11/17/24
November 12, 2002
What does everyone think about having weekly reports of the NBA, NFL, NHL, etc.? Someone could post an initial link that highlights the week, and others could comment and post other links within the thread. Would it function too much like a discussion board? Is there room for this kind of post, since SportsFilter only covers sports? As others have mentioned before, it may be too much to ask that members find original sports content on the web. How can we enhance this site to make it a sports connoisseurs dream? If we had weekly threads that provided links within the thread (pointing to the best net coverage of a particular sport) as well as discussion, would it be annoying or beneficial?
posted by jacknose to editorial policy at 03:52 PM - 51 comments
I think weekly recaps would be great. The amount of discussion from those would be great. I dunno how may times I've read ESPN's NFL weekly recap or Mortensen's weekly "top 5" reports and wish that I could respond within the form. Great idea. My vote goes towards giving some members the power to weekly rank teams, individuals, games, etc. in a front page post. I would love to read owillis's weekly musings on the NFL, etc. These sort of listings usually make for not only fun reading but great discussion pieces as well. If there are any two properties that this site posseses, humor and sports knowledge are them. I'd love to see more ESPN page-2-esque writing.
posted by ttrendel at 01:42 AM on November 13, 2002
I think they would be great only if you included weekly reports of the the Premier League, Bundesliga, La Championat, Eredivisie, La Liga, Ekstraklasa..etc...
posted by StarFucker at 08:22 AM on November 13, 2002
Yes, it might be interesting to have some SpoFi members volunteer to be post specialists (field reporters). We could have someone responsible for a weekly NBA post, NFL post, NHL post, Premier League post, etc. -- offering readers the best links of the week and giving others a place to add links and comments. Let's say every Tuesday we could expect an NFL weekly post/report/rankings, and every Wednesday an NBA weekly post/report/rankings, and so on. It would provide web users a place to find the best weekly sports commentary and a place to discuss the week's events. It would also be nice if we had a weekend summary of the best sports writings/essays on the web, preferrably with summaries of the pieces. SportsFilter would, thus, be filtering the web and provide a valuable weekly resource (and distraction) for sports connoisseurs. Of course, these weekly reports would be in addition to other posts that members would be free to make at anytime on any sports subject.
posted by jacknose at 10:53 AM on November 13, 2002
I like the idea too, and I'd volunteer for college basketball.
posted by jbou at 02:19 AM on November 14, 2002
I like the idea also. I agree with corpse, I just want to talk about sports.
posted by elsoltano at 06:43 AM on November 14, 2002
I think SportsFilter should avoid the pure discussion board format (posts without links--the whole pancake thing). While we may be more discussion-oriented than MeFi, "beat posters" should still be obligated to bring together some of the best, most pertinent, or most unique weekly writings/perspectives on the Web that concern their specific sport. I, for one, would love to see SportsFilter provide weekly recaps for all sports, with filtered links to the best coverage, and a SpoFi top ten ranking list. For sports that I do not regularly follow, I would just read the SpoFi weekly recaps and click on a few interesting articles. Ideally, the post would be a well-written (informative/entertaining) paragraph summarizing the week with links throughout. The heading could be in bold and read: NFL Weekly Recap. (Of course, all headings would not read NFL.) At the end of the paragraph, we could indicate that there is a "Top Ten List [inside]" Inside the thread, the beat posters could provide their own top ten ranking of teams or players or plays with some brief explanation. I think this would strengthen SportsFilter as a resource and a place to discuss sports. jbou, thanks for volunteering. Please feel free to lead us by example.
posted by jacknose at 10:11 AM on November 14, 2002
It depends on what you want SpoFi to be. Do you want it to be a sports discussion site, or a place for people to find and talk about cool sports-related web links? I think with something like sports, you're obviously going to have a lot more news-related items, which is fine. Those will lead to discussion. But in the future, should SpoFi blow up to MeFi-esque proportions (or even half that), then it will look more like a BBS than a Filter of any sort. I think SportsFilter should avoid the pure discussion board format I agree whole-heartedly. That said, I think one thread per week could be a good remedy for people to toss around chit-chat and shit talking. I'm for the proposals as they stand right now, although I'm probably don't keep up well enough with any sport to be in charge of a category.
posted by Ufez Jones at 11:16 AM on November 14, 2002
I volunteer for the Premier League report. Just the Premier League. As you'll see, just one report that encompasses all the Euro leagues is way to much. I also recognize I will be inundated by Premier League experts, including those who actually live in England (I'm talking about the Mavericks of the Midlands, Fat Buddha and BigCalm.) But I guess that's a good way to get the "quiet ones" to come out of the woodwork. I'll probably start by pointing to places to read match reports, see goals of the week, live text commentary as well as my solid-gold list of live EPL Internet radio links (already posted here on SpoFi).
posted by worldcup2002 at 12:09 PM on November 14, 2002
Thats cool World Cup!
posted by StarFucker at 12:13 PM on November 14, 2002
Sure, we're getting near the end of the college football season, but I'll gladly volunteer for a weekly roundup. My only question is should we have some sort of informal schedule for this so that we're not all posting on the same day?
posted by thescoop at 12:19 PM on November 14, 2002
I think we should have a regular schedule, so members know what day to expect their weekly recaps. So why don't we have our "beat posters" call out a day for their recaps. I think it'll be fine if there are some overlaps.
posted by jacknose at 12:22 PM on November 14, 2002
Cool, so we have three "beat posters" so far: jbou - college basketball worldcup2002 - Premiere League thescoop - college football *If ESPN steals you from us, don't forget your roots.
posted by jacknose at 12:29 PM on November 14, 2002
I'll take the NFL beat...
posted by owillis at 12:53 PM on November 14, 2002
I'll cover the NBA (for the time being). If someone else wants to take the NBA beat, please let me know. Monday is usually an off day for NBA games, so it might be a good time for a weekly recap. But it might be a better day for the NFL (unless owillis wants to wait until the MNF game is over). If he wants Monday, I'll take Wednesday or Friday (but, again, I think it's okay if we overlap--we'll have to). Beat Posters: jbou - NCAA Basketball worldcup - Premier League thescoop - NCAA Football owillis - NFL jacknose - NBA (Monday or Wednesday) BPs, call out your potential days.
posted by jacknose at 01:21 PM on November 14, 2002
Sundays for college b-ball, I did my first wrap up, which is really a preview, today, but I'll stick to Sundays.
posted by jbou at 01:30 PM on November 14, 2002
Is anyone tackling the Champion's League and UEFA cup? I'm definitely more qualified for baseball, but that's still months away.
posted by trox at 01:50 PM on November 14, 2002
trox, they are yours for the taking.
posted by jacknose at 01:56 PM on November 14, 2002
I can help with Champions or UEFA...
posted by StarFucker at 02:16 PM on November 14, 2002
So it's only just a paragraph or two, huh? I'd like to see what a completed report looks like first, but I think I could cover (or share) the duties for the NHL.
posted by Samsonov14 at 02:45 PM on November 14, 2002
Beat Posters Update: jbou - NCAA Basketball (on Sunday) thescoop - NCAA Football (on ?) owillis - NFL (on ?) jacknose - NBA (on Monday) Samsonov14 - NHL (on ?) worldcup - Premier League (on ?) trox - Champions League or UEFA (on ?) StarFucker - UEFA or Champions League (on ?)
posted by jacknose at 02:55 PM on November 14, 2002
I'd like to do the MLS once the season starts up again.
posted by elsoltano at 02:55 PM on November 14, 2002
Thursday may be a good day for the Champion's League/UEFA Cup.
posted by trox at 03:12 PM on November 14, 2002
I say Premier League reports on Mon, Tues or Wed, depending on when games are completed for that "week." Most games are played on the weekends, but sometimes, due to international games or Euro games or bad weather, postponed games will be played during the week (could be any of the days, tho it tends to be mostly Monday, followed by Tues, and in rare cases Wed.). If I have to settle on one day, I'd say Monday, and be flexible when there are games to be played during the week. Sorry, EPL scheduling _is_ that messy.
posted by worldcup2002 at 04:28 PM on November 14, 2002
I'll volunteer for golf. Is that a sport? Anyway, this year there's no shortage of material, even in the "silly season." If there's interest, I'm up for it.
posted by jmpeterson at 04:36 PM on November 14, 2002
Is Tuesday ok for NCAA football? That's a couple of days after the games but a day or so after the polls come out. I'm ok with Tuesdays.
posted by thescoop at 06:48 PM on November 14, 2002
Latest Beat Posters Update: jbou - NCAA Basketball (on Sunday) thescoop - NCAA Football (on Tuesday) owillis - NFL (on ?) jacknose - NBA (on Monday) Samsonov14 - NHL (on ?) worldcup - Premier League (on Monday) trox - Champions League or UEFA (on Thursday) StarFucker - UEFA or Champions League (on ?) elsotano - MLS (on ?) jmpeterson - Golf (on ?)
posted by jacknose at 08:03 PM on November 14, 2002
Hell, I'll take Tuesday. I was half hoping for an objection. No matter. I guess it's time for my stupid star to shine! I can't post on the weekend (that's Neil's time), but most of the time I'm sober by Monday. I don't do any real work on Mondays anyway, so that would be a good time to compose an update for the next day. I don't think there's a lot of overlap between college B-Ball fans and Hockey fans, so hopefully thescoop and I won't get in each others' way. If it's a problem, I'll move to Wednesday. I hope it's cool if we go through an experimental phase with this weekly update thing. No poetry or anything, but I'd like to post things other than the best links and the top ten teams each week. Maybe the top ten hockey blogs, the top ten NHL player's journals (or five, depending on how many I can find), or the top ten unrecognized players? Is that okay with everyone, or should we stick with a straight ranking system like ESPN's Power Rankings?
posted by Samsonov14 at 08:48 PM on November 14, 2002
anybody have MLB?...i'll surely take it. would be tough with the off season but the hot stove league will heat up by thanksgiving. i'll do it every 2 weeks this winter on saturdays...cool?
posted by oliver_crunk at 10:55 PM on November 14, 2002
i'm thinking along the lines of a hot stove index....so when the mets go out and sign steve finley or some similarly overpaid, over-the-hill freak show, we can track the next bonehead phillips move and compare it to the brewers.
posted by oliver_crunk at 10:59 PM on November 14, 2002
Beat poster. Hey, is that like me doing a Jack Kerouac impression while I rattle off the weekend scores? Heh. It's late.
posted by worldcup2002 at 12:30 AM on November 15, 2002
I'll do MLS on Sundays so we can recap the saturday games and prepare for the wednesday matches. Should I include US Men's National Team news in there, or is that out of scope do you think?
posted by elsoltano at 07:01 AM on November 15, 2002
UEFA or Champions League... Champions League could be on Thursday, UEFA on Friday. But am I taking both?
posted by StarFucker at 08:30 AM on November 15, 2002
Starfucker, I had assumed that I was taking these, but if you're willing, we can split them up. I don't really have a preference, but I can guarantee that I'll be following the Champion's League more closely (Go Gunners!).
posted by trox at 09:14 AM on November 15, 2002
No no...they are all yours. I don't really have the time.
posted by StarFucker at 09:37 AM on November 15, 2002
Methinks Sunday nite/monday is the best time for an NFL update - since everything more or less happens on Sundays unlike the other sports...
posted by owillis at 07:01 PM on November 15, 2002
Beat Posters Update: jbou - NCAA Basketball (on Sunday) thescoop - NCAA Football (on Tuesday) owillis - NFL (on Monday) jacknose - NBA (on Wednesday) Samsonov14 - NHL (on Tuesday) worldcup - Premier League (on Monday) trox - Champions League or UEFA (on Thursday) elsotano - MLS (on Sunday) jmpeterson - Golf (on ?) oliver_crunk - MLB (on Saturday)
posted by jacknose at 11:53 AM on November 17, 2002
Could these beat posts be archived in all one spot somewhere?
posted by corpse at 08:36 AM on November 18, 2002
Sorry for the delay. I can do golf on any day -- but since most tournaments end on Sunday, I think Tuesday would be ideal (to capture any Monday post-mortems). It's kind of golf's silly season right now, so there may not be much to talk about until the 1st of the year.
posted by jmpeterson at 12:37 PM on November 18, 2002
Argh, comment didn't go through for some reason. What I wanted to say was 'can we please use 'more inside...' instead of filling the entire front page with 20+ links or 5-10 <br> tags? The 'come to spofi, see one post on front page' thing sort of sucks.
posted by tieguy at 01:22 PM on November 18, 2002
tieguy, since we don't have 20+ comments a day (a la MetaFilter), I'm okay with these more elaborate posts. It's not too difficult for me to scroll down (I use the mouse scrolling wheel). Is it really that annoying? Is it really a bother to scroll down? (Those questions are not meant to be snarky.) What do other members think?
posted by jacknose at 02:13 PM on November 18, 2002
I kind of agree with tieguy about using 'more inside'. I don't think it's that hard to scroll down, I just think the front page looks cleaner with shorter front page posts.
posted by pfuller at 02:22 PM on November 18, 2002
I didn't see tieguy complaining about owillis's NFL post (in fact, he was the first to join in the comment fray). But he took the time to gripe here and in my EPL post, too. Hmmph. So, this is the reward of the beat poster. You shoulda warned us, jacknose. I want combat pay. ;-) And pfuller, what are you doing backing up the gripe? I'm giving you ammo for your climb up the SpoFi EPL fantasy league! Goshdurnit!
posted by worldcup2002 at 02:28 PM on November 18, 2002
No, I was prompted to bitch by both, wc2002. Note that in the NFL thread there is one comment made by someone who clearly didn't see the article that was only two items further down the front page. It's not a matter of it being a bother to scroll down, it's a matter of people not scrolling down and not seeing other things that just got posted. It's precisely because of the low # of FPPs that this matters- if you assume that nothing 'below the fold' is new (which has always been a safe assumption here if you read at least once a day), and a post occupies all of the 'above the fold' area, you'll never see the FPP or two (or three) before one of these massive posts.
[Additionally, it's aesthetically unpleasant. But that's secondary ;)
posted by tieguy at 03:12 PM on November 18, 2002
Hmmm, I liked woldcup2002's itemized list. What about a "beat template"? Something like this (just as an off-the-top-of-my-head example to start discussion): BEAT REPORT: NFL WEEK X Main Story: The Tennessee Titans managed their fifth win in a row, unfortunately at the expense of Tommy Maddox's noggin. It looks like Maddox is OK, though. Which is good news. Other Items:
- Packers lose to Vikings. How do you pronounce Favre again?
- From the Department of Redundancy Department: The Detroit Lions suck.
- Tonight's game: Bears and Rams.
posted by jmpeterson at 03:15 PM on November 18, 2002
worldcup, I think that both posts were excellently done and I don't mean to gripe about either one. I will read them whether they are on the front or inside. ...and as for EPL, I think I'm up to 10th so watch out
posted by pfuller at 03:21 PM on November 18, 2002
Aw shucks, y'all are so sweet. I'll tone it down for next week. Just one link. I'll even try to make it a one-liner.
posted by worldcup2002 at 03:27 PM on November 18, 2002
I agree that a (More Inside) would be preferential. Especially for those of us that read spofi mostly at work and don't have the windows maximized all the way.
posted by Ufez Jones at 04:07 PM on November 18, 2002
Some nice comments. I'm sure the Beat Report will evolve. BTW, don't be discouraged by the amount of comments at the beginning. I think it will take some time to gain a larger audience, but I believe the Beat Poster will catch on and be quite beneficial for the SportsFilter community. We'll see what the Beat Posters do tomorrow. wc2002, the checks in the mail.
posted by jacknose at 06:24 PM on November 18, 2002
I'll give out the best picks for all the gamblers in here(US sports)
posted by catfish at 02:25 AM on November 19, 2002
ooh like a weekly best picks for gambling across all sports? I'd like that, good call catfish.
posted by elsoltano at 07:23 AM on November 19, 2002
I don't think their are enough interesting sports links out their to justify only posting those types of things from the web. So, I'm all for weekly recaps, because all I really want to do is talk about sports, really, I could care less about the links. Op Ed articles are great too! They cause more discussion than your regular run of the mill, this is what happened at the game sports links.