Marc Spears, the NBA writer for Yahoo Sports took some time to speak with the 2010 SJI class about the NBA finals and about how to become better in the journalism industry.
Spears, who formerly wrote for the Boston Globe and covered the Celtics, believes this game will be "a long series" and predicts the Lakers will win in seven games citing their size and wingspan advantage in the post
"Gasol is much better than he was two years ago," he said. Another advantage he thinks give the Lakers is Kobe Bryant, calling him Jordanesque so far in these playoffs.
The one advantage he believes the Celtics have is Rajon Rondo, who has come on strong in the 2010 playoffs. His assessment of Rondo's amazing progression from role player to star player is due to his confidence.
"He doesn't care he thinks he knows everything and to play with those all-stars you have to be like that." he said.
Spears, who is close with Rondo from his time covering the team, says that Rondo's confidence also comes from being an underdog for most of his basketball career.
As far as the business side goes Spears had a well of information on how to become and stay successful as a journalist in the sports world. One of his main points was that journalists need to build sources and contacts quickly.
"It can be intimidating to get to know these people, but I just say be yourself. Try to find something in common with him", Spears said.
His relationship with Ray Allen came out of his ability to talk about life as well as being an athlete. Talking with Ray on a personal level allowed him to be more comfortable talking with Spears for stories. He was so close with players that a rival reporter labeled him a "players guy", but he also mentioned not to "let players walk over you."
He also spoke about the transition he made from the Boston Globe to Yahoo Sports. As a writer for the globe he was able to utilize his proximity to break stories about teams, but at Yahoo he has to cover all NBA teams. "I had to reconstruct my brain on how to cover it," Spears said. "They want us to come up with something everyone else doesn't have. It's hard to not have a beat writer mentality."
His advice to young writers was to keep motivated by being creative. As a writer in a small market he would use alumni players who went pro for professional clips. As far as covering small events his advice was "Treat every event like the Super Bowl. Your job is to cover that event no matter what it is," he said. "People can tell whether you care or not."
Overall Spears gave the class, me in particular, a lot of vital information, but what stands out to me the most is that the job takes sacrifice and hard work. I also took away the fact that you have to work for a while before you get a big job.
"It takes time," Spears said, "none of it happens overnight."
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