The Good, Bad, & Challenges of Being On A HSSR Deadline!

The Good, Bad, & Challenges Of Being On A HSSR Deadline! 

Moncks Corner - The second season of Spring Sports, a.k.a. the play-offs, are in high gear across South Carolina; as the HSSR goes to press (Monday, May 6), and we can all expect many highly competitive games across numerous sports that bring  communities together in support of thousands of young student athletes.

The HSSR extends best wishes to all teams competing. Always remember, that good sportsmanship will be honored and appreciated in all situations, no matter who is calling the balls and strikes! 

In the process of my goal of “original and self-directed research” over 100 hours are spent coordinating the production of the nation’s only statewide publication, devoted exclusively to prep sports in any one state during, “deadline week.” In helping prepare this one-of-a-kind 72- page publication, with a joint web site companion known as of hssr.com each month, we have a team of experienced and seasoned writers, a senior photographer with a five-star camera, and a network of contacts second to “no one else” in the Palmetto State.  

We also thank the high school coaches across the state who understand when they get a call at 11 p.m. on deadline nights, from yours truly, often with this opening comment, “I hope I didn’t wake you, but you never returned my phone calls the past three days, or my 8 text messages, and we go to press in seven hours!”

(Reactions vary from Coach to Coach)  

We feel blessed at the HSSR, and honored, to be a one-of-kind combination print/web site media, devoted exclusively to promoting the positive achievements of our hard-working prep athletes in South Carolina. It has been over 38 years of “one day feeding into the next day:. (Pretty soon you have a whole lot of days making your hair grayer by the day!) 

Here are just some of the musings, happenings and seat-of-the-pants issues confronted by this Publisher on this deadline alone: For the first time ever a certain high-profiled softball coach in our state was asked “once again” to e-mail the stats of her highly regarded team to the HSSR for information to be used on one of the “Softball Class Feature pages in this very issue. We got the stats in a matter of hours, Thank you!  This note was written in the body of the e-mail: “My stats are attached. Will these be published somewhere before playoffs are over? If so, I would prefer to not be included - I don't share stats with my players / parents until after the season;)

A short while later this e mail arrived that read: “I appreciate it. If we get to the championship series then I'm good with you using it at that point).”

Well, I said this was a “first time ever” because for the past 10 years this coach has always provided stats for our publication that we put up on our widely read stats page, in both the publication and on our web site at hssr.com. I have not checked, but if this team’s games are live streamed through Game Changer or Facebook, that is the best scouting report you could ever give to your opponents. By live streaming your games you could be providing “real video” for opposing coaches to record your athletes in competition allowing them to observe your players strengths and weaknesses batting, fielding and all of the above for example! 

I am likely to ask God at the Gates of Heaven one day, why is the publishing of players stats somehow giving opponents an advantage over their competition? With all the social media available these days (in real time also) the publishing of stats should be the least of our worries. If stats are not important to the resumes of student athletes, or to the scrap books of our hard-working student athletes, and their parents, then go-ahead and take down the score boards on our ball fields and in our gyms, and quit keeping score!

(Yes, I honored the wishes of this coach but I will never request her stats again!)

The SCHSL has a wonderful partnership with Max Preps and I wish more coaches would use this media to at least publish their rosters so “we” in the media can make sure we have player’s names spelled correctly.

During this deadline one Max Preps soccer team site had a team roster on it, but it was missing the names of all three senior co-captains!  (I told one of the parents of this team to leave my name out of the conversation after I had to call them to ask them how they spelled their last name because no roster was available at their game I had just covered). I cover all games using player’s jersey numbers and match the numbers with names later.

On this deadline I also got a call back at exactly mid-night from Dillon head softball coach Stevie Grice. “You sound wide awake,” was the first thing he said when I answered the phone, still plugging away on deadline. Got in bed four hours later, and was back-up at 8 am sending text messages and e mails out to coaches all over South Carolina.

Lastly, I get some of the most unusual phone calls from people during the tense moments of a deadline. Some folks confuse the HSSR with the SCHSL, and they call at the wrong times sharing their concerns. “Sir, I just want to report that the plate umpire in our game yesterday was so confused that he kept going out to the field ref to consult with him to see if he had the count right out on the batter at the plate. Do you have any idea who this umpire was and why did he get assigned to my team’s game?”

After pausing for a few seconds, a stab at humor was attempted, “Mam, I have not a clue who the umpire was in your game yesterday. Nor, can I speak to his apparent confusion. However, it just so happens that the Sports Report needs a current copy of the stats from this team you follow. You mind stopping by the school and asking your favorite coach to send his stats in right away?”