We want local!
Caller 1: I just wanted to thank the Dispatch for your excellent coverage of Gilroy’s field hockey team. I’m a former player and I’ve really enjoyed keeping up with the team’s success online. I don’t know any other paper that covers field hockey like you guys do. Anyway, just thought I’d tell you that. Thanks again.
Green Phone: Thank you, Caller 1. The city and the high school have a field hockey team we should all take pride in. And in addition to their success on the field (back-to-back league championships), coaches Adam and Erin Gemar have always been ready and willing to help out us in any way they can with the paper’s coverage. We certainly appreciate their continued cooperation.
Caller 2: A local newspaper should have local sports stories. We can see everything about the World Series and other things on TV. This should be local sports stories. There’s a lot of kids and adults in our town that are doing a lot of great things. They should be showing up in the paper.
Green Phone: Caller 2, we greatly respect your opinion. We agree that a lot of people are accomplishing a lot of great things on the fields and courts of our community. But while there’s always room for improvement, we do feel we’re doing our best to cover a wide range of athletes and sports. The World Series coverage did not replace or delay any planned, local coverage.
In addition, as we’ve heard from other callers, there are many people who actually do get their national sports news from the Dispatch. Maybe they don’t subscribe to the Mercury News. Maybe they don’t have cable TV. Maybe they don’t stay up for the 11 o’clock news.
We don’t run much national sports material – almost never on the front page of the section. Every once in awhile, though, an event in sports rises to the level of water-cooler material – where even your grandmother is talking about it at bridge club. We felt like the Red Sox ending their 86-year-old curse was one of those. At its core, though, this is a community paper, and its sports section will almost always reflect that. Trust us on that one.
Caller 3: Brett, just read your column on your personal World Series conflict and it made me want to give you a hug. It’s going to be OK. If I can give any advice, I’d say to cheer on the Sox because with them getting a win, the Cubs’ turn can’t be far behind. And you just don’t want to cheer on the Cardinals. Good luck with it.
Green Phone: Much to his horror, the Edge woke up Saturday morning and realized he had actually told the public he was having doubts about cheering against St. Louis. He claimed it must have been something he ate on Friday. As it turned out, he was more than happy to cheer on the once-cursed Red Sox. Even if this sweep already led to incessant bragging from his Boston buddy – and many more years of it to come – Brett said it was well worth it to see the Cardinals embarass themselves on baseball’s biggest stage.
