Today's Sunday paper has 3 stories on the Pistons. Not even Piston fans follow the Pistons these days. Two stories on the Red Wings, a page recapping high school sports in a font size that requires a magnifying glass. Nothing on WMU, in fact basically nothing regarding college sports other than a big article that scUM plays Illinois today.

The lead article in the sports section is about Prince Fielder. Wow, baseball talk, with 4 inches of snow on the ground. I've got to call and dump this rag. My wife likes it for coupons, but whatever we save in coupons we lose in paying for the Gazette.

(02-12-2012 12:15 PM)Chipdip Wrote:  Today's Sunday paper has 3 stories on the Pistons. Not even Piston fans follow the Pistons these days. Two stories on the Red Wings, a page recapping high school sports in a font size that requires a magnifying glass. Nothing on WMU, in fact basically nothing regarding college sports other than a big article that scUM plays Illinois today.

The lead article in the sports section is about Prince Fielder. Wow, baseball talk, with 4 inches of snow on the ground. I've got to call and dump this rag. My wife likes it for coupons, but whatever we save in coupons we lose in paying for the Gazette.

Yeah, Sunday GR Press Sports is a joke too. The same Associated Press Prince Fielder story on the front page. Never mind that, though I know it's not popular on this board, the Hope-Calvin game was the biggest thing going locally, and is on Page 3.

In Sunday's paper we find the prep basketball roundups from ... Friday. Sure you could read them all on MLive earlier, but they don't do all the capsules in one article, so they can get more hits, and it takes forever, whereas the print roundup can be scanned in 90 seconds. The other silly thing MLive does is put a byline with all its prep game stories, so when you see it on the main page it looks like someone actually covered the game, but no, when you open it, just the two sentences that the coach called in. No need for a byline, you didn't do anything except type!

(02-12-2012 12:15 PM)Chipdip Wrote:  My wife likes it for coupons, but whatever we save in coupons we lose in paying for the Gazette.

Some papers nowadays offer a coupons-only delivery each week for a reduced rate. Not sure if the Gazette has that option but it might be worth considering. Especially if she uses enough coupons that their is still a net savings $-wise.

This Booth-MLive thing has been-is being mismanaged so badly one has to wonder if they are trying to hasten the death of the print editions.

i don't think it's being mismanaged, i think theyre doing it exactly as they planned, which is to have as close to a unified paper as possible across the state

the only thing that sucks about that is that there aren't a TON of people who pick up the paper with the intention of reading WMU sports as there are say for UM or MSU.

(02-13-2012 08:37 AM)SilentStryk09 Wrote:  the only thing that sucks about that is that there aren't a TON of people who pick up the paper with the intention of reading WMU sports as there are say for UM or MSU.

The number is more than you think. Kalamazoo is littered with "casual" WMU fans. ie-they follow WMU sports from a distance because they are afraid of being recognized as someone who does not following a Big Ten team. AKA bandwagon jumpers. When the team does exceptionally well, they will show up and chear for the Broncos, acting as if they've been there all along.

Tuesday Night Paper Sports Section

P.1
Red Wings header Mlive syndicated article
Pistons loss to Wizards (toilet bowl of NBA games) Mlive syndicated

P.2
A 1/3 of a page article on the "Lady K Wings." Ohhh yes, give me more, give me more!!!!!!
The rest a scoreboard and a 1/3 of a page Mlive ad.

P.3
AP story on Katie Upton from St. Joe being on the SI swim suit cover. This is sports????
Area boys bball ratings
A local high school wrestling article.

p.4
Tiger's packed and ready to head to Florida Mlive syndicated article
Lions article Mlive syndicated article
Izzo expecting more from Payne and Nix Mlive syndicated article
Bill Simonson Huge Opinion, i.e. stating the obvious article

P. 5
Mostly scoreboard
One AP article on lifting NFL black outs.

P.6
AP article Mountain West and CUSA to form a new league
AP article Oakland A's get Cuban player
AP another Tiger Woods article

And that's it. Only two local articles in 6 pages (lady K Wings, Allegan wrestler) and both were written days ago.

In a nutshell the entire newspaper is cobbled together from Mlive syndicated articles and AP releases.

There's a D-1 college only a mile and a half from where this rag is "supposedly" published. Who knew????????

Might as well get used to it. I don't think it's changing. I really do find it hard to believe that mlive can't support someone in GC's full time role in bball and football for wmu. It's downright violating how they gutted the info provided.

It's really only a matter of time until local newspapers are eliminated completely. Info will only be found online, larger newspapers will be the exception.

(02-14-2012 10:52 PM)EA3 Wrote:  Might as well get used to it. I don't think it's changing. I really do find it hard to believe that mlive can't support someone in GC's full time role in bball and football for wmu. It's downright violating how they gutted the info provided.

It's really only a matter of time until local newspapers are eliminated completely. Info will only be found online, larger newspapers will be the exception.

Or, as GC once told me. Someone may come into towns with healthy papers like GR and Kazoo and start a new paper. As he said, there's plenty of experienced talent available who would love to give it a go.

The Ann Arbor newspaper was the first paper in the state to go strictly internet. It's failed badly. The Mlive model of 3 day delivery and box sales plus internet has had reasonable success in other markets. The problem I see is the paper version is USA Today Light. It's not a Kalamazoo paper it's a Michigan paper. And I don't for a moment believe it's playing to the customers.