“To me, the time went by very fast. We used to fly with the team, and now for the most part, you never fly with them, you’re never on the bus with them, and you don’t stay in the same hotels. It used to be that if you had an issue you wanted to discuss, you could talk it over on the plane. I played many a card game with (former Tigers manager) Sparky Anderson, and it was in those games of Hearts that I could see how quick his mind was. Nowadays, it’s very difficult to get close to the team.
It used to be that you didn’t have to rush out of the press box to write everything up. But now, with the internet, it’s not like you have a 6:30pm deadline. Your deadline is all the time. You can’t linger in the clubhouse or wait until after batting practice to speak with a player a second time. There’s less time to develop your sources, your relationships with players, and to just build trust.
Twitter has overhauled the industry. You always have to be monitoring it. It’s really made for baseball reporting.
There’s also been the emergence of national writers, who are getting a larger share of the scoops because of their impact. I don’t think local writers get as much information anymore because they don’t have that national scope. I’m not saying they don’t get good information, or that the scoops just fall into the lap of national reporters—they work very hard at it—but the back-and-forth between national writers and agents is very advantageous. Local writers just have to work hard, be thorough, and not worry about it because it’s just the way it is.”
An interesting look at the evolution of baseball coverage from Anna Clark. Her point about focusing on numbers because player access has decreased is really intersting, too.