The World of Sports Reporting

The world of sports reporting
Full of “clichés, bad metaphors and meaningless statistics,” but not necessarily.
Can be dynamic, interesting, informative and original.
For student journalists, high school and collegiate athletics provide an excellent
opportunity to develop reporting skills by covering organized, high-level sports.
Nowhere do clichés flourish more luxuriantly than on sports pages. It doesn’t

have to be this way, as good sportswriters prove every day. But the weaklings
succumb in droves to the handy platitude.” – Rene J. Cappon, The AP Guide to
News Writing
Writing Sports Stories

Main elements:
 catchy lead
 clear focus
 lots of quotes
Good sports stories:

 combine background and statistical information
 the writer's paraphrasing of a source's quotes
 quotes themselves in a seamless fashion.
If an article flows nicely and tells the story, the reader may not even notice the
writer.
Keep your paragraphs short

 newspaper columns are thin
 long paragraphs can be hard on the eyes.
Four types of sports coverage:

 sports news
 game stories
 profiles/features
 opinion pieces
Sports News Articles

News articles about sports
Should be balanced and be written in an "inverted pyramid" style.
About 500 words is usually an adequate length for a sports news story.
Examples:
the hiring of a new coach
changes in the school’s athletic budget
stories on school sports facilities
drug use among campus athletes.
Blueprint for a sports news story
Step No. 1 - Use a lead that gets the readers' attention.

Try to make it answer as many of the five "W"s and an "H" as possible.
 “The new model of the Big Red Machine won with spare parts. The
Cincinnati Reds were so good in this World Series that they lost two-thirds
of their starting outfield Saturday night and still swept the Oakland
Athletics.” (12 and 26 words)
Try to use the active voice.
 Which sounds better: “Liu Xiang broke the 110-meter hurdles world
record” or “The world record in the 110-meter hurdles was broken by Liu
Xiang”?
Step No. 2 - Lead support.

Put the most important information on top, and the least important at the bottom.
Have no more than one thought per sentence.
Aim for clarity rather than flowery language.
Step No. 3 - Conclusion.

Do not editorialize in the conclusion or sum up your article.
End your story with the least important fact you have or with an interesting quote.
Game Stories
Sports reporting is unique from other areas in a student newspaper.
 Sportswriters end up meeting with the same people on a regular basis a lot
of the time, especially when covering games.
Summarizes a game and gives a few post-game quotes from the players and/or
coaches.
Very time sensitive.
 Because most student papers are published weekly or even monthly,
sportswriters must try to rework them.
Profiles
Feature-style articles that highlight the story or achievements of a particular
athlete, coach or team.
Tend to be longer than regular sports stories — somewhere between 700 and 900
words — and require more research than in sports news stories.
Profiles are written in the present tense (e.g. "I always trained on that field," says
Smith).
In contrast, sports news stories are written in the past tense (e.g. "The field
was horrible," said Smith).
Opinion Pieces
Good way to inject color and life into a sports section
Should be between 400 and 600 words long and focused on a specific
issue relevant to the athletics your paper covers.
About sportswriting
All sports stories are not game stories, obviously. More and more, sports stories
also involve legal, medical, social, and business issues. You won’t always be
writing about people playing children’s games.
The sports page is a microcosm of the real world with all the problems.
Sportswriters need to be able to weave a story, play with words, hold the reader’s
interest from top to bottom.
Sportswriting breaks the mold and allows the writer to try new approaches. But
first, master the old approaches.
Another problem is you are writing for the occasional sports page reader and
the diehard fan. Their needs are different.
Tips on writing the sports story
Search for the “wow” factor.

Put the final score high in the story.
 Never wait to reveal the final score in the middle or the final paragraph.
Leave that to the television sportscasters.
Look for:
 great moments in the game
 ironies (e.g. tall vs. short)
 outstanding players
 crowd reaction
 crowd numbers
 venue condition
 breaks in the norm.
Make the reader interested in your story by

 using short sentences
 lean writing (cut out all unnecessary words)
 using the active voice rather than the passive voice
Consider using additional identifiers in lieu of the last name:

 The 6-foot-10 freshman, the former UST Tiger, the three-time all-district
performer, the four-sport athlete.
Develop points brought up; don’t just… quit.
Get specific, meaningful quotes.

 Avoid quotes like “We did good” or “I was happy with my play.”
 Use the summary-quote approach (paraphrase-quote) to get more into the
story.
 Quotes are best that answer the questions “why,” “how” or “so what?”
Depending on the sport, play-by-play works OK for part of the story, but
keep it short.
Keep your observation powers churning. Rely on your eyes, ears and insight to
get facts that stand out.
Writing style is something developed over time.

 When you read a game story, look at how it is written as well as its
contents.
Advice for sportswriters

Sportswriters must be neutral, objective and fair.
 Keep opinions out of news stories, but if you’re a columnist, be prepared
to praise or blast teams and athletes, depending on the circumstances.
To break into sportswriting, there are only three issues: write, write some more,
and keep writing.
 Take as many writing courses as possible
 The ability to write your thoughts via clear and concise sentence structure
is the most important element of reporting.
Learn about sports:

 Examples: What constitutes a 300 game in bowling, how to do a box score
in baseball, what events make up the Triple Crown in horse racing.
 Watch and read about as many contests as possible.
Read everything you can get your hands on.

 Keep in mind that, as in other branches of journalism, every subject will
come in handy: history, political science, biology, etc.
Stretch your writing muscles by trying to create similes and metaphors.

 Example: Instead of “He couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn,” one Sports
Illustrated writer wrote: “He couldn’t throw a ball into the Grand Canyon
while standing on the edge.”
Become a better sportswriter by reading good writers — and not just in the
newspaper sports sections and sports magazines.
Master the ability to articulate your thoughts verbally.

 It’s just as important for print journalists to feel comfortable speaking to
others.
Learn to listen.
 Many people embrace the erroneous stereotype of the overbearing reporter
shouting questions at people and hustling off to file a story.
 The best reporters are those who take the time to listen to their
subjects.
 One of the best interviewing techniques is to remain silent after the
interviewee has answered the question.
Become a Web-head.
 Many people believe the Internet has revolutionized journalism.
 Students should get as much Internet research experience as possible.
Read editorials.
 It will help you be familiar with important national and international
issues and provide a model for complex yet concise writing styles.
Sports writing can be more flexible than news or feature writing, but remember
that even in sports writing a clear distinction exists between reporting and
commenting.
SPORTSWRITING RULE
NEVER NEVER be a cheerleader for your teams on the sports pages.
 Never end a story like this: "The Fighting Boars will undoubtedly be the
class of conference and will achieve anything they set out to do. So let's all
go out and support the Boars!!"
One final note

Fifty years ago, Stanley Walker, the noted American sportswriter,
said this:
 “The sports reading public today is remarkably well informed. It

cannot be tickled by mere extravagance of writing. A lazy and
incompetent writer finds it increasingly difficult to get by with a
sloppy story, spun on a thread of artificial conceits. The demand is
that he give his readers the facts, and give them straight. When
crowds of 75,000 and more attend baseball and football games,
and boxing matches, while millions more are listening on the radio,
the sports writer should realize that he has an immense, well-
informed audience that does not like to be fooled or short-
changed.”

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The world of sports reporting

Nowhere do clichés flourish more luxuriantly than on sports pages. It doesn’t

Writing Sports Stories

Good sports stories:

Keep your paragraphs short

Four types of sports coverage:

Sports News Articles

Blueprint for a sports news story

Step No. 1 - Use a lead that gets the readers' attention.

Step No. 2 - Lead support.

Step No. 3 - Conclusion.

Tips on writing the sports story

Search for the “wow” factor.

Make the reader interested in your story by

Consider using additional identifiers in lieu of the last name:

Get specific, meaningful quotes.

Writing style is something developed over time.

Advice for sportswriters

Learn about sports:

Read everything you can get your hands on.

Stretch your writing muscles by trying to create similes and metaphors.

Master the ability to articulate your thoughts verbally.

One final note

 “The sports reading public today is remarkably well informed. It

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