For years, my boyfriend, Kevin – who gets too much recognition in this blog – has subscribed to sports message boards from Scout.com, Rivals.com and GatorBait.net. I’ve watched him spend hours reading posts for the past year. Today I found out these message boards are also used by The Alligator sports writers to sometimes get tips for their articles about U.F. athletics. That’s a lot of follow-up calls – and probably a lot of hit-and-misses – but it’s still so simple and convenient for journalists.

“They’re sorted by topic, so people who know about that subject or are in that area are more likely to post something because they’re more knowledgeable on that subject,” Kevin said in a casual interview tonight. “A lot of the people who post on GatorBait are people here in Gainesville who have access to the coaches and actually go out and attend the practices. They’re certain names out there who post that have such a history of being credible that you can trust what they’re saying.”

In my advanced reporting class of about 20, we all had to sign up for a day to teach the class a topic of our choice. (I signed up for the last day with no idea what to teach my classmates who are already established in the journalism industry – what am I going to teach them?)

Today, my personal favorite sports writers, Bryan Jones and Nick Zaccardi, gave a PowerPoint presentation about sports reporting. In addition to message boards, they spoke in length about the different types of sports stories and game day coverage, such as the press box rule of absolutely no cheering - unless you’re in the obnoxious University of Tennessee press box and singing “Rocky Top,” they recalled from experience.

Bryan and Nick told us they have a rule at The Alligator: if you’re a sports writer caught wearing Gators gear, then you’re fired on the spot - or at least you should be. In order to remain neutral journalists, they said you have to stop rooting for the team but to still be a fan of the sport.

I’m such a nerd for objectivity. More on sports reporting tomorrow.

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