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You become a sports writer I think number one, with a passion for it, a desire to do
this, but then the other part of it is you're absolutely going to need to go to school,
you're going to need to get trained and educated in the fundamentals of journalism, the laws
of journalism, and understand liable slander, and the things that you've got to avoid as
a writer. But, I would say anybody that wanted to do it, the best thing to do number one
is have a passion for this job, which most of us do. But, then you need to go to a good
journalism school, and get an internship while you're in school, and then be willing to pay
your dues, because you're probably not going to start at the New York Times, in fact most
people are never going to work there. I think the patience and the willingness to work your
way up, and you can get there with enough patience and diligence. Well, again I think
a good journalism school, the best one that you could probably get into is a great start
for anybody in this profession. You don't have to go to Northwestern necessarily to
do that, but there are schools that offer a good journalism program. And again, I think
an internship for a college student is really invaluable, it's a great opportunity for you
to learn the business, looks good on a resume, just write as much as you possibly can, don't
turn down any opportunity to write and just learn how you do this, and there's really
no substitute for this, other than getting out and doing it. And, so education is part,
going to school that's also part, cutting your teeth into this and read people who can
write, read good writer's and see how they do it. Work experience, anything that you
get to do to write, anything you can do to write, will make you a better writer. There's
really nothing you should turn down, if you're trying to get into this business, and you
want to become a sports writer, even if your local little newspaper wants you to go cover
the high school football game, you should do it, because it's a clip you can put in
your portfolio, it's a clip you can put on your resume. And again you're learning more
how the process works, and you're learning how to write, there's a way to write for books,
there's a way to write for magazines, and there's a way to write for newspapers, and
you need to learn how to write for newspapers, and know the proper style, and how to do that.
So, I think they only, there's no substitute for just writing and getting that experience.
If you have a hesitation of asking questions, this is probably not the line of work for
you. If sometimes, if you have a hesitation of asking hard questions, this is definitely
not the line of work for you. Everything that I do as a sports writer is driven by me asking
people questions, whether it be after a game, whether it be me trying to find out something
that's happening in the middle of the Summer, like now, when we're not in football season,
news never really stops but a good reporter is going to be willing to dig, and ask, and
probe, and if you do have a hesitation about walking up to people and saying "excuse me,
I need to ask you a few questions for this article I'm writing," this is not the place
to be. The flip side of that, is it really helps you interact with people on a social
and daily basis, in that, I have no more hesitation about just striking up conversations with
people, because I have to do that everyday as a sports writer. So, it kind of helps you
in life, you don't really have any hesitation just saying hi to people and striking up a
conversation.