The Talk

I knew that I had to talk to the Producer Chad the next time we were both in the studio, but I am not one to bring things up. Despite popular belief I am not a fan of confrontation especially when it is about my job or potential job. I started talking to Chad like normal and then he brought up the words no person wants to hear, "we need to talk." I knew this was it and I needed to be prepared for what ever came my way.

I braced myself for negativity, partly because I was being negative about the situation, and I thought Chad would be negative as well. I was surprised when the talk went in a positive way. Chad explained to me that he too came from a communications back round instead of taking a broadcasting route, that was something I needed to hear because I felt at such a disadvantage going into the internship.

Chad had explained to me that in this type of field I need to be more vocal about what I want. I need to start and ask for more tasks like learning how to create a highlight, or shooting standup, even asking to go to practices and games. I really need to keep asking people in order to get what I want out of sports.

Asking people for more tasks is hard for me because I never want to come across needy or feel like I am nagging people. I was very surprised that this is the way this internship was run. Chad also told me that my concerns were valid, and I was asked to do certain tasks because I am an organized person, and everything I do is organized and make his job a lot easier.

 I really admire that even though I felt like i was being a baby about the situation, he found the positive and helped me understand more things. Chad also advised me that he would not hold that against me.

I learned how to edit that night and have set time to try and create highlights. Chad told me he would critique them and I would learn more on my own. This made me happy that I would be taking learning into my own hands. I felt like something was accomplished.

That night we, Brendon, Chad and myself, went out for dinner, nothing special just Five Guys, but  I finally felt like part of the team, and felt more positive than I was feeling. I now have a new cut throat attitude, towards sports, that makes me feel like a Bitch some times, but I realize I need to do what I have to do to survive in this industry. That means calling people out when they do not do their job right and just trying to be better at all the different tasks I do.

Until next time guys I am out and working on being more hardcore!

The Tapes That Almost Broke Me

I like to listen to music and read inspirational quotes to get me through the tough times, and as an intern we are expected to do grunt work and have a few tough times that make us really question not only our selves but our career choice. This week I had a lot of questions regarding if sports is where I want to be, and if I am cut out for what the sports world has to offer. besides from talking with my friends who all reassured me that I was in the right spot I heard a song by Pink that said, "Where there is desire, there is gonna be a flame, Where there is a flame, Someone's bound to get burned but just because it burns,doesn't mean you're going to die, You've gotta get up and try " and I realized she was right. I needed keep trying despite my spirits being down.

Photo By: Nikki Romanuk

As an intern we are required to do grunt work. I get “paying your dues”, and what not but I just felt I was the only intern paying them. Here is what killed my spirits. There is this wall full of old sports tapes, you should know before everything went digital believe it or not we did record everything and kept all those tapes.

Any ways all of those sports tapes are kept in a giant wall and were only organized according by team; the major four Boston sports Patriots, Red Sox, Celtics and Bruins. There is also a section of old high school and college tapes. The producer had asked us interns on different nights to organize the tapes according to years, because they were already in teams. 

I had already done the Celtics and the Bruins and created labels for them using posits because I had no tape or stickers. Anyways the other two interns were supposed to have worked together to organize the other two teams, seems reasonable. Well Chad had asked me when all the tapes were edited to write down what labels needed to be made so he could print them out. 

Here is the problem. When I went to look at the tapes, I noticed that the Patriots and the Red Sox were not organized at all. I saw all the years mixed together with random labels thrown on the shelf to make it look like they were organized. When I told Chad I was asked to redo the wall. 

I took me over four hours to organize just one of the teams. This was on a Thursday night so there was another intern there. What upset me is ,I was organizing tapes, and wearing a dress which I have to mention I got some rug burns, and the other intern was playing golf in the studio, and watching me do all the work. I felt very upset.

Photo By: Nikki Romanuk

The next time I came into the studio was on Sunday, I assumed that the other team would be done, but just my luck I received an email from Chad asking me to finish the wall and organize the last team too. I was not happy about this because I felt like I was doing all the grunt work while the other interns got to cut highlights and shoot standups. 

I finally talked to one of the producer who is only there a few nights of the week who advised me to talk to Chad about the problem. I did finish the wall it took me another four hours to finally finish. And I did finally get to learn how to cut a highlight (which I hope to teach myself more of). 

Later I will get to talk to Chad, and that will be a whole new post.

The Alpha Dog

This week Fox 25 Sports sent me out to the Patriots media day with Walt, like I said before, it is always an adventure when I am with Walt. I met Walt at the Fox 25 studio Wednesday morning, and we drove over to Gillette Stadium together in the Fox van. Walt is not a Patriots fan so to when we entered the hallways and saw other media people, Walt was sure to yell "how about my boy Sherman." If you are not familiar with Sherman, he is a Seahawk player that intercepted Brady causing the Patriots to lose the game. So as you can imagine, I was scared of how people would react but Walt is Walt and in his words he "is an alpha dog", meaning he does not take crap from anyone.

Walt and I were on our way to the blue floor, which is where the media people meet up and get some food, but when we reached the elevator we ran into people from channel seven who said there was no food. I had met the camera guy from camera seven; his name is Greg Classy and a really nice guy. Greg always tries to get me to ditch Walt and Fox and go work with him at channel seven.

Walt and I decided to skip going up stairs and go to the visitor locker room where the Tom Brady Press conference would be held. We were waiting for Tom to come out, but talking to Greg and other camera people. It is an interesting environment to walk into, everyone knows each other and they are all friends. Walt describes it as being a family because they spend so much time together. I like the environment. Tom Brady comes out and people ask him a few questions, I am able to get pretty close and got some nice pictures. Walt comes up to me and asks if I am ready for the locker room.

I should tell you guys that Fox subscribes to a camera company called LSN who film certain things for us so we can get different stuff, if we did not subscribe than we would not get as much footage as we do. So with LSN filming the press conference, we were able to go to the locker room where Rob Gronkowski would be talking. I am going to be a girl here for just a second and say that Gronk is my favorite player and I have had a crush on him since his rookie year, there is no doubt in my mind we will date one day! Okay back to intern mode. I was able to get pretty close when holding the microphone, but there were not a lot of reporters in the locker room so that was easy.

The next person to come out and talk was Deion Branch. The best way to describe the locker room is this: if you have ever been to a concert and are in the general admission area, and the star comes out and all the fans rush the stage and you get caught up in the middle, it is the same thing. The player comes out and all the reporters and camera people rush the area, if you are not quick enough you don’t get close or you get trampled. I learned this very quickly! I also became very stealthy when it came to working my way up close!

We got a few more players and then the locker room was closed and everyone rushed upstairs for lunch. Like I said before Walt is an "alpha dog" so we ended meeting one of his old interns (who now works for the Patriots) and he took us up a different elevator so we got to cut the line a little. We ate lunch with all the people from channel 7, Greg the camera man, their intern, and Rhett Lewis the 6:00 sports anchor. It was a very entertaining lunch, most of which I just sat and observed what was going on.

After Lunch the Bill Belichick press conference began and we watched it. The last part of our day would be to head down to the practice field and watch the Patriots practice. The practice is only open for about 15 minutes meaning, if the players are late, then we do not get much footage. Lucky for us the players were late and all we got was them walking onto the field. That concluded our day at practice.

I am quickly learning that this field is hurry up and wait sort of deal. Some parts you have to be hardcore and fight your way to the front for the story, other parts you can just sit around and talk to people.  I am in the Studio again on Thursday and Sunday to log the Patriots vs. Jets game, which should be a show down, until then guys!



P.S. Here is the run down of what media day looks like.

Wednesday, Oct. 17

10:30-11:30 a.m.         Media Check-In and Press Box Open (Media will be escorted to the visitor’s locker room from Security Command at approximately 10:45 a.m.)

11:10-11:20 a.m.         Patriots QB Tom Brady Press Availability (Visitor’s Locker Room – Set Press Conference Style)

11:15-12:00 p.m.         Open Locker Room

12:00-12:30 p.m.         Media Lunch as well as Credential and Parking Pass Pickup (Red Level Press Box)

12:40-12:55 p.m.         Patriots Head Coach Bill Belichick Press Conference (Red Level Press Box)

Approx. 1:15 p.m.       Media Availability at Patriots Practice until Team Drills (training camp practice fields, weather permitting)

TBD                             New York Jets Head Coach Rex Ryan Conference Call

TBD                             New York Jets Player (TBD) Conference Call

We Are Live!

This week was an exciting week for me at Fox 25 Sports. This week we launched our Facebook and Twitter pages. Before I was an intern Fox 25 Sports did not have a Facebook or Twitter page. I offered to start the pages because I feel that it is important, because Fox 25 Sports will be able to establish a fan base and be able to connect with the fans.

Something I noticed while interning is that there is a lot of work that makes up the 10 minutes or so you see on the news. I thought that having social media sites will show the fans what they do not normally see. I also think that having a social media sites will allows Fox 25 Sports to cover more stories that they cannot cover due to time constraints. This is very exciting for me because now, I have more responsibility to prove myself to the boys. 

When creating a social media page, it is important to get the word out about the page. We started by asking all of our friends and family to “Like” our page. By liking our page, we are hoping to get the word out about our page to establish a fan base. This began to be very exciting part of our day as we got more and more likes. The producer Chad, anchor Brendan and myself would scream out we go another like. The first night our Facebook page was up, we got 60 likes, which is a good start.

Our next step was to establish content. When establishing content I wanted to establish a voice.

Why is voice important? Well voice is important because I really want the social media sites to continue even when I am no longer interning at the studio. Establishing voice was not an easy task and I am finding out that I really do not yet know how to talk the talk when it comes to sports. This is a challenge for me because I would really like to sound intelligent when updating a Facebook status or a twitter update. In order to become a better sports writer, I decided that I am going to have to do my homework and read more sports articles, follow different sports stations on Twitter and Facebook, and figure out what type of voice I can develop.

Another struggle I have with running the social media is what I can post. I have read that most people are likely to look at pictures or a video, rather than read something; this means I have to be careful on what materials I use. I would not want to get the station in trouble for something I post. The pressure is on me, considering the other interns do not help out with the social media.

How are we getting followers?!

A way of getting Twitter followers is to do live tweeting. If you are not familiar with live tweeting, it is a way of tweeting while an event is occurring. So this week I took on live tweeting during the Patriots vs. Seahawks game, which ended up being more difficult than I first thought. Now live tweeting is not too difficult, it is basically reporting via the internet. However, live tweeting while logging he game, and watching the game can get pretty confusing. Not to mention figuring out what is trending (meaning what people are talking about) and how to speak sports! 

I did the best that I could, but I quickly learned that I had to proof read my tweets due to the amount of errors I made trying to tweet quickly. Something I should have learned by now with all the writing classes I have been taking. But you live and you learn, and you don’t make the same mistakes. You also take your time when conducting a tweet so you can get the hand of it. 

The next game the Patriots play will be a home game against the New York Jets, and since they are sending another intern to the game, I will be in the station logging the game and tweeting the game. If you are interested in my work check out the Fox 25 Sports Facebook page, and our Twitter. 

Next week I will be going into the Patriots locker room again, this time for practice and organizing a wall of tapes, not to mention I will me attempting to live tweet again, and continue my quest for followers. Talk to you guys next week!