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Stewart's Twitter page a hot topic
The Charleston Daily Mail Wrote:Stewart's Twitter page a hot topic
By Mike Casazza
Daily Mail sports writer
March 27, 2009
MORGANTOWN - The secret is out. Truth be told, Bill Stewart is relieved ... and grateful.
West Virginia's football coach is indeed the personality powering his Twitter page (http://Twitter.com/CoachStewart), but he is neither the mind nor fingers behind its growth and popularity.
"I'm at a crossroads," Stewart said. "I want to be informative and I want to tell our people what's going on. I just worry about people thinking there's too much of that and not enough coaching."
"I'm an old-school guy."
"Old school" is out and Stewart is now in the new world of micro-blogging on Twitter, a social networking service that allows an author to send updates to followers. Anyone who signs up to follow Stewart receives an alert when he has news.
That aspect excites Stewart, but he remains worried.
"I have some ideas and I think it can be really good," Stewart said. "It can help with recruiting. It can help with ticket sales. It can help with fundraising."
"I'm just not comfortable doing it because I'm not from this era. I didn't grow up with this stuff. I don't get all of it."
Stewart is one of several college coaches on Twitter. Despite no publicity, his page had close to 300 followers as it neared the end of its second week.
* * *
NEEDLESS TO say, this wasn't Stewart's idea. His director of football communications, Mike Montoro, took a Web-based seminar last month about Twitter and started tinkering with an account for WVU football.
"When I was doing it, just trying to figure it out to see how simple it was, I had a bunch of people following me," Montoro said. "I thought it could be pretty useful as far as getting information out to our fans."
Last Monday, Montoro shared the idea with some people on the WVU Sports Communications staff. John Antonik, the director of new media, suggested Montoro use Stewart as the subject.
Stewart scoffed.
"I don't know about that technology stuff. I can't do it," he said.
"You don't have to do it," Montoro said. "You tell me what you want to say and what you want to talk about and I'll handle it."
Stewart thought for a moment, considered the benefits and agreed.
Montoro added one condition.
"It has to be you doing it or it's not worth doing," Montoro said. "It's got to be your words."
This is where Stewart becomes bashful. He does not want people to think he's putting time aside to Twitter, that he's neglecting his coaching duties so he can become a salesman.
And he's not.
"I see the positives, but I also see people saying, 'Why isn't he coaching instead of sitting on the Internet?'" he said. "That's always in the back of my mind because I'm old-school. That's why I can't go hook, line and sinker here."
"I want to jump in with both feet, but I'm still old Bill Stewart. I'm a football coach. I'm not an entertainer. I'm not a journalist. I'm not good in that world. I'm good at being a football coach, but I will try to get the facts out."
He has help. Through the normal course of the day, he sees Montoro three or four times and they'll quickly go over a few things worth Twittering - that is, if something is worthy of a Twitter that day.
Spontaneity rules, too.
Stewart might text Montoro with an idea. He's also been known to call reporters out of the blue to talk about something he's just seen on TV. That happens to Montoro, too, who then has the unique chore of paring Stewart's sometimes elaborative thoughts down to 140 characters or less, while keeping it authentic.
"It's pretty easy to handle the texts because the way he texts is pretty easy," Montoro said. "I really try to make it as personal toward him so it reflects his personality as much as I can."
There is no firm structure ... no requirement for updates per day ... no guidelines for what can be included.
"We're taking it slowly, but we're trying to stay ahead of the curve," Montoro said.
Lately, the Twitters have been about spring practice, but also speaking engagements, best wishes to the Big East Conference and other WVU teams and athletes and recommended reading about the football program.
"Say you and your wife had a baby," Stewart said. "I'd say, 'Congratulations to my friend.'"
* * *
STEWART VOWS he will not "chat" with followers. That's his rule. Only one more exists. Stewart can't recruit.
He can brag about or bring attention to anything that might reflect favorably on his program and indirectly impress a prospective student-athlete.
He must otherwise conduct himself in the world of Twitter as he does in everyday life and follow the rules governing interaction with those prospective student-athletes.
"That's it, really," said Chad Wall, WVU's interim director of NCAA compliance. "But one thing we're also going to have to monitor, because it is open to everybody, is that there's no interaction from others in regard to recruiting."
A high school sophomore, for example, could follow Stewart's updates and could even comments on Stewart's page. Stewart can't subscribe to the sophomore's page and can't respond to any comment or question.
The immediate issue is not how Stewart will comply, but how others will.
"It's something fairly new and we're all kind of sitting around thinking how we'll do this and what the ramifications are," Wall said.
"It's been pretty good so far, but, again, it's in the early stages and it hasn't been publicized at all. My concern is how things go when the season starts and we go through the new recruiting process."
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