Tuesday, January 31, 2012

National Signing Day Coverage

Fax machines in college athletic departments across the country will be turning-and-burning throughout the day on Wednesday as prospective student-athletes make their official commitments as part of National Signing Day.

For college football fans, it's a can't-miss day on their calendars; that day when hope springs eternal and everyone is still undefeated for another seven months. Fans will scrutinize their favorite school's newest recruits, compare them to their rivals and wait for their coaches to size 'em all up.

At Tennessee, fans will actually be able to watch online the fax machine as it goes into overdrive with NLI's. Hopefully someone remembers to load it up with paper tonight.

At UC Davis, we're not going to have a webcam on our fax machine, lest all those offers of free trips to the Bahamas get more play time than they actually deserve. But we are going to bring you more and quicker coverage than ever before. And not just of the Aggie football team's newest members, but also those for men's and women's soccer and field hockey as well which also have signing days on Wednesday.

We'll have plenty of ways for you to follow all the action.

UCDAVISAGGIES.COM - Your home for all things Aggies is your home for all things NLI on National Signing Day. Jump on our first-ever Football Signing Day Central Page as we add the names of the Aggies' signees as soon as their paperwork is approved. Check out the list of names, where they're from and all the other particulars as soon as we receive them in Athletics Communications.

Of course, at the end of the day, we'll have complete news releases with bios, coaches comments and other key data for all of our signees across the different sports.

TWITTER AND FACEBOOK - All signees, whether they're for football, soccer or field hockey, will be immediately tweeted to nearly 2,000 followers of the official UC Davis Athletics twitter page. We'll give you the important up-front details so you'll know almost the exact moment we know. Want to be part of that group? Follow UC Davis Athletics by going here.

FOOTBALL SIGNING PARTY - Come on out to Aggie Stadium - future home for those newest UC Davis football players - and join the football coaching staff and other supporters for a celebration of the recruiting class on Wednesday at 5 p.m. Head coach Bob Biggs will talk about the newest Aggies and will show a highlight film (which will be available on the website in coming days). Note: Per NCAA rules, no prospects or family of prospects are permitted to be in attendance.

There's a lot going on throughout the day Wednesday. It's more than we've every done before and we hope you're a part of it.

And our fax machine is loaded with paper and ready to go.

Mike Robles, assistant athletics director for athletics communications. 

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Basketball Homecoming

Bob Williams was the first coach I worked with when I started at UC Davis in 1995. I was still a relative greenhorn in sports information and was slightly more than intimidated by Williams who was building a highly respected Div. II program.

Three years later, he led UC Davis to the pinnacle of Div. II basketball, taking a non-scholarship Aggie team to its first-ever Elite Eight in Louisville and, ultimately, an improbable national championship. It was a professional and personal highlight I will never forget.

His star rose quickly after that and with the NCAA trophy having barely collected California dust, Williams was scooped up by UC Santa Barbara where he has since resided and has enjoyed success.

Thursday brings Williams back for his annual visit to Hamilton Court with all of his championship memories and an NCAA banner hanging overhead. He'll shake hands with public address announcer Larry Swanson, former Associate Athletics Director and his longtime friend, and he'll say hello to the staff and Aggie supporters who were part of that title.

And then he'll toss his fondness for UC Davis into his bag as the Aggies and Gauchos do battle at The Pavilion. Memories only go so far.

My guess is most of the students and many of the fans in the stands won't know his Aggie background but I'll never forget my time working with Bob and the memories that came with him having fun at my expense. 

I was barely acquainted with him and on my first roadtrip when the coaches and I made our way for some late-night fast food. Believe me - well, you don't have to if you know anything about me - but it was the last kind of meal I needed and Bob knew it. He could see it. Heck, we could all see it.

I ordered a combination-something, jumbo size of course, and, here's the kicker, a large Diet Coke. Like Diet Coke was the elixir for the billions of calories waiting for me at the drive-thru window. I relayed my order to Williams - remember, I barely knew him which mattered little to him - and he slowly turned around from his driver's seat to look at me in the back, gave me a long stare and said, "Geez, Robles, what the &$#* are you getting Diet Coke for after all of that?" 

I loved it. I also lost my appetite. Temporarily.

A bookend memory to my tenure with Williams came at the press conference the day before the 1998 NCAA Championship game when he held comedic court with the assembled media. Asked how his team was faring on the nearly week-long trip, Williams mentioned it was worse for Swanson and I who were rooming together and he joked had started bickering like a husband and wife because we both "snore like a couple of buffaloes put in a cage."

Beautiful. Especially in newspaper print.

Williams won 156 games for the Aggies, went to the NCAA Division II postseason four times and, of course, helped bring home a national championship. He'll also bring a very talented UCSB team into the Pavilion 

He still calls me "Los", a nickname he gave me many years ago and for which I never got a good explanation on its origin, and I'll look forward to saying hello. I'll also remember what he taught me, particularly with being accountable and taking ownership for mistakes, a lesson I still carry to this day. I thanked him for that when we chatted briefly last year.

I hope the Aggies beat the Gauchos. He'd want me to do nothing else.

*********************************

STILL TRYING HARD
It's not the season anyone following the Aggie men's basketball team expected, let alone the players and coaches who are in the midst of it. The resolve to turn things around is definitely there. No one's given up on the year and they hope no one's given up on them.

Injuries, a young roster and a difficult schedule - including a nearly month-long roadtrip - provide legitimate excuses but Coach Jim Les is not into excuses and neither is his team.

Coach Les talks about focusing on the process, on getting better. The players have been saying the same. Get a little better everyday. 

The record may indicate otherwise, but this team has a dangerous side. The Aggies are among the top three-shooting teams in the country, ranking 29th in three-pointers per game (8.2) and 38th in percentage (.383). Pretty impressive.

Tyler Les has proven to be one of the most effective Division I shooters as well, rising to 10th among all Div. I players in the latest rankings by making 46.6 percent of his three-pointers. Oh yeah, and he's 46th in the NCAA with 2.7 made per game. 

There are times when he seems more comfortable shooting from the midcourt stripe than the three-point line.

Yes, the Aggies looked at double-digit deficits in the first halves of their first four Big West games but in three of them they came back to either tie or take the lead, and in the other (at Big West leader Long Beach State) they battled back to within two.

Three league losses have come by a total of seven points, two of the games against teams (UC Riverside, Cal State Fullerton) that are currently tied for second. A couple of minutes of the basketball gods shining on them rather than against them and they'd be 3-3 instead of 0-6.

I love watching Coach Les work the sidelines. I really think if the game didn't end he'd still love to stay out there and keep coaching. He's constantly teaching and treating every game like it's tied and every shot is the game-winner.

The Aggies are busting their you-know-whats as if they're 17-1 rather than the mirror's opposite. I see it every game. I see them diving for every loose ball, encouraging each other like each possession is their last, and I see them ready to turn the corner to better results.

The question is, will you be there to greet them? I hope you will be. 

Mike Robles, assistant athletics director for athletics communications, hopes the stands are filled for the Aggie men's basketball games against UCSB (Thu.) and on Cal Poly (Sat.). Yes, he is a graduate of Cal Poly and, yes, he grew up around the Gauchos' program but those allegiances will be put in HIS bag this weekend. He also notes he does not "snore like a buffalo." His wife has no comment.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Geography 101

The 2012 UC Davis women's lacrosse team took its head shots last week. In updating the photos on the online roster, I noticed something. I can put into words what I saw, or I can give you a visual aid.

I like the second way (click to expand):


EDIT (1.24.12): Junior Hannah Mirza just alerted me that her hometown is actually Westchester, N.Y., not Mill Valley, Calif. as was previously listed on rosters (apparently, her parents lived there for a year). So make that nine Californians and 14 out-of-staters.

Yep. Nine student-athletes hail from the Golden State, while the other 14 come from 11 other states. To my knowledge, this is the first Aggie team from which the majority of players come from outside California's boundaries.

Both UC Davis and the overall UC system has targeted an increase in out-of-state students in the past year. The Chancellor's plan for an expanded UC Davis placed a significant value on increasing non-California residents, as was reported in Comstock's Magazine (and reprinted on the Chancellor's own site). In a campus press release last April, vice chancellor Lora Jo Bossio noted that "enrolling more out-of-state and international students will enhance the educational experience for all students and prepare them to be successful in a global society."

It's also preparing them to be successful in the MPSF.

Of course, the reason for the Aggie lacrosse team's geographic composition is rather simple: although lacrosse continues to grow on the Pacific end (and in the greater Denver, Colo. area), the sport remains more popular in a stretch of the East Coast from New England down into Virginia. I liken it to water polo, only in reverse: while water polo continues to grow in popularity on the side of the country were Saturday Night Live is actually live, its mother lode remains in California.

This isn't to say that California fails to produce fine lacrosse talent. Several years ago, Katie McMahon (Pleasanton, Calif.) led the nation in goals scored. The team's returning All-MPSF performer is Vannessa Jamison, from Poway. Last year's leading scorers were seniors Gina Hoffmire (Corte Madera) and Christina Corsa (Danville). So head coach Elaine Jones (from Baltimore, Md., by the way) continues to do an admirable job mining California for talent while training one eye eastward.

The Aggie lacrosse team kicks off its season in February and hosts its first home games in March (vs. LIU on Mar. 11, Central Connecticut on Mar. 19). The games take place out at Aggie Stadium. Personally, I hope those on campus who have made out-of-state recruitment a priority will check out a game or two.

And yes, I know Aggie Stadium is a long walk from the center of campus, but many of the players... well, they came a long way, too.

Mark Honbo, assistant athletics communications director, considered it a personal victory when he (a California native) taught an SID at a small Virginia-based university how to keep women's lacrosse stats.

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

From Aggie Blue to... lime green?

I often use the Thinking Outside The Boxscore blog to talk about former Aggie student-athletes who have enjoyed landmark moments in their post-UC Davis careers. Quincy Amarikwa now wears Colorado Rapids burgundy. Daniel Fells wears the Broncos' orange, navy and white. Daniel Descalso wears, well, St. Louis Cardinal. This former Aggie student-athlete chose a different color:



Those who followed our athletics program in the late 1990s probably recognize the moves, even if you can't see the face. That's Kenny Kane, the UC Davis soccer player who served as the Aggie Pack emcee under the alter ego "Chicken Man." That spastic physical comedy used to energize our crowds at football, basketball and gymnastics events.

I'm sure it also confused a few opponents, too -- something of a physical manifestation of "Bossy Cow Cow."

In Aggie Pack: The Documentary, I credited Kane for being an innovator for Aggie Pack. Phil Champlin had done an admirable job assembling and organizing the crowds in the first two years, but it was Kane who brought that crowd to a frenzy.

Many of Kenny's idea remained with Aggie Pack long after he left our campus. The tube socks that fly into the stands at games? Yeah, Kenny started that. Candy Madness? Also his creation, although back in the day, we targeted candy to our loudest fans rather than showering the audience in random fashion. By the way, we also had Aloe Vera Madness, Soap Bar Madness and (my favorite) Foam Head Madness.

In fact, the mere idea that he showed up in a costume -- or in character, as the show-biz types say -- was a Kane creation. Back then, the sideline of an Aggie Pack event might feature Kenny's Chicken Man, the Aggie Farmer, Pinky Floyd, a pair of Jersey cows and the SuperPope. Inspired by the movie Braveheart, several members of the men's volleyball club created the Men In Kilts. The Chicken Man and the Men in Kilts later gave way to Indiana Aggie and the Kiko The Burrito Bomber. (Just as an aside, I enjoyed a flashback this year: Kayla Varney and Lev Girshfeld showed up at several home matches as a gorilla and a banana. Absolutely a throwback.)

Fans of the comedy It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia get the Green Man suit. Those who haven't seen that show are likely confused. But everyone can't help but look at that in amusement or bewilderment.

That, in a nutshell, was the Chicken Man.

Kenny Kane still delivers his unusual brand of comedy all over the country. You can get a sample of it or check out his upcoming dates at his website www.kennykane.com.

Mark Honbo, assistant director of athletics communications, briefly appeared as Joliet Jake Blues during the 1995-96 athletics year. He saw Kane go from an open mic night at Laughs Unlimited to featuring for Brad Sherwood at the San Jose Improv to giving assistant A.D. Scott Brayton a lap dance as the headliner at the City Hall Comedy shows in Davis.

Saturday, January 14, 2012

Tales From The Road

A little bit of this, a little bit of that while on the road with the Aggie men's basketball team.

THE CURIOUS CASE OF DOMINIC LIPPI
I'm sure neither Dominic Lippi or I will forget his official court debut for the Aggie men's basketball team on Thursday night. I just think we'll remember it for different reasons.

Lippi, a freshman guard from Alameda who once scored 15 points in the last three minutes to help his high school team win a NorCal Championship, played the final 52 seconds against Big West leader Long Beach State.

It was his first action of the regular season and I'm sure provided some personal excitement amidst a tough loss to the 49ers. Lippi wasted little time getting in on the action, quickly erasing the zeroes on his stat line by picking up a rebound, a turnover and narrowly missing his first points from the free throw line.

That much he'll remember. I'll recall his first game for what happened after.

Seems that technology didn't know Lippi was on our team because when he checked into the game, the computer stats program couldn't find him, setting off a postgame convention of stats-type people - myself included - to try and rectify the situation.

The stats program doesn't much care for adding players to the game file after all is said and done so it revolted by mixing up player stats. Each fix seemed to lead to another problem before something very close to the correct stats was produced.

I volunteered to make the final fixes to the file which was the least I could do because it was my roster file that somehow dropped Lippi. 

As I examined the new play-by-play coding in the game file during my CPR, I started noticing random "12's" scattered in places where nothing should be – or was before. 

Guess who wears #12 for the Aggies? 

I replaced it all with new coding - sans #12 - and nearly an hour after the game a final stats packet was available. Coaches were long gone but the online world of ESPN, the NCAA, etc., finally had their stats.

But Dominic Lippi made one final appearance later that night after I returned to my hotel. I received a slightly revised game file but that tiny update inadvertently threw things out of whack again and I spent a couple of hours in the wee morning getting everything back in order before sending it back to LBSU.

And, yes, some of the fixes included removing more "12's" from coding. When Lippi makes an appearance, he really makes an appearance.

In the end, everyone had correct stats and Dominic Lippi made his Aggie debut in memorable fashion. He's a hard-working player and here's looking to him making all future memories for me on the court.

RED AND BLUE PARADE
One of my semi-annual tasks is inputting the dates and times of all Aggie athletics events into my computer's iCal calendar. It's a tedious, time-consuming task but allows me to see everything our athletics communications staff is responsible for over the coming months.

It also helps when my wife Linda asks me on Sundays, "What nights will you be home for dinner?"

Events in blue in my iCal are home, road game are in red. I can look at entire months at a glance and pinpoint busy days - ones that have more blue than a tropical sky - and can begin planning staffing and equipment needs.

As we enter the New Year, our staff - as are most folks in the athletics department - is readying for what we call "crossover", a usually four-week period in the fall and a 6-8 week time in the winter and spring where sports seasons overlap and we scramble daily to keep up with home and road events.

iCal March


 As an Aggie fan, there are no shortage of events for you to see. Only five days in February and six in March, the latter because of final exams - are without some kind of UC Davis Athletics event somewhere. Take a look above for a red-and-blue flavor at what I see on my iCal calendar for March.

Not surprisingly, weekends are the heaviest. On the light end, Saturday, Feb. 4 has just four events (one at home) while Saturday, Mar. 10 is filled with is filled with two home games for women's water polo, a baseball game against Seattle, a huge track meet and a softball tournament.

Oh, and that's also the weekend of the Big West Basketball Tournament in Anaheim, potentially impacting my staff considerably. 

Note to my wife, I might not be home for dinner that night.

Still, the takeaway here is there are lots of chances for you to follow the Aggies and we hope you do. Check out our online composite athletics calendar for a quick way to see everything at once.

DOUBLE-DUTY PIECHOWSKI
Sometimes our office is called upon to fill in gaps at home games if there is a need. In addition to our normal responsibilities, we've all been called upon to run scoreboards, handle public address duties, etc.

Assistant director Amanda Piechowski has added singing the national anthem to that list although her talent landed her that gig.

Thursday night, for the second year in a row, she delivered the Star Spangled Banner prior to a women's basketball game at The Pavilion. I tried to tune in online and watch while I was with the men's team in Long Beach but the only sound my computer was picking up was the LBSU men's basketball radio announcer.

Something tells me Amanda wasn't singing about the 49ers' starting lineup but that's what I heard in my headphones as she stood at midcourt at The Pavilion.

Things must've gone well because I was able to see the women's coaching staff give her plenty of high-fives. Then it was back to her courtside seat where she took care of her usual duties.

Amanda is also our baseball contact and has handled national anthem duties at Dobbins Stadium as well, so if you missed her on Saturday, don't be surprised if you hear her encore performance before she settles in to figure out hits and errors.

Assistant Athletics Director Mike Robles assures Dominic Lippi and his family that he is in fact on the computer stats roster file for Saturday's game at Cal State Northridge. And while Robles didn't hear Amanda Piechowski sing the national anthem on Thursday, he can vouch for her singing prowess, evidenced in the office by numerous afternoons of her delivering every soundtrack from the cast of Glee.

Friday, January 13, 2012

Before Pen Touches Paper

UPDATED FEB. 8, 5:20 p.m.

Although most of our work involves the day-to-day operations of staff events, writing up press releases and recaps, maintaining the website, etc., a small part of the UC Davis athletics communications slate is dedicated to penning an article in each issue of the the alumni magazine.

Mike Robles composes the majority of athletics-related material in the magazine, but the remainder of our staff has taken a turn at writing up a story. If I may allow myself a shameless plug, here are a few articles I've submitted to the magazine in years past. Unfortunately, I can't locate my previous articles (Jamey Wright, the Med School Five) on the UC Davis Magazine website, so I only can go back a few years:

Kelly Albin: NCAA Woman of the Year (Winter 2005)
UC Davis Breeds Coaching Success (Fall 2007)
Daniel Descalso feature (Winter 2011)
Sig Mejdal: A Numbers Game (Winter 2011)
Jennifer Gross sidebar (Summer 2011)

In all honesty, writing for the UC Davis Magazine should come as a snap. The articles generally clock in at about 1,200 words. A typical event recap on our website ranges from 400 to 700 words, depending on the sport and the amount of available information (a five-match volleyball marathon takes longer to summarize than a 7-0 road win in tennis). A season preview can push 2,000 words. At face value, one would think this article should take me an hour and a pot of coffee.

But here's the rub:
a) the deadlines seem to fall during inconvenient times: in the thick of fall season, right as basketball starts; right as our teams report in August; or during the "crossover" from winter to spring when UC Davis has had as many as 17 active teams.

b) we tend to write about alumni, who are not as readily available for interviews as our current student-athletes or coaches.

c) Brevity is not my strong suit, as is evident from my blog posts. With the magazine editors looking for broader stories, the challenge is cutting down to 1,200 words. (This is a far cry from a scene in the Carl Reiner comedy Summer School, when a student reached the minimum size of an essay by writing "that why I liked this movie very, very, very, very, very, very, very much.")

For the purposes of Thinking Outside The Boxscore, I thought it might be interesting to provide a behind-the-scenes glimpse of putting together these articles. In the interest of disclosure, some of the initial entries of the timeline have been written retroactively. But for the most part, I'll attempt to make this a "live" blog of the process.

Friday, Jan. 6 - Met with Jan Conroy (executive director), Kathleen Holder (managing editor) and Clifton Parker (associate editor) of University Communication. We do these meetings on a quarterly basis, mostly to drum up story ideas. The Bob Biggs retirement and the new athletics director will wait. A feature on KDVS Sports will serve as the sports story for the Spring 2012 issue. The idea was spurred by an unusual coincidence -- former Aggie baseball player Rich Waltz, now an announcer for Fox Sports Florida and the MLB Network, called Descalso's first major league homer -- but also by my desire to get more students to take an interest in broadcasting Aggie sports.

Note: at this point, I was under the incorrect understanding that Waltz never broadcasted for KDVS but rather got into the business after graduation. I wasn't sure how I would incorporate him into the feature, but I knew he had to be mentioned. Waltz has arguably gone the farthest in the industry -- so much so that he would make a fine candidate for the Aggie Legacy Award.

So that's it. A total of 1,000 words on KDVS Sports, discussing the opportunities available on this campus and the radio and TV careers that have come about even though UC Davis does not have a true broadcast journalism major.

Monday, Jan. 9 - Begin creating a short list of some possible interviews. Much of the focus of this story will be the current guys, namely sports director Steve Vote and former sports director Ben Taylor. But this is an alumni magazine, so I need to line up KDVS Sports Alumni. Among the possibilities: Eric Hasseltine (Memphis Grizzlies play-by-play and Memphis sports talk show host), Jason Ross (sports director for Sacramento's own KHTK 1140 AM and the radio voice of -- oh yes -- Sacramento State football), Scott Marsh (radio voice for UC Davis football and men's basketball).

Other possibilities are Matias Godinez, who served more behind the scenes for KDVS but now offers Spanish color commentary for the 49ers; and Michael McGauley, who does news and traffic for various entities in California. Yet another is Scott Moak, who is not a broadcaster but whose voice is probably heard as much as anyone: he does P.A. for the Kings, Hornets and nearly every other Sacramento-area sports entity.

Wednesday, Jan. 11 - Talk informally with Waltz, who calls on his way to College Park, Maryland (he also does ACC basketball for Fox Sports). Oddly, he is about to meet with my former boss, Doug Dull, now the associate A.D. for the Terps.

Turns out, Waltz did serve as sports director for KDVS and, he adds, his broadcast partner was Andy Reichwald. I abashedly admit I don't know Andy. Waltz gives me the short version of his old friend's CV: ESPN Major League Baseball and Monday Night Football. Another ESPN producer, Tim Sullivan, followed Waltz and Reichwald. Pretty good roots right there. I also get a pretty good overview of Waltz' career, ranging from calling Aggie basketball games to landing his first job in minor league hockey to his current role with the Marlins.

Broadcasting at that level is effectively a form of show business, I think. These guys get to this level with a combination of talent and perseverance, plus an ability to recognize and seize opportunities (which some people scornfully call "luck"). My call to Rich is about 15 minutes long, but it's clear he has all of these qualities.

After getting off the phone, I look up Reichwald's name in Google. Among the search results are a few sports Emmys. Yeah, add him to the list.

Thursday, Jan. 12 - Prior to the women's basketball game, I brief former KDVS sports director Ben Taylor (who still does the call for Aggie football and women's basketball) on the magazine story. Naturally, he's pretty excited to get some awareness on his operation. While this is happening, Waltz sends me a bunch of photos of himself on the job: one in the Marlins booth, another with Tommy Hutton out at Wrigley Field, plus a head shot. He also answers a few additional questions for the story and provides an action photo from his playing days, and some contact info for Reichwald.

I also make arrangements to interview Steve Vote, the current sports director. It will be Steve's job to recruit future KDVS Sports talent, so I hope the magazine article will help him in that cause.

Friday, Jan. 13 - Reichwald responds via email. His vacation schedule is such that I can reach him that day or wait until the 23rd. Hoping to have my story done by the latter date, I get on the horn before I can finish the email. One hour of pure gold: memories of Lower Freeborn, calling Aggie games with Waltz, the Hamilton Towel Brigade, selling ads to Longs Drugs, his first job working Dodger games, and many, many familiar names. This will take twice as long to transcribe, but it will be worth every moment.

One cool nugget won't make the article so I'll put it here: during Game 6 of the 2011 World Series, his son turned to him and asked, "Dad, can I stay up to watch this?"

"Ethan," Reichwald replied, "not only can you stay up, but you have to stay up... this is awesome." The younger Reichwald rooted for the Cardinals because of his favorite player, Albert Pujols. The older Reichwald rooted for the Cardinals because of UC Davis grad Descalso, who Andy met prior to a game earlier in the season. Sharing a thrilling baseball game with his son at home was among his fondest sports moments, and this is coming from a guy who produced the game in which Barry Bonds broke Hank Aaron's record and who once interviewed Don Newcombe on KDVS' own airwaves.

Friday, Jan. 13 - Received some nice art from Reichwald: two shots of him in the Monday Night Baseball trucks, plus photos taken under the monster video board at Cowboys Stadium and another at Target Field's opening day.

Here are samples of Waltz (with Hutton at left) and Reichwald (right). Sure makes my office seem very, very small.



* * * * *

UPDATES SINCE JAN. 13:

Tuesday, Jan. 17 & Thursday, Jan. 19 - Spent several hours transcribing the recordings from my conversations with Waltz and Reichwald, the latter of which was much longer. This isn't quite as simple as writing down everything said, like a court stenographer does. (I'd love to learn how to do that, by the way.) As I listen, I begin the early stages of putting certain elements of the story into prose, not knowing whether or not I'll use it. Other parts of the conversation must be transcribed verbatim, as I want to use it as an actual quote.

That's one of the beautiful parts of interviewing broadcasters (or in Andy's case, a former broadcaster) -- they know how to articulate their thoughts better than most subjects.

Friday, Jan. 20 (a.m.) - Lined up interviews with current KDVS sports director Steve Vote and previous sports director Ben Taylor, both of whom call the action for the UC Davis women's basketball team. I fear my article has shifted focus to Waltz/Reichwald, which isn't a bad thing given that it IS an alumni magazine.

I'm curious to hear from these two, about how they got into broadcasting and what experiences they've had early on. Ben is already working on launching his career, having created a website with an online reel. Does Steve plan on doing the same? I won't know until I sit down with them.

Friday, Jan. 20 (p.m.) - Interviewed both Ben and Steve, one after the other. As I said before, Ben has already taken steps toward advancing his broadcasting career. Steve is headed to law school, but he provided me with an interesting note: he credits his experience at KDVS for making him a better candidate for law school.

A photo from my own camera of Ben and Steve doing a postgame wrap-up at Santa Clara earlier this year:



Both of these guys had a fair amount of common ground with their predecessors Waltz and Reichwald. I suspect if I were to interview other past KDVS sports directors - Hasseltine, JRoss, Rick Heron, Jason Belzer, et al. - I would find continued agreement: serving that post provided as good an education as anything they received in the classroom.

A thousand words? I'll never make it.

Sunday, Jan. 22 - Gymnastics ended in time for people to get to their nearest TV screen for the 49er game. The water polo results arrived around 6 p.m., which freed up the evening to...

Nope, decided to sift through my recordings of Ben and Steve. This article will run in the early spring which times itself well for some things (e.g. the annual KDVS fundraiser) but misses out on others. In particular, Steve spoke about recruiting new volunteers. It simply won't be timely in March/April, so I'll quote it here:

"If people want to get involved, this is the best time to do it. This is the heart of our year. We have a little bit of women's basketball conference left. We have the Big West tournament and possibly the NCAA tournament. Then we have baseball and softball which are the best. It's a lot of experience and, to me, it's the hardest. The action isn't thrust into your face. It's an art form that's different than football or basketball because there is a rhythm to your speech that you have to master. You can't speed through everything or you'll end up with dead air of you'll be searching for things to say."

So there. If any interested students read this, get in touch with KDVS Sports in January and February. The volume of games combined with the six- and nine-inning formats of the diamond sports make for numerous on-air opportunities for those hoping to learn the trade.

Up next: a visit to Tuesday's Aggie Talk show (7 p.m.) to get some photos and to soak in the environment. Plus, I'm guessing a certain football game will be a hot topic...

Tuesday, Jan. 24 (afternoon) - Started writing portions of the article, mostly summarizing the careers of alumni Waltz and Reichwald. The more of this stuff that I can get down, the less I have to worry about later. I refuse to write to fit, instead putting words and thoughts together with a plan to tighten and cut later.

No mention of Ben or Steve, no lead, no mentions of the other alumni who have come through yet. What I have right now is barely more than a Cliffs of Waltz' and Reichwald's resumes. The InDesign word count read 867.

Yikes.

Tuesday, Jan. 24 (evening) - Attended tonight's episode of Aggie Talk, partially to shoot some photos of the current KDVS Sports crew but also to soak up a bit of the culture. I also wanted to meet Joey Kistler, a grad student who worked at the Georgia Tech student station. Word has it that he didn't have an opportunity to broadcast sports for the Ramblin' Wreck. I thought it might provide an extra footnote to my story but my intel was inaccurate: Kistler said he did some baseball at GT. Oh well. Not that I can fit much more.

I'd been to 14 Lower Freeborn before, but only for the 15 minutes or so when my student-athletes are interview guests. The sneakily expansive maze of rooms is exactly what one would expect of a student station. Wall-to-wall records and CDs from every genre. The couch in the lounge is old enough that Andy might have taken a nap on there at some point.

Aggie Talk was slightly delayed because the lead-in show -- a radio theater that ran a melodrama -- was running slightly over time.

Steve and his crew discussed subjects ranging from the recent Aggie games to the best overweight athletes in history. Meanwhile, various characters walked right through the studio during the show, most of whom looked more interested in the exploits of Mike Shinoda than Blair Shinoda. I looked at the schedule: the next two Tuesday night shows are called "Esotericism and the Occult in the Western World" and "The Chicken Years," the latter of which is hosted by a local legend and pizza delivery man known as Mick Mucus.



It occurs to me that this may be the strangest place to produce so many significant figures in the sports broadcasting business.

And now I have my lead. Time to get to work.

Thursday, Jan. 26 (afternoon) - Unable to touch this project on Wednesday, I decided to reserve Thursday to finish up the story. I've written up a lead (teased above) that almost works like a cold open on a TV show. Once I had a way to introduce the Waltz story, I was off and running: Waltz flows well into Reichwald's portion, which allows me to segue to Tim Sullivan, Hasseltine, Marsh and JRoss. It actually makes sense to bring up Marsh and Ross together since a) they were part of the same KDVS crew, b) they call opposite sides of the Causeway Classic rivalry and c) they continue to co-host a weekly show. I also can't leave out Godinez although I'll need to get some better clarification of his path to the airwaves.

Unfortunately, it's about 4 p.m. and I have to head to the Pavilion to set up for basketball. I've written the following notes to myself to help me pick up the train of thought when I return tonight:

BEN TAYLOR
COMMUNICATION DEPT.
BRING BACK TO STEVE VOTE RE: RECRUITING OF FUTURE BROADCASTERS

The story checks in at 1,214 words (including those notes), so I'll have to do some trimming. But I think I've got something, I promised the editor I'd have it by the end of the day Thursday, and technically Thursday ends at midnight tonight. Bring it on.

Talk to you soon.

Thursday, Jan. 26 (evening) - Back from basketball. I've decided to finish this thing tonight, no matter how late I go. Ben Taylor's section bumped me up to 1,596 words and I haven't really gone into the detail I would have liked. Before I move on, I think I'll need to go back and scale back the previous parts, painful as it may be to do so.

The Waltz/Reichwald section could be an article on its own and probably deserves to be, given what those guys have accomplished. But I'll have little choice but to condense their careers into a few paragraphs. I will also have to shorten all of the mentions of Sullivan, Hasseltine, Marsh, Ross and Godinez into little more than a list. I HATE to do this: the only reason I don't have more about them is that I went to Waltz and Reichwald first. E-Dog's story is so amazing that it deserves its own piece. I am somewhat comforted by the fact that a student webzine at Virginia Tech has given him such an article, but I wish I could share that story with a UC Davis crowd.

Thus, although I haven't wrapped up this up, I'll start advance-editing. I should keep the trimmed parts for a potential "director's cut."

Friday, Jan. 27 (early morning) - All right, we're nearing 12:45 and this is starting to shape up. I'm down to about 1,300 words. It breaks my heart to shorten the passages on our various alums as much as I did but that's the way it goes unless the editors expand the sports section of UC Davis magazine. (I would love that but I can imagine my co-workers putting a contract on my life if that ever happened.)

As I work on this, I imagine some UC Davis alum who has now lives in the South, perhaps a Tar Heels fan or a Terps enthusiast. Waltz does ACC football and both ACC and SEC basketball for Fox Sports, so he has quite a reach. I like to think they'll read this article and realize they've been listening to a fellow Aggie all these years. Does Waltz namedrop his UC Davis roots as often as Madden mentions his Cal Poly days? I should find out.

Home stretch.

Friday, Jan. 27 (wee hours) -  It's 3 a.m. and I've done all the damage I'm willing to do. The story checks in at 1,522 words, more than 500 longer than was originally assigned but down by about 400 from what it could have been. Then again, when we met with the editors, I was under the impression that Waltz was NOT a KDVS alum. We thought we would have a sidebar for his story. Instead, he is the largest part of the main story. That changes the way the story will run and (hopefully) increases my allotment.

I've read this thing out loud six times over, including once in as close to a Morgan Freeman impression as I can muster. That's not a good sign (nor is it a good impression).

If I lose the battle for more space, I foresee two elements that will have to go. One is a short examination of why UC Davis has produced quality broadcasters despite not having a broadcast journalism major. I first conceived the story around that idea, thinking it might attract prospective broadcasters to this university. But I've discovered that none of my subjects came to campus with such aspirations in mind. So this odd "recruitment" angle has become an afterthought.

The other part is my choice to structure the piece with a prologue/epilogue or, in TV parlance, a cold open and tag. The article begins in present day (and uses present tense), to describe the scene of Tuesday's Aggie Talk. It then shifts to past tense when introducing our alums, which is the meat of the article. Then I pick up where I left off, returning to present-day Aggie Talk. I admit it's an odd choice and it accounts for 370 words. If I lopped off the two bookends, the article would still be self-contained. Seriously -- I've read it without and the middle section stands up quite well.

However, cutting it all but removes Steve Vote as a character. I hate to do that because he has been extremely helpful throughout this process.

Enough. It's now 3:20 and I'm prepared to send this in as is. If the editors insist on truncating my article, I've essentially written perforations into the story. As for Steve, well, he'll know I meant well.

Stay tuned. No pun intended.

Wednesday, Feb. 7 (3:30 p.m.) -  Yeeeesh.

I received feedback from both Mike Robles and Jan Conroy that they liked the article, but had yet to hear anything from Kathleen Holder. Until now. The page designer requested that it be trimmed to 650-700 words. That's less than half its submitted size. Fortunately, Holder lobbied for some space and got it to 1,000. Furthermore, she said, the section in which I list the other alums can become a sidebar list. I feel bad enough that I gave them so little mention as is, but I suppose those are the breaks. Reichwald and Walsh were the first I reached, so their contributions -- abridged as it may be -- will be the focal points.

Knocking out the "alumni list" into a sidebar helped trim the main story, and axing the section about the communication department reduced the story to less than 1,200 words. Trim a quote? There's a dozen words. Summarize Waltz' long career? That was sad, since I wanted the name Dave Niehaus in there to provide some gravity for what he's done. But keeping Bob Costas' name in there should be sufficiently impressive to serve that end.

Same cuts from Reichwald's section. Again, I hate to do this. Part of giving credit to both careers is showing just how long and winding the roads were. Waltz and Reichwald each worked extremely hard to get where they are. Shortening their career summaries into a couple 'graphs does not do it justice.

Wednesday, Feb. 7 (5:10 p.m.) - I recently listened to Marc Maron's interview of late-night titan Jimmy Kimmel. In 1997, Kimmel landed his first TV gig co-hosting the Comedy Central game show Win Ben Stein's Money. From my seat on my couch, that was his start. So I was intrigued to learn how long Kimmel had been working in radio leading up to that point. He started out as a high school kid in Las Vegas then had stops in Phoenix, Tucson, Seattle and Tampa before truly establishing his name in Southern California. Kimmel's recollections from each stop were entertaining for sure, but truly illustrated how hard he worked and how many dues he had to pay before he reached what I had perceived as his "first break."

In turn, Kimmel's interview got me to imagine Waltz, broadcasting minor league hockey in Spokane, Wash. in his first year out of college. He probably felt a long way from the big time. That was 1987. Waltz made his version of a major league debut in Seattle in 1994. The total driving distance from Spokane to Seattle is only about 280 miles. Yet the entire terms of George H.W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev are contained by the years spanning Waltz' gigs in Spokane and his first time in Mariners' press box. And that Seattle debut is a decade before Waltz landed his current role with the Marlins.

It also made me think of Eric Hasseltine, still plugging away in the Sacramento area, doing sidelines for our football games. At the time, he probably wondered where his next break would come from. E-Dog had succeeded both Jason Ross and Scott Marsh at KDVS, and now seemed to wait in a queue behind both at KHTK. Years after graduation, he was still on the KDVS airwaves calling Aggie basketball with then sports director Ryan Richmond. He just kept working for little to nothing; in part because it is part and parcel of the industry, but also because it's part of his character.

In a follow-up to my first phone call to Waltz, he gave me the following:

"In the minors I heard a lot of other guys complain about the impossible odds or lament how you had to be the son of a famous announcer to get to the Show. My attitude was completely different. I wasn't worried about the odds, I was just worried about getting better. I still do that today. I still go into each telecast trying to improve on some part of my game."

Hasseltine was described as having the same qualities, according to Gaither Jones' story on Planet Blacksburg in 2006. Said John Paul Stevenson, the Grizzlies' P.A. announcer, "Eric also is constantly looking to hone his skills to make him a better broadcaster. He knows that you can never know everything there is to know, so he strives to constantly learn as much as he can."

Bottom line: one thousand words in the UC Davis Magazine cannot possibly convey my admiration for what they've accomplished, so I'm glad I had the opportunity to voice it here. As I follow Ben Taylor's career, I hope he exercises the same diligence that brought Waltz, Reichwald, E-Dog and the others to their current career places.

But why wouldn't he? He's an Aggie.

Mark Honbo, assistant athletics communications director at UC Davis, will spend more time editing the story than he did writing it, so don't be surprised if you see him at a Starbucks on the way back to the office after the game.

Monday, January 9, 2012

On To Foxboro

We are approximately two months removed since baseball's World Series, when many UC Davis fans directed their attention (and support) to the St. Louis Cardinals. We saw our own Daniel Descalso help the Birds capture the title, cheered when he rapped out two hits in his team's miraculous Game 6 rally, and watched as he retired one of the last Texas batters in the final inning of the seventh game.

Well, we get to do it again.

With Denver claiming a 29-23 overtime win over Pittsburgh in Sunday's AFC first round, tight end Daniel Fells moves a step closer to matching Descalso as a UC Davis grad winning a major pro sports championship. Fells even took part in the action, hauling in a 40-yard pass from Tim Tebow as can be seen at the NFL video archive.

A member of the Aggie football team from 2001-05 (and a senior when UC Davis claimed that 20-17 upset of Stanford), Fells signed with Atlanta as a rookie free agent in the spring of his senior year. He did not play for the Falcons that year, nor with Oakland in 2007, but signed on with St. Louis a month into the 2008 season. Fells' role with the Rams grew to the point that he posted career highs of 41 catches and 391 yards last year, playing all 16 games and starting six. He then signed as a free agent with Denver at the start of the 2011 training camp.

Fells shifted from more of a receiving tight end to a blocking one when Tebow took over as QB in October, having recorded 11 receptions for 159 yards during the five games when Kyle Orton was slinging the pigskin. Of course, Tebow's influence became the stuff of legend -- Denver won seven of the next eight after a rought start -- and the Broncos snagged a division win and a postseason spot with an 8-8 record.

Up here, most NFL fans will likely have their eyes on the 49ers, who will take on a New Orleans team replete with Div. II and mid-major alums: the Saints field such regular contributors as Marques Colston (Hofstra), Jeff Charleston (Idaho State), Jahri Evans (Bloomsburg), Ramon Humber (North Dakota State), Jermon Bushrod (Towson), Chris Ivory (Tiffin) and Junior Galette (Stillman). To get any of you to switch from Fox to CBS will be a stretch.

But at least during the commercial breaks, glance over at the action in Foxboro and look for big #86. You're gonna want to root for him. Again.

-Mark Honbo, assistant athletics communications director, still wonders by the devoutly Christian Tim Tebow does not throw more often to a man who listed his nickname as "Rev."