Only the shadow knows … or at least the job-shadow student from Covenant Academy, Samuel Griffin, who learned about a career in sports writing Friday by spending several hours in the Standard newsroom.
“I was thinking about sports writing, or maybe broadcasting sports,” Griffin said. “I know my interests lie in sports so I’m thinking about different career paths.”
Griffin is a sophomore at Covenant Academy so he has time to do more job shadowing in his pursuit for a likely path. He does plan on attending college after he completes high school.
There’s more to sports writing than covering ballgames. Griffin put in a pretty good day's work at the office taking information gathered at sporting events and turning it into a product or narrative that can be disseminated in the paper. Covering the actual games are just a small part of the process.
Griffin was given pointers in how to use the SLR camera, that to be a good writer one needs to first be an avid reader, how to write a lead or – as they say in the business – a lede line which gives readers the main points of the story, gets readers interested in reading the story, and accomplishes both “a” and “b” in as few words as possible.
Another tip Griffin heard about is not to “bury the lead,” or begin the article with background information or details of secondary importance to the readers, forcing them to read more deeply into an article than they should have to in order to discover the essential points.
As a baskeball player at Covenant Academy, Griffin is on the playing field of the ballgame but got to switch places for a little while, albeit on a softball game, the Lady Pioneers to be exact, as there aren’t any local games going on the hardwood.
Statistics being the best friend of a sports writer, Griffin’s overview included how to craft a story from one scoresheet to a complete computerized statistical breakdown of a ballgame.
Putting together the main points including the who, what, when, where and how, plus adding the vernacular terms for each sport is helpful.
Before he was done for the day, he even crafted today’s story on the Lady Pioneers opening day against Shelbyville … not bad work for his first day on the job.