Over the past few months, I struck out and applied for full-time jobs in sports journalism for the first time. I thought almost three years of writing for quality publications while juggling an unpredictable full-time job had given me enough experience to enter the sports media full-time. One’s first steps in a giant career change rarely go perfectly, and I didn’t get either gig.
Unlike the field of higher education, sports media job searches (when you get far enough in them) give you closure: they are kind enough to tell you why you didn’t get the job. My downfall: I can tell a Lutz from a loop, a back handspring from a roundoff, can analyze women’s college hockey and cover a high school tennis championship like nobody’s business…but over time, I had focused so much on the sports I was covering that I let let my major sports knowledge slip. My pro sports knowledge was excellent when I was starting out in sports writing and working for sites like SBNation, but now has been reduced to whatever I could gobble up after a two job day while falling asleep watching SportsCenter or its Fox Sports equivalent that sometimes has Gabe Kapler on it (I am not sure of its official name – I just call it the Gabe Kapler Show.)
When I first got that feedback, I went through the three stages of job-grieving:
1) Sadness. Woe is me, I’ll never get a full-time job in sports media. I should hang this up for good.
2) Anger. Who do they think they are, telling me I don’t know some sports? Who says being able to recite the last five years of Massachusetts high school girls gymnastics champions doesn’t count for something?
3) Honest acceptance.
The truth: by nichefying myself, I had been able to get the writing clips I needed to apply for full-time gigs, but by doing so, I lost touch of the topics I would actually cover in those higher level jobs. So I sought to find a balance between my current writing jobs and bringing myself back up to speed on big sports, while balancing that with an increased rigor at my full-time job.
How did I do that?
– Taking advantage of apps: I prioritize reading a few sports iPhone apps on the first part of my morning train commute. I read two or three items from the WEEI and ESPN apps, and then I’m allowed to peruse Twitter to seek out more articles to read. The habit I had to break was just scanning headlines and tweets, and not reading articles that dove deeper into subjects.
– Back to print: I buy a print copy of the Boston Herald most days and read the sports section top to bottom during both commutes and during a break during the work day. I make a conscious effort to read columns about the big sports I know the least about (golf and the NBA.) I try to save football (which I could read about until the cows come home) to last as a treat (like when you did the homework for your least favorite subject first right after school to get it out of the way.)
Reading the paper is helpful twofold: one to bring back a well-roundedness, the second is to note the writing styles of beat writers and columnists. Now that I work within print word counts instead of the word-length ambiguity of web content, it is helpful to read how other writers flourish within the limitations.
– Nix the music: I used to tweet about few and far between “sports radio days” in my office, which were occasional afternoons where I could listen to sports radio while I worked. Now, if I am doing work in my office and don’t anticipate too many interruptions, I always have one earbud in with sports radio on. National shows, local shows, local shows from other markets – I don’t care, I’ll listen to everything (but if you start chatting about repairing your roof instead of sports, I’ll turn the channel.)
I still love figure skating, gymnastics, tennis, and college hockey, but next time I apply for a writing job, I know I am far better rounded than I was during my first two attempts. It’s easy to become complacent and research and follow just the sports that you cover or like, but if you want to succeed in a tight market, you need to be well-rounded.