Thomas Robinson: It's not personal, he's just playing basketball.

Each writer has his own personality, just as each poster has his own personality. Nobody is saying that people should write like the Associated Press, but I think any one of you guys could write about the team with your own personal spin.

I covered sports professionally for seven years. I worked for ESPN, Hoopsworld, and originally Sportstalk.com. I was just an inexperienced kid when I first started covering the team back in 2003. There's no reason why most of you couldn't do just as well as I did as a rookie sports writer. It's all about a willingness to put yourself out there and learn. I think you guys already write some of the most interesting and thought provoking stuff on the Blazers, and that's just right here on this forum. No reason that can't be used to show the team that there's some damn good talent on this board.

 

True. BNM and Brian routinely pen technical analyses that are superior to anything the majority of sports writers could do on their best day.

 

We are spoiled on this board. I truly cannot listen to local sports radio because I feel like the quality of analysis is just piss poor. The people who post on this board are infinitely better. Maybe I'm biased, but I enjoy debating with you guys a hell of a lot more than the fans I'd find anywhere else.

 

Know your audience.

Who is the audience that the Blazers are trying to reach by giving Nate and Sly press passes in exchanges for them doing a write-up?

Is it the same audience that Denny is after?

We already write for each other every day (after day after day after day after..... )

I agree that there are plenty of mainstream writers writing the usual mainstream fare. S2 certainly has many unique perspectives to offer. That's what piqued the Blazers interest, right?

 

The unique perspective that I have always tried to offer is a look at the Blazers through the eyes of a fan. I've been a Blazers fan all my life, that's not going to change just because I was getting paid to write (those days are long gone). Rather than turn my back on it, or deny it, I believe that it was better to embrace my outlook as a fan because I always felt that it gave me insight into what people wanted to actually read about. There's no shame in that.

The thing is, we are limited to what we can write about at a game, and further limited to what we can actually get quotes on. Without access to the players, there is very little we can offer outside of actual game coverage. In the past, I did most of my work at practices and before games because that's when you can actually ask the players about anything. Without that kind of access, we can only convey what we see, which isn't much different from what you guys see on TV.

 

Didn't anyone listen to Olshey on media day? We talked about his quotes so much, I figured it was pretty ingrained that all these writes just copy-and-paste each others' work.

 

This reminds me of the Road Trippin' with Big John. Man, that guy wasn't the funniest, but he got some very interesting and casual interviews of the staff and players. I miss that guy.

 

Just laugh AT him, not WITH him.