Herald-Leader reassigns Josh Moore to UK Football, Jared Peck to Preps Sports

[Colonels_Wear_Blue]

Effective today, apparently. Josh has been covering the preps desk at the HL since this time in 2015. I thought he did a hell of a job with it. It's not too often that you see newspaper writers putting out actual stories about high school teams in other regions of the state. He'll be handling the UK Football beat moving forward.

 

Jared Peck, who is now the man in charge of the preps sports desk, has apparently been handling social media reporting for the Herald-Leader on game days as an assistant to Josh Moore, but has 30 years of sports writing experience. Got his start with the Paducah-Sun.

[NEERFAN]

I'll miss Josh on the HS beat.

[gchs_uk9]

Moore was terrific and will be missed. However, I’ve liked Peck’s work for a long time too. Happy for both.

[The Double Deuce]

No offense to either gentlemen, I'm sure they do Yeomen's work, but it is 2019 and everything I want to know about High School Sports in Kentucky I get from this website and its posters. :thumb:

[The Scribe]

Josh did a good job. Had big shoes to fill and filled them nicely.

 

Instead of moving him, you would think they would add a high school reporter but just another example of how large city newspapers don't value their high school sports coverage. Four people covering the UK Basketball/Football beat and one person covering eight high schools in Fayette County and a dozen more in the surrounding counties.

 

Newspaper management just don't get it. Or they don't care.

[rjs4470]

Josh did a good job. Had big shoes to fill and filled them nicely.

 

Instead of moving him, you would think they would add a high school reporter but just another example of how large city newspapers don't value their high school sports coverage. Four people covering the UK Basketball/Football beat and one person covering eight high schools in Fayette County and a dozen more in the surrounding counties.

 

Newspaper management just don't get it. Or they don't care.

 

It's neither. The problem is not enough people are reading or buying newspapers. It's a dying industry, especially at the local level. Local newspapers are dead, and the large city papers are more focused on national/regional stories because these are what still what few newspapers that get sold. So those local stories don't get covered because of limited interest, which leads to more complaints and even less readership, and further budget cuts. Overall there just simply isn't enough interest in newspapers for them to be able to afford to cover everything.

[Voice of Reason]

It's neither. The problem is not enough people are reading or buying newspapers. It's a dying industry, especially at the local level. Local newspapers are dead, and the large city papers are more focused on national/regional stories because these are what still what few newspapers that get sold. So those local stories don't get covered because of limited interest, which leads to more complaints and even less readership, and further budget cuts. Overall there just simply isn't enough interest in newspapers for them to be able to afford to cover everything.

 

Local stories are where I would focus resources. Local connects with your readers and will make people want to read your paper.

[sweet16]

Local stories are where I would focus resources. Local connects with your readers and will make people want to read your paper.

 

Agree. I read the papers for local stories.

[rjs4470]

Local stories are where I would focus resources. Local connects with your readers and will make people want to read your paper.

 

It’s not doable. Remember, we are talking about the big newspapers. It takes way too much time and too many resources for the big newspapers to cover all the local regions in their area. And people in Town A don’t care about what happens in Town B and so in. There’s just way too much ground to cover everything, which results in higher costs, more labor etc, but doesn’t fix the fact that there’s not enough ad or subscription revenue to make money because digital has taken over. Again, it’s a vicious cycle that Will end with the elimination of newspapers. There are people in their mid 20’s who have never picked up a newspaper and consume most of their information digitally. Within 10 years that generation will Be the primary drivers of the economy. How do newspapers win that group over?

[theguru]

I thought Josh did a good job covering Kentucky High School Sports, thanks Josh Moore!

 

I think I happen to be an expert on this topic and I can tell everyone there is no money in high school sports, at least not in Kentucky.

 

I don't know anything about the Herald Leader other than I assume it is like all newspapers, slowly dying out.

 

Josh is talented and if I was in charge at the HL I (too) probably would assign Josh to the last remaining and consistent cash cow, UK Athletics.

 

As far as Jared Peck is concerned, if he worked for the Paducah-Sun then he worked with Joey Fosko (Joey I hope you are resting in peace) which means he learned from one of the best and we should all be thankful to have him (but really anyone at this point) assigned to the preps sport desk.

[The Double Deuce]

Local stories are where I would focus resources. Local connects with your readers and will make people want to read your paper.

 

Too niche; if that was the right model, the Community Press and Recorder papers would have worked -- they were hyper-local. Even in a market with only 2.2 million adults like Greater Cincinnati, the more "local" you get, the less interesting you become to the majority of the market (outside of Pro and College sports, because at least you have 30% of the market that roots for each of the big 4 in Cincy [Reds, Bengals, UC and Xavier]).

[gchs_uk9]

It's a dying industry, especially at the local level. Local newspapers are dead...

 

I'm not sure I agree, unless we're debating on the meaning of "local." I think county papers still serve an important market. Large papers like the New York Times, Washington Post, etc. will always have their readership. The problem is regional papers that cover a handful of towns/counties around one city can't afford that coverage. The Herald-Leader has always done a good job of expanding coverage to not just Fayette County schools but also the surrounding counties; they can't afford to do that now.

[sweet16]

It’s not doable. Remember, we are talking about the big newspapers. It takes way too much time and too many resources for the big newspapers to cover all the local regions in their area. And people in Town A don’t care about what happens in Town B and so in. There’s just way too much ground to cover everything, which results in higher costs, more labor etc, but doesn’t fix the fact that there’s not enough ad or subscription revenue to make money because digital has taken over. Again, it’s a vicious cycle that Will end with the elimination of newspapers. There are people in their mid 20’s who have never picked up a newspaper and consume most of their information digitally. Within 10 years that generation will Be the primary drivers of the economy. How do newspapers win that group over?

 

You don’t have to be at every school every night. But if you put tidbits in and cover the schools periodically then people will read.

 

Online subscriptions have to outnumber print copies. People still read but more online.

[The Double Deuce]

 

Online subscriptions have to outnumber print copies. People still read but more online.

 

Of course they do, but whereas they used to be getting $20,000 for a full-page, full-color ad (and several of them), they now are getting ad dollars based on $6-$12/CPM. The model isn't sustainable. There is too much competition on the internet, whereas the Paper used to be THE source for news and information, above even TV and Radio. Now...not so much.

[rjs4470]

Of course they do, but whereas they used to be getting $20,000 for a full-page, full-color ad (and several of them), they now are getting ad dollars based on $6-$12/CPM. The model isn't sustainable. There is too much competition on the internet, whereas the Paper used to be THE source for news and information, above even TV and Radio. Now...not so much.

 

Bingo. Most of the big advertisers are now using digital instead newspaper advertising. Look at car dealers for example. Big dealers spent 100’s of thousands in the newspapers. But not anymore, because digital is such a better fit. Real Estate is the same way. Classified ads are dead. And the audience is all wrong for advertisers. It’s getting older and older. Throwing a few more stories about high school sports isn’t going to fix anything that’s wrong with the industry.