Sports Writing: How I found a New, Yet Old, Passion

By: Jack Kutz

Photo courtesy of Story Blocks

Throughout my life, sports have always been a passion of mine. However, I found that I did not have an opportunity to put that passion into professional experience. That was, until this semester, where I have begun to work with JMU Sports News, an independent JMU sports-focused journalism group.

How I got into Sports Writing

When I was in elementary school, my morning tradition was checking baseball scores from the night before, and walking to my bus stop where I talked to my neighbor about how the Baltimore Orioles did, as that was our favorite team. Each day presented a new opportunity to talk about and experience sports, which is what sparked my love for sports writing and analysis. 

Throughout the years before college, I stayed involved with sports in my community by playing in recreational leagues, PA announcing at my little league, and attending local high school games, however, I did not got into sports writing until my senior year of high school.

During my senior year, I was a part of my high school’s news team, where every day we recorded school announcements, weather, and sports. Although I was the anchorman and weatherman, sports were always my favorite topic to discuss, and I conducted a lot of research on my high school’s sports so I could report on them as well as possible, which is what inspired me to get into the world of sports media.

My Experience at JMU

When I got to James Madison University, I declared my minor as sports communication. During my first three years of college, I did not gain much experience in sports writing, but gained experience writing about other topics. For the most part, I enjoyed it, but it was not the kind of writing I wanted to do for the rest of my life, making me forget how much love I had for sports writing. 

However, during my senior year, an opportunity presented itself. I saw that JMU Sports News needed a student contributor for the year, and as an avid JMU sports fan, I took the opportunity to apply, and after an interview, I was in.

Throughout this amazing opportunity I have been able to do a number of great things- I get to record a weekly podcast, create digital content, and write an article every week about JMU sports. Despite all of these being different each from each other they all come back to one thing: sports writing. 

Sports Writing Applies to Everything Else

Sports writing has provided me with many opportunities. One for example has been how it has taught me different writing strategies such as changing up sentence structure in order to be straight to the point in order to avoid the audience getting bored. I have also learned to build up tension. Sports are filled with constant suspense and it is important to reflect that in writing. When covering a game, I have found that I like to build up particular moments over the course of a paragraph or even a sentence to create a more dramatic effect. 

These strategies do not just apply to sports, but also to everything else that I write about. In my advanced public relations writing class, I applied these new strategies I learned to a variety of topics, ranging from charity events, the forklift industry, and breweries. 

Working with JMU Sports News sparked my love for sports writing once again as well as writing as a whole and has reminded me why I fell in love with it in the first place. More importantly, it has shown me that I value writing regardless of the subject. I am grateful for the opportunity to have rediscovered that passion and I am excited to see where it takes me next.