The State of Journalism, 2018

… As it relates to high school basketball.

Last year saw the Bellingham Herald drop most of its local high school sports coverage. Just the big stories are left. That is, the story that can be written without a particular deadline and run whenever available column inches allow. That followed similar exits from day-to-day coverage by the Kitsap Sun, Seattle Times, and others. It looks like the Tri-Cities Herald is going the same route this year.

I don’t understand. For the Seattle Times, the local sports teams ARE the Seahawks, Mariners (unfortunately), Sounders, and Huskies. But for smaller markets, what do people expect to see in their local papers? The local sports! There are zillions of places to check NFL statistics in order to make fantasy sports draft picks. Where do you get to see your kid’s name in agate type? In the Bellingham Herald (well, not anymore), the (Longview) Daily News, the Walla Walla Union Bulletin, the Quad-Cities Herald. Maybe it is cheaper just to pick up syndicated content from elsewhere, about sports elsewhere. But as a reader, I can just go elsewhere and get that content directly. Lots of it. Why should I look in the Abedeen Daily World for the latest stories on the NBA? There’s a daily show on ESPN with just that. If I want to see just how Montesano fared against Elma, well it’s ONLY in the Aberdeen Daily World. Protect your monopoly!

At least the Seattle Times is still offering on-line high school data. How’re they doing? Not well. Today’s (December 7, 2018) database is typical. It’s a really nice looking database front end. Probably looks great on an iPhone X. The content is mostly missing. And what content there is too often wrong. I take the opposite view. My website is clunky. But the html is tight, with high signal to noise ratio, and the data is right: not perfect, but I check and make corrections.

Here’s from the boys basketball part of ScoreBook Live, the Seattle Times’s outsourced data provider. The Seattle Times wishes that somebody live-update the game for them (gee thanks, what do I get paid? Nuttin’). The Lakeside v West Seattle game didn’t get very far: 2-0. But what is the game? Lakeside Girls v West Seattle Boys. Come on, man!

There is a spiffy map to show the location of the game. Here for Nathan Hale at Cleveland.

Is that right? Just go east on I-90. Way east.

Or this map. Really useful, huh?

Game is being played somewhere in the world. Don’t need to ask Elon Musk for a ride.

They’ve even got a choice for games from defunct leagues.

The screen caps are from the boys portion of the database. But that doesn’t mean the girls aren’t participating:

They do know that Edmonds-Woodway boys played Kamiak boys on Friday, although I bet it wasn’t at 11:15 during first lunch. Edmonds-Woodway apparently had a double header according to the Seattle Times. No, that’s the girls game. It wasn’t in the girls section of the database. Here’s another:

Yeah. The girls game. But at least there is content, even if it is wrong.

For girls games on Friday December 7, the Seattle Times has no games for Cascade league(right!); no games for Emerald City (there were four); five games for Kingco 3A/2A with no results–there were four games; six games for Kingco 4A with no results–there were six games, so there were at least the right number of empty spots; seven for Metro with two results, and that boys v girls game ended at 2-0 again; and finally for Wesco three games spread across the two choices with no results,there were actually nine games. (Phew, that sentence was an arduous journey).  So two results for 30 games. Impressive!

I’m sure the Seattle Times sports editors would say that if nobody reports the results it’s not their problem. Besides, they’re all too busy writing the next 1-10 rating of greatest Seahawk what-ever thingy that they can figure up a list for. They fired all the high school sports writers. The old old old (three iterations ago) Seattle Times database is still around, just not linked from the Seattle Times website. But if you want to compare, here it is (until they take it down out of sheer embarrassment at the comparison). Note that the Seattle Times actually covered high school sports from Pierce to Whatcom county.

Go, Go, Sammamish!

Once upon a time, Sammamish girls basketball was good. Regularly stately; four of six years between 1990 and 1995. Then the coach retired or was otherwise replaced (I really don’t know the circumstances).

I recall a brief conversation with Lorinda Flikkema, the new coach, before a Liberty @ Sammamish game in 2001. Teresa Eliott, a 6-2 pretty good senior center but also national-class rower had been dropped from the roster. I noted the absence and asked Lorinda. “Teresa is not on the team.” I persisted a bit until “TERESA is NOT on the TEAM!!” I understand. It is of what we do not speak.

By 2004, Sammamish was playing with six varsity players. A seventh was on the roster but only as an emergency promoted JV in case of dire need. Although only six players, they easily made the league tournament (not a terribly difficult task). For league, at Bellevue Community College, Lorinda dressed NINE players. ‘Good’, I thought. ‘Build for the future even from the crumbs you have.’ Sammamish held close to Newport through the first half, but in the third quarter the bottom fell out. Soon down by 30 points. A Sammamish senior fouled out. In goes girl #6. Lorinda commiserates with the DQ’d player. No, mostly it looked like a girl chat from across the floor–fhe three varsity wannabees ignored at the end of the bench. Somebody yells across the court, ‘Clear your bench!’ No. Lorinda just kept her back on the others. The next day she quit. Good riddance!

It was a hard row to hoe that she left. An absolutely empty roster. A losing streak that reached 110 league games, But in 2015, Sammamish made state and advanced into the quarter-finals. Now in 2018-2019, on December 3,2018; no Kingco 3A/2A girls team has won a game. No (0) wins. Sixteen (16) losses. It is up to Sammamish on Tuesday. Highline is a low bar, and Sammamish hasn’t carried the Kingco Banner for 30 years.  But at this point, Kingco 3A/2A girls need whatever they can get. “Just Win, Baby!”