<div class="quote_poster">Voodoo Child Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">Step 1 - Get a business law degree.
Step 2 - Know people.
Unfortunately, no matter how good you are, step 2 usually keeps most people who have step 1 down from going far in that profession.
Writers on the whole don't get paid well, but there's a lot of small scale writers out there that bring down the averages. If you're writing for a major newspaper and have some sort of tenure, you'll be making six figures.
One of my friends in high school had a dad whose job was to cover all of the minor University of Memphis sports (ie: all the sports outside of basketball, football, and baseball). He'd write a daily column, but it was usually something like a recap of a tennis match or a story on a hiring of a new assistant coach or something minor like that, so you'd think he wouldn't be getting paid much. The thing is though, he lived in the nicest neighborhood in town, had a three story house, and drove a Navigator, so you know at the very least he was making six figures, to have that kind of disposable income.
Another one of the writers for the Commercial Appeal (Memphis paper) came to talk to our high school journalism class one time and claimed to be making more than he did as a lawyer, and this guy had a law degree from Yale. Actually, he was the same guy who got into the argument with Jason Williams a few years ago, if any of you remember that. Jason Williams bugged out and stole the dude's pen. I mean, you just don't get experiences like that in practicing law.
Keep in perspective though, those are two guys who have been writing for papers for 10+ years. In the first guy's case, I think he's been with the paper for nearly 25. Tenure is important in any profession. You'll be starting out with a lot lower of an income than you get later on in pretty much every line of work out there.
And I dunno, MrJ, that Adande article was pretty good imo. It made me want to reconsider sports writing. I love this quote -
"It's not all I do, but it's primarily what I do. I write about sports because they somehow manage to incorporate every aspect of our world: life, death, hope, disappointment, victories, losses, politics, rules, crimes, fair play, cheating, health, drugs, love, hate. I write about sports because you never know how the story will end (unless Tiger Woods holds the lead on Sunday). I write about sports because, for better or worse, that's where most of the country gets its look at African-Americans and I want to do my part to keep the lens clear.
I write about sports because when I was a fourth-grader a rookie guard named Magic Johnson made me fall in love with basketball and the Lakers, and I decided I wanted to play for them. I write about sports because as an eighth-grader I realized that wasn't going to happen."
...especially that last paragraph. I think we can all relate to that.</div>
I liked the Adande article and prior to my last couple of months in high school, I wanted to do journalism. But all of a sudden I was getting into business and how money works, so I don't think I'll be doing journalism anymore. I don't even know how much "potential" I have anyway. The only sport which I really ever followed is basketball, so someone like you, Schaddy, or Swish would probably be better suited. I remember talking to Knicks Analyst a few years ago and he was talking about how it was extremely hard to be big-time. I think the writers here could make it though. Take Swish for example, he interviewed players from the Orlando Magic multiple times. He got more experience there than he would've gotten at any sort of internship.
Isn't that Warriors fan (Zhone?) an NBA agent? Maybe I should hit him up about it.
