Block out the noise.
It’s a cliché, and one that I usually look to avoid in my writing. But I believe it is crucial advice to anyone looking to go into sports reporting. I also understand it is quite ironic that this is the note a journalist — a professional manufacturer of noise — is looking to leave behind.
You will always have detractors. Most of these people are well-intended and simply do not understand why you are driving five hours to cover a subpar FCS football game. In all honesty, you probably don’t get why you jump through hoops for these stories, either. Why do you feel the need to incessantly post Big 5 basketball news on social media? Why do you go out of your way to talk and cultivate relationships with coaches? Why do you borderline stalk an athlete’s digital presence and comb through their high school stats before interviewing them?
You just enjoy it, so you do it. That’s the truth for me — no matter the size or scope of the story.
It could be news of a pseudo-NIL collective forming, an interview with a track star who was cheated out of $40,000, or a slice-of-life feature on a college team’s in-house DJ. Whatever it is, there is a uniquely intoxicating feeling to newsmaking. You know that you are the smallest part of the stories you publish, yet you become addicted to seeing your byline next to an article about someone else. You chase it again and again, with each success only fueling your excitement for what’s coming next.
Now, others may be intentionally cruel. Hopefully, like they were for me, these people will be few and far between. Ignore them and chalk up their comments to their probable hatred for their own profession (probably consulting) and a tad of jealousy that you found something you love. Block them out, especially.
I have spoken to countless successful athletes through my time at The Daily Pennsylvanian and through my internship with The Philadelphia Inquirer, and “blocking out the noise” is a mantra they also repeat. Judging by their varied successes, it works, but it is sometimes easier said than done.
During the winter of my junior year, I was having intense bouts of anxiety, and the noise was definitely winning for a moment in time. Only the people closest to me really knew about this, but others probably noticed. I was irritable, quick to overreact, and constantly stressed. One thing that helped me was getting lost in my work. I feel like this is horrible guidance if you don’t love what you do. But I do.
When I was courtside at the Palestra, reporting on a losing Steve Donahue-led Penn men’s basketball team, the noise went quiet. I was no longer worrying about my future or any stupid mistakes I may have made in the course in the course of my reporting. I was just focused on why then-sophomore guard Sam Brown had made a turnaround during conference play or wondering how the Quakers would fill in a Nick Spinoso-sized hole once the big man graduated.
Reporting on men’s basketball helped me block out the noise the most, and I will really miss writing about that team — one that always welcomed my reporting and necessary criticism.
So now what? Your classmates are headed off to Wall Street or medical school. Meanwhile, you’re graduating with an Ivy League degree, and all you have to show is a portfolio filled with basketball stories and some fun memories working for the DP’s only section that matters.
That’s the noise again. Block it out.
CONOR SMITH is a College senior studying communication from Mount Royal, N.J. He served as a deputy sports editor on the 141st Internal Board of The Daily Pennsylvanian. He also served as a senior sports reporter and sports columnist. His email is conorfs@sas.upenn.edu.
