A review of the new U-T Sports page

I used to read the Union-Tribune every day. Let me provide a little more context. I used to walk to a corner in the Gaslamp District and purchase one from a vending machine so that I could read the Union-Tribune every day beginning with the Sports page.

Over the years of depositing change* into the newspaper box I felt first hand the rising cost of news as well as the diminished size of our local newspaper. Was there less happening in the world? Much time has passed. Now it's called the U-T.

*I recall the days of .25 cents. Then .35 and .50 cents. Oh, crap. Quoting prices is the death knell of youth!

Yesterday the U-T presented their newly formatted Sports page in what has been described as more of a magazine style. It looks good. A lot of color pictures and a very cool black and white photo from the 1930s at the races in Del Mar. That's the one and only story on page 1. There are previews to other stories including Tight End competition amongst the Chargers, Everth Cabrera's dash for home in the Padres Saturday night win, and the upcoming Olympics in London. The only text written however belongs to the story of Del Mar and the opening of the track on Wednesday.

It's different . . .



I've been down on the U-T Sports page for sometime. Outside of in-season Chargers coverage, admiring a Tim Sullivan column, and laughing at Nick Canepa word jumbles I just don't get my news from there with any regularity. Now, with Tim Sullivan's unfortunate dismissal I have even less reason to return. You could say that I'm skeptical of it all: The paper's content and, its leadership (Doug Manchester and John Lynch).

Contrary to my usual concerns, yesterday's Sunday U-T Sports page was stacked with content. People complained via twitter that the Padres dramatic Saturday evening win in Chavez Ravine didn't deserve to be jammed all the way back on page 11. Sports Editor Jay Posner explained that the decision was a function of advertisements dictating how the inside of the paper is formatted but most importantly, to keep all of Major League baseball together.

In addition to the game recap written by Bill Center, the paper featured a Canepa column (D3*) on pitching injuries, a Chris Jenkins story on Kip Wells' fight to get out of the Mexican League, and a Q & A with Alex Hinshaw. There was a lot to digest. In a good way.

*For those irked that Everth Cabrera and the Padres did not receive mention until page D11, the Canepa column did appear on D3, right as readers open the paper. Maybe Canepa will get buried next time? No. OK. Let's move on.

Is the varied and increased content the product of this simply being the debut of a new format (and a Sunday no less) or is this what readers in San Diego are in for permanently?

The most important thing I read in Sunday's paper was the Q&A with new Executive Sports Editor, Larry Graham. Graham comes from ESPN.com (where he focused on AFC East football) but he also has newspaper experience on his resume.

Graham explains that they're hiring more people to deliver more content including more Chargers coverage (another blog) and increased prep coverage.  It sounds like many ideas will also revolve around the new U-T TV station and the increased staffing will look to deliver more "compelling stories".

Is there a lot more Padres coverage coming? Graham mentions a blog for the Padres which could be good, but it also sounds like the Friars will have to earn their bonus coverage. The largest metropolitan cities have all of the big four sports leagues: NFL, MLB, NBA, and NHL. San Diego has but two of these leagues so sports coverage is distributed in the following way: Chargers, Chargers, Chargers, and Padres.

If you told me all of this 10 years ago I would have been ecstatic. More quality, local, sports content is all a sports junkie could ever ask for during a time when newspapers are downsizing. To integrate a more dense sports page with exclusive web content and a new television station is exciting and it is the dynamic type of product for which I'm willing to pay.

But it's not 10 years ago and again I return to that one little word: skeptical. The leadership at the U-T has made it known that they have an agenda and in terms of local sports it all revolves around a new stadium for the Chargers. They've also made it known that they will terminate the employment of their most talented writer (Tim Sullivan) if that writer does not walk mindlessly in lockstep with those in power. I find that to be a scary prospect when looking for unvarnished truth from those who call themselves journalists.

Will Padres coverage stagnate while emphasis on the Chargers' role in San Diego is emphasized by the U-T? Healthy skepticism is a hallmark of a critical mind but so is an openness to something new. I'm curious to see where the U-T goes.

Why the Chargers Game May Get Blacked Out: the Longshanks Effect

In the film Braveheart, King Edward's character famously said:

"The problem with Scotland.....is that its FULL of Scots!"

Well this Charger fan will dutifully paraphrase the cruel Longshanks and posit the following:

"The problem with San Diego.....is that its FULL of transplants!"

This ladies and gentlemen is the Longshanks Effect.

I mean that with kindness and absolutely no disrespect to......myself. I am a transplant but I've lived here long enough to know where my bread is buttered and unfortunately I can't say the same for a good many of my neighbors. Because of this indisputable truth we face the possibility of a blackout for Sunday's Chargers/Chiefs game if 1300 tickets aren't sold by tomorrow. San Diego may have a resident pool of over 1 million but that figure does not ring true for the Charger fan base. So what to do? The Union Tribune's Jay Posner proposed the following in his media column this morning:

What better weekend could there be for the Spanos family to buy the remaining tickets, donate them to some worthy causes (military, fire, police, youth groups, etc.) and give all of Southern California a huge thank you for its support over the years? After all, coming off years of ineptitude, the Chargers have sold out every game since 2004 and TV ratings are at their highest point in too many years to count.

I'm sure the Chargers could find a couple of sponsors to join up, and they could hit up KFMB Channel 8, which must be making gobs of money off those huge ratings. But even if they couldn't, so what?

Sure, it's easy for me to spend the Spanoses' money, but we're really not talking about that much cash. To a fan or a sponsor, the cost would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $225,000 — 3,000 tickets at about $75 a pop. But the Chargers' cost wouldn't be nearly that high, because the club wouldn't actually “buy” the tickets. Instead, the Chargers would have to pay only the 34 percent of each ticket that goes into a pool the league later distributes equally to all teams (so they'd get back 1/32nd of the money).

Thirty-four percent of $225,000 is $76,500. But that doesn't factor in that some of those 3,000 extra fans would pay $25 to park, plus all of them would figure to spend at least $10 — and probably much more, given the prices — at the concession stands.

See, it's really not that outrageous, is it? Shoot, the Chargers could almost make a profit by doing this.

Sounds good to me and I would venture a guess that either the Chargers or Channel 8 will pick up the tab when the bell tolls tomorrow.

Hey I wish I were going...... but I was in Denver last week and have already been to one pre-season and two regular season home games. Balancing the budget to make it to another game this year will be difficult ( //hoping for playoffs) so It is my want that reason prevails and someone ponies up the $260 K to ensure that I can sit on my couch and see the 50 greatest Chargers honored this Sunday.

Make it happen, ye with deep pockets!

Next Week on the UT Charger Roundtable: Kevin Acee meets the Bloggers....and then Nick Canepa has an aneurysm

I was just watching the weekly Chargers Roundtable that Acee, Canepa, and Posner do for the Union Tribune and there was mention that Kevin Acee would have special guests next week: local Charger bloggers.

Acee's guests will be members of Bolts From The Blue and Glorify the Past. After watching the entire Charger Roundtable: what condescending pricks!

The only thing that ever really matters is perception and what I saw was a boss who told his beat writer he needed to do this to keep up with the competition (see: 619Sports.net)...... who incidentally, had already beat them to the punch on the concept. Oh.....and I also saw a crotchety relic of a columnist named Nick Canepa, nudge Acee and scoff at the notion of meeting with "non-journalists". A gathering with the steerage class of sports writers? Lord no! What a couple of ass-hats.

Or have I overreacted?

Go ahead and hover over the video. The mighty paper of record couldn't even spell [sic] Chargeres correctly. Also, if I'm not mistaken it was a Charger blog (GTP?) who suggested to Kevin Acee that he needed to make his UT videos available for embedding on other sites. Glad the paper lent credence to something a lowly blog suggested.

Editor's Note:
I don't think that I've missspelled anyting. Of coarse teh same standerds dont apply at this site,