in Charlotte. Not the case. We had five gazillion teams in tennis, soccer, lacrosse, track finals. We have to cover that stuff too. Wasn't the strongest year in softball and baseball, though Hough beat Mallard Creek in quarterfinals. So we had teams going all the time that we had to cover, local teams winning state titles, including private schools. My/our focus cannot be as narrow as yours.

As for Weddington being the best baseball team in the area, I don't know, but we did write about them today.

 

See my earlier answers

 

I am from UC and my comments were pertaining to the EJ - not toward the Observer. Both staffs are slim I am sure. I was just making observations on what I have seen.

 

The article in today's paper was nice to see. Corey did a nice job.

 

You mention that Weddington beat a local team and didn't see a blurb in the paper. Sometimes yes. We almost always have the score and the score by innings and what not, so there is a record. It's online too (http://www.charlotteobserver.com/prepstats). But on a given Spring sports night, there are just so many things going on, it's hard to touch on them all.

No issue here. I understand there are limited people to be in an area with very limited time. I understand about "in season" games. However, when the 4th/ 5th round of the playoffs are happening, there just isn't that much HS sports teams still going. That's the nature of playoffs, the number of teams are reduced....quickly.

You say a lot of teams lost early this year in Charlotte. Not the case. We had five gazillion teams in tennis, soccer, lacrosse, track finals. We have to cover that stuff too. Wasn't the strongest year in softball and baseball, though Hough beat Mallard Creek in quarterfinals. So we had teams going all the time that we had to cover, local teams winning state titles, including private schools. My/our focus cannot be as narrow as yours.

As for Weddington being the best baseball team in the area, I don't know, but we did write about them today.[/QUOTE]

A nice article by Inscoe. I appreciate it.