Advice for young journalists

A special thank you to Lars Anderson and his sports journalism class at the University of Alabama for having me visit this week. It's always fun talking shop and they asked really good questions.

Thinking about it afterward I was reminded of a list I did for my book No Time Outs on my 12 rules of sports writing. I've never posted it before, so here goes:

1)    Read, read, read.
2)    Write, write, write.
3)    Never lie, cheat or fudge.
4)    Work hard. Then work harder.
5)    Keep it simple.
6)    Trust your instincts.
7)    Never forget your subject is a person.
8)    Don’t screw up a name in print.
9)    Always go to the top.
10) The desk is your friend.
11) Think ahead.
12) Always have higher expectations.

It's hard to believe No Time Outs was published in 2006, and since it was my second book that means 2015 is consequently my 10-year anniversary as an author. It amazes me how much the industry has changed during that time period, and I can't wait to see what happens over the next decade.

All good things ...

Thursday was my last day at Saturday Down South and I just wanted to take a moment to thank all of the readers, etc. I appreciate you more than you'll ever know. 

With nothing much going on football-wise for a while except National Signing Day I wanted to do something to hold Crimson Tide fans over, so posted a 12-part "Crunching the numbers" series. When you're ready for a little more perspective on the 2014 season and where the Alabama program's at just hit one of the following links:

Freshmen

Sims vs. McCarron 

Quarterbacks

Receivers

Rushing

Tackles

Fumbles

Sacks

Interceptions

Offense

Defense

Mistakes

As for me, I don't know what's next, and for now I'm ok with that. Similar to a coach or player at the end of a long season my wife and I are going to take a little time, catch up on sleep and figure some things out. We firmly believe that every ending is a new beginning so we're looking forward to seeing what's next. 

Thanks again and take care ... 

Rough week ...

There's a manuscript sitting on my desk, and unfortunately the picture here is all you'll probably ever see of it.

One of the things I've had in the works for a while was a championship book if Alabama won the national title. The plan was for it to go to the printer the morning after the final game in Dallas, and be available almost immediately.

Literally, the thing was done except for the semifinal game, the title game and a short sidebar on the championship game MVP. I had spent a good part of December working on the manuscript, making sure it was worthy of being a keepsake, and I was pretty proud of how it turned out.

But then Ohio State upset Alabama at the Sugar Bowl, and that was that. Actually, it turned out to be the least of my worries last week (more on that in the near future), but it's the kind of thing that I thought some of you might be interested in hearing about. Over the years I've had a few books never see the light of day, but sometimes that's just the way it goes. Back to the drawing board ...