As a kid in Colorado, in the Time Zone Baseball Forgot until the arrival of the Rockies, I grew as a fan of the game by playing it and hearing stories about its history from my father and grandfather. My connection to Major League Baseball was at a distance, but what brought me closer to it was the daily newspaper and the box scores. I clipped and saved and devoured and memorized baseball writing before I knew it could be a career.

I’ve grown to realize that my fondness for newspapers and baseball are symbiotic. They are both daily. They’ve both been called outdated, right? They are both a pursuit of being better tomorrow.

I graduated from the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism with a print degree and a political science degree, and my goal going there was to emerge as a political journalist, covering courts and elections. But the gravitational pull of sportswriting was strong because of the variety of stories a beat writer could tell from breaking news to longform to investigative. When I learned I might, maybe, possibly have an opportunity to cover baseball – I pursued it. At every step of my career I looked for and pitched (ahem) reasons to cover baseball at any level. After a few years as a beat writer for preps, major college sports (LSU), NBA (Nuggets), and NHL (Blues), and a few cameo appearances covering pro baseball (Rockies, minors), I received a chance to join the Cardinals beat at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 2004 and I haven’t left the ballpark since.

It has been more rewarding than that kid in Colorado could ever imagine.

Two leap to mind because they are on opposite ends of emotion and style.

In 2022, Albert Pujols, one of the greatest hitters of all-time and an all-time great Cardinal, returned to the team for his final season, and in a magical second half, he took a run at hitting his 700th career home run. That was an exclusive club of three – Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and Barry Bonds – before Pujols came knocking. And as he hit 697 and 698, it was on my mind that if I had the opportunity to write the first draft on his 700th, it would be a story that few beat writers ever got to write. My story had to rise to the moment.

It would be a deadline story, so I prepared in advance by researching history and doing interviews to collect quotes I might use. Pujols would be the first Dominican Republic-born player to reach 700, so I looked at the debut date of the first player from the Dominican Republic as an example. He hit No. 699 and 700 on the same night at Dodger Stadium, and at the moment, it was about absorbing as many details as possible. Whom did he hug? How fast did he run? How did longtime teammates react? I noticed that when he broke his bat before the homers, the bat boy brought him one bat – not the usual two to choose from. He hit the home runs with that one. I tracked down the bat boy to ask why he brought out only one. That became the lede, and that made the story. It’s a special story, a memorable story because the history it covered meant it had to be, and I hope I pulled it off.

That’s a story of euphoria, and the other story is one of tragedy. I had a night to write the Pujols story, and this next one I had (and needed) time to write. It was about a player who befriended a young boy battling cancer at a St. Louis children’s hospital. The player and the family were so open to sharing their story and their bond with me that I felt the responsibility of writing up to their trust. I knew the story had a sad ending. That made it more important to show how the player and the young boy lifted each other up with the joy of a soaring friendship. This story was special to me because I wanted to do my best for the boy and his family, and that feeling stays with you.

I hope my favorite article is yet to come.

There’s no muse quite like deadline. Or, more precisely, for this question, there’s no fuse quite like deadline.

One of the most significant changes in journalism – ever – has been the advent of social media and access/expectation to immediately publish news. Deadline has become perpetual. When I cover a game, one of the stories is due the moment the game ends. I have an internal clock to know when it’s time to get going on that story, to begin the process of writing.

This question is great, and it got me thinking because deadline is a race – right? – and this question reaches beyond that. It’s asking what starts a burn within that leads to the creation of something to share, some writing I’m eager for people to read.

While thinking about this question, I realized one thing about covering sports is how sound is a significant part of it. A stadium murmurs and gasps in anticipation at a major moment, as if the crowd is holding its breath. There’s a swell to the noise from a hockey or soccer crowd as a goal-scoring opportunity develops. Those are more than cues for a writer; they are something to try and capture and convey. If a good game story takes the reader to that game, part of that is recreating the experience of being at the ballpark, and describing the senses, especially sounds, that are essential to that.

I don’t have a specific quote, but I have multiple essays (vrooommmm, Tom Wolfe!), articles, and books that resonate with me and stick with me and “ignite” me because I’m still chasing sentences and descriptions and reporting as good as I read in any of them. 

All the usual gizmos that you’d expect stuffed into a journalist’s backpack. I have a digital recorder for interviews, press conferences, and the occasional podcast audio that I’ll produce later. I write on a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop, but unfortunately, the Y, H, and U keys recently gave up on me, so now I travel with a spare keyboard. An iPhone is essential for getting news out swiftly and producing video reporters.

Beyond the tech, I have favorite spiral notebooks – either Ampad Gold Fibre (5x8) or Penco (4 ¾ x 7 ½) – that I carry for reporting and interviews at the ballpark. I like the larger size with the classic top-coil of a reporter’s notebook. I use bigger notebooks to track stats.

I also have an everyday pen (Uni Ball Vision Elite) for notes, stats, and interviews, and a variety of ballpoint pens for postcards. I always have a stack of those handy, sometimes tucked in a Traveler’s notebook with stamps. That is near a journal and my pouch of Blackwing pencils I carry.

And then there’s my bespoke scorebook. I make a new one for every season, and I enjoy the rhythm of that process – picking out the logos to set it apart, copying and coiling 162 games, and adjusting the page for more notes or new rules. I keep each year’s book, and every so often someone will ask for the sheet from a birthday or an engagement, and I’ve been reluctant to part with the original sheet …

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