Wichita Eagle reaction

Tom Seals, assistant sports editor of The Wichita Eagle, and Kirk Seminoff, sports editor, spoke to our class last Thursday about the wonders of sports journalism.

These guys are cynical and sarcastic, but still really seem to love their jobs.

They are adjusting to the changes after 20-plus years in the newspaper business and are now having to think about things in a multimedia package format. They said you have to think not about great stories now, but a great product. They are now fighting what everyone in newspapers is fighting—readers that are jumping online instead of picking up the print version of the newspaper. I would imagine that for the most part people who buy the newspaper for the sports section are either 1) avid readers, 2) buying it for a special story once in a while or 3) buying it because someone they know is being featured. Everyone else is hopping online.

The Eagle has a substantial number of blogs, which I find to be more interesting and informative than most of their stories. They give me an inside look at the team and what the games mean in the broad sense without an extended play-by-play game story. I like the shorter snippets, probably because I’m not such a sports enthusiast and have trouble making sense of, and staying interested, in longer articles.

The one question they said to ask was one question I think not enough writers ask themselves with anything they write: Is my approach interesting? Too often writers just regurgitate facts onto a piece of paper, throw in some transitions and ignore the fact that it is boring drivel. They fail to ask themselves if they would even bother to read it.

It was amazing to me that as busy as he is, Kirk still reads every e-mail and responds to it. Not many professionals still take the time out of their days to do that (maybe it’s a welcome relief from reading sports, though, to get to have a take on things.)

The other point they brought up that I thought was pretty interesting is the back-and-forth between coaches and reporters. I never particularly thought about it, but it does make sense that good times for the teams usually means good times for the newspaper and its Web hits.

Overall, an interesting and thought-provoking visit.