This type of work humbles you often.
One of our News-Herald coverage area schools in a team sport I cover once won a state championship.
While tempting to say who it was since the example might be too easy to discern — and knowing it’s not indicative of the community — it’s best not to.
You feel responsibility in all moments, but particularly that one, to deliver your “best.” Quality of content. Volume. All of it.
The next morning, sitting in a hotel after a long night posting my story and tons of video, I perused my then-Twitter notifications/replies. One was posted under a video clip — not the story, but a video.
“Congratulations to (the team) on winning the state championship,” this woman wrote.
“But this story is terribly written.”
It goes with the territory.
Honest opinion? Granted. Condescending? That, too.
You must have a thick skin when covering high school sports for 27 years like I have, because you never know what’s next. While mostly kind, on occasion it’s not. Nor should it be every time.
People who will ask unfiltered, “The News-Herald is still in business?!” In your presence.
People who will not be shy in ridiculing you on a personal level.
People who will blatantly steal your work and repurpose it, screengrabbing stories and photographers’ pictures among other methods, all the while tap dancing the excuses away.
People who will complain about value being placed on our livelihood on social media — and would never dare place the same “logic” on any other profession, including theirs.
Not for nothing, but if you are in any of those camps, you’re not on our side and please don’t claim you are. Because actions speak volumes.
Not to mention the advent of technology in the life-altering form of AI that could eventually make professions like mine, among many others, obsolete.
Yes, many people are supportive, have a vested interest and recognize when that respect is merited and earned — although an increasing number are not. They’ll also tell you when you’ve fallen short of that expectation, which is fair game, of course.
Again, humbling.
But as we close another school year in this space, I usually attempt to end positive. That would be the preference — and maybe in a sense, there is positivity embedded within what’s about to be expressed. However, it’s admittedly difficult.
Because in a world in which more and more people feel entitled to your work for free and in full without limitation, there’s no telling how much more time we have to share this bond at all.
And in the grand scheme, whether that even matters.
Which, amid an entire professional lifetime in this pursuit, is heartbreaking to accept.
We’re all friends here, so I’ll level with you: Whenever I use my “no identities in order to better convey a point” mantra you see so often here, there is that part of me that wants to say who in instances such as these.
The problem is, the callousness is prevalent. Schools. Administrators. Coaches. Student-athletes. Families. Fans. In every direction. Heart of our area. Geographic extremity. Public. Private.
That guilt abounds.
All we have ever asked is the opportunity for a fair shake. We work every day with due diligence to earn that trust and earn the right to earn a living for the bills that come due the same time of the month for us as they do for you. Further uphill as that becomes over time.
When a story is posted. When a photo gallery is posted. When the paper is published. If value is provided, recognize it through subscription. A generous word if warranted. Click on a link. Share a link. Buy a paper. If a choice is made to not do any of those, that’s fine, too.
Serving the community, though, doesn’t mean your toil equates to a free community service.
Here’s what I believe: The dynamic of high school sports and the local media who covers it remains relevant. It is worth the fight to preserve it.
Spotlight still matters. People and resources to provide that spotlight well and effectively still matter.
From the state titles to the backup running back scoring the winning Week 3 touchdown to the soccer reserve netting the match-winner and all points in between, it’s still vital to the heartbeat of a community to have that united purpose. To have those who mutually understand those moments.
The triumphs. The tragedies, much as we wish those never existed. The mundane. The human interest of overcoming life’s adversity that boosts us all in a shared existence.
In written form. In a video. In an image. That matters.
By the way, there is no questioning (or stopping) the rampant evolving use of AI in all facets of our lives. But no one can ever convince me having it as a direct replacement for human connection, or human word, in this aspect is forward-thinking or not insulting to the people you expect to accept it at a cost. Complement for improved efficiency? Absolutely. Direct replacement? No.
So, as we conclude another year and reflect, I remain grateful to those who support high school sports coverage by local media. Who are still interested. Who are still engaged. After all these years. Especially now.
You learn something important in this line of work: Whether someone is immersed, indifferent or, even yes, thinks it’s “terribly written,” you provide the same determined effort.
Because the best of a moment deserves your best. No matter what.
There remains a vitality within our fractured world to high school sports being treated as a worthwhile endeavor by those within it, with people who can amplify and complement that cause through their coverage of it.
All amid fending off those who are clearly, at minimum, not helpful to that cause or care to be.
We’ve reached a crossroads in that reciprocation.
May those stories be ready to tell everywhere. And may there be those who share them everywhere.
Today. And ever more.
