Out With A Bang

The other resolution we had blog-wise for 2009 was to try and not start every other post with the word ‘interesting’. Even if it is.

So in a bid to turn over a new leaf, that is fascinating.
http://blogmaverick.com/2008/12/24/why-pro-sports-need-newspapers/

Before we start to dissect Mr Cuban’s thoughts on where next for networked sports reporting in the US, a brief bit of background… he’s 50, an ‘entrepreneur billionaire’ who happens to own the Dallas Mavericks NBA basketball team.

As in www.mybasketballwriter.com/mavericks

He also owns NDNet – a cable distributor; so, therefore, should have a vague idea of how networks run.

Anyway, the piece is very interesting illuminating on a number of fronts; not least how, say, Sheffield United and Sheffield Wednesday fans might ever get their Blades and Owls news if the Star ever went to meet its JP maker.

And, of course, the Football League’s reaction to that event – given that they would then enjoy near monopoly status on both the access to and the distribution of football club news contant via their own FLi/PremiumTV news portal…. ie/eg http://www.sufc.premiumtv.co.uk/page/Home/

Just as the NBA has its own, huge ‘official’ site – all ’sanitized and sanctioned’, according to one of its own club owners.

“Bottom line is that despite the huge volume of sports coverage, the local coverage of teams for the most part sucks,” he continues, displaying the kind of enlightened web-type thinking that, presumeably, comes with owning a networked distribution model. And being a billionaire.

He’s also clearly never met Ken Bates.

“There is little depth and certainly not the consistent coverage of a newspaper with a team beatwriter or 2. Thats a bad scenario for sports leagues.

“Teams in every league need as much local coverage as we can get. The more stories that are written by sportswriters and columnists, the more opportunities for fans to connect and stay connected to our teams…”

Which was the traditional role of the ‘beat reporter’ – be it he Mavericks reporter on the back pages of the Dallas Morning News or me – as and when my ugly mug used to pop up on the back of the Norwich Evening News.

Only one problem, of course. Cuban has now twigged that the Dallas Morning News etc are going down the pan…

“The problem of course is that newspapers are pushing themselves to the point of irrelevancy.

“They have cost structures that dont support they business they think they are in. They don’t have a vision on what a profitable future might look like.

“They are getting crushed by disappearing advertising revenues. They are doing what anyone in their position would do, they are cutting every penny they can and praying for divine intervention.

“Professional Sports Leagues and teams, if we want to continue to connect to our local casual sports fan, needs to work with our local papers to try to keep them alive as long as possible.

“The question is how ?”

Or why. But let’s let Mr Cuban do his how…. and the answer is an out-source deal. Kind of like the one that was on the table between me and Archant in the spring of ‘06 before we went our, ahem… separate ways.

“My suggestion to the powers that be in the leagues I have spoken to is to have the leagues work together and create a “beatwriter co-operative”.

“We need to create a company that funds, depending on the size of the market and number of teams, two or more writers per market, to cover our teams in depth. The writers would cover multiple teams and multiple sports….

Mmm. So if they did, say, www.mybasketballwriter.com/mavericks in the morning, they could do, say, www.mybaseballwriter.com/mustangs in the afternoon and roll them both into the Dallas Morning News overnight… and what we could do for Dallas, then the same ‘beatwriters co-operative’ could do the same out of, say, Philadelphia…

http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=121

What a great idea…

“The leagues and teams depend on quantity and quality of coverage. We need to recognize the weaknesses of those we depend on and start addressing them today,” he concludes.

Suits me.

For given that we’ve got our hands full with www.myfootballwriter.com/norwichcity and would love to be able to put our ideas behind www.mylocalwriter.com in motion, it’s been crossing my mind of late to see if I could offload www.mybasketballwriter.com www.mybaseballwriter.com and www.myhockeywriter.com to some interested party in the States.

With the best will in the world, it’s never going to happen from my kitchen table in Loddon.

‘Dear Mr Cuban,

‘My name is Rick Waghorn. I used to be a beat ’soccer’ reporter on the Norwich Evening News…’