While sites like Fox Sports, MTV, Vocativ, Vice and others do their respective pivots to video, there’s one company that is hiring writers and that is The Athletic. It’s also launching national sites devoted to college football, The All-American and college basketball, The Fieldhouse. Led by former SI college basketball maven Seth Davis, the site has hired two writers, both of whom made announcements on Twitter:
Brian Hamilton was a colleague of Davis’ at SI and wrote at the Chicago Tribune before that. Hamilton says Davis isn’t done bringing writers to The Fieldhouse:
And former Sporting News and Vice NBA Draft and college basketball writer Sam Vecenie announced he was joining The Fieldhouse:
https://twitter.com/sam_vecenie/status/890950326945054720
He added that while he’ll again be covering the Draft as well as college basketball:
https://twitter.com/sam_vecenie/status/890950867314032642
https://twitter.com/sam_vecenie/status/890951394408112128
The latest
These are solid moves for The Athletic and The Fieldhouse. There are still writers who were laid off from other sites still looking for work so we’ll see if some are picked up and get back on the horse to cover the sports they know and love.
As outlined by our Andrew Bucholtz, The Athletic has brought in writers from all over the country including SI and Fox college football writer Stewart Mandel who will lead The All-American. The Athletic is also launching local verticals to provide readers with sports coverage. It’s the total opposite of what other sites have done in dropping written stories replacing them with videos.
Can it work? Time will tell, but this is going to be watched closely to see if this becomes a model or if it will be another example of a site that gave a noble effort, but fell by the wayside. There are writers who are rooting very hard for The Athletic’s success and they hope that it lead to the launch of other sites down the line.
About Ken Fang
Ken has been covering the sports media in earnest at his own site, Fang's Bites since May 2007 and at Awful Announcing since March 2013.
He provides a unique perspective having been an award-winning radio news reporter in Providence and having worked in local television.
Fang celebrates the four Boston Red Sox World Championships in the 21st Century, but continues to be a long-suffering Cleveland Browns fan.