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I had just returned to my press box perch inside Nationwide Arena last Friday evening when I spotted the comment on my social media feed.
“Does any other reporter get to ask questions?” the X user named Jamie B wondered, tagging my account.
He was referring to the Winnipeg Jets media availability that had just gone down in Columbus, moments after the NHL’s No. 1 team had laid waste to the Blue Jackets by a 6-2 score.
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The Jets carry a live video feed of those post-game sessions, which he had been watching.
Anyone tuning in would have heard only one other voice that night besides head coach Scott Arniel, winning goaltender Eric Comrie and the man with the hat trick, Nikolaj Ehlers.
That would be mine, asking five or six questions of each person, generating about 10 to 12 minutes of post-game soundbites.
To be clear, this wasn’t a case of hogging the microphone or silencing those around me who wanted to jump in. Far from it.
Rather, it’s the reality of life on the road these days: the Free Press is the only newspaper in this city — and one of the few remaining in North America — still sending scribes like me into enemy territory to cover the daily happenings of the local hockey club.
To answer Jamie’s very fair query, there typically ARE no other reporters present to ask questions.
The Winnipeg Sun stopped travelling a couple years ago, not just for the Jets but also the Blue Bombers. The Athletic attended just a handful of Jets road games last year, and so far this season they’ve been at one of the first six (the season-opener in Edmonton). Sportsnet does not send a writer on the road, nor does any other local outlet/blog, etc.
The vast majority of the time, it’s either me or my colleague Ken Wiebe and nobody else when it comes to independent media (that is, people who aren’t employed by the team or the league).
Mike McIntyre and Ken Wiebe are often the only reporters on the road with the Winnipeg Jets and able to question head coach Scott Arniel after a game. (John Woods / The Canadian Press files)
I wish that weren’t the case and for a couple of reasons.
One, I want the state of the journalism industry I have spent nearly 30 years in to be as healthy and vibrant as possible.
Two, even I sometimes get tired of hearing my own voice in those one-man “scrums.”
I like to think I’m fairly adept at thinking on my feet, listening to what an interview subject says and coming up with follow-ups on the fly, but I’d love to have another person or two joining me in firing questions.
Occasionally, a writer who is based out of whatever city we happen to be in joins the mix to gather soundbites for whatever outlet they happen to be on assignment for (a stringer for The Associated Press, for example). When that occurs, I always pause and look their way to see if they’d like to jump in. They rarely do.
Last Wednesday in Detroit, for example, I noticed a young woman standing beside me holding a recording device during the post-game scrums with Scott Arniel, Mark Scheifele and Neal Pionk.
The only question she asked was directed to me, after Scheifele had finished answering the last of my half-dozen queries.
“Who was that?” she asked.
All-righty then.
The Jets have their own broadcast crew (radio and TV) and a social media team on the road that includes a camera operator to grab post-game video, which usually involves one-on-ones between the Free Press and Jets players/coaches.
As an aside, I always laugh when I read stories that include some of these quotes and the attribution includes “told reporters in Columbus.” Reporters? I guess “told the reporter in Columbus” would sound strange, even if it’s true.
It would be an interesting scenario if I (or Kenny) were to stay up in the press box after a game to finish writing our story, rather than hustling down to the Jets room to grab some quotes — something that is often extremely tempting, given how tight deadlines can be and the stress involved in trying to juggle everything.
The post-game sound you would hear would be silence, unless players and coaches decided to make on-camera speeches without any prompting. Highly unlikely.
Post-game soundbites are just a tiny fraction of why we are on the road. The real benefit for us comes after morning skates and on practice days between games, where it’s a much different story. Literally.
We routinely get off-camera one-on-one chats that lead to unique stories and features that you literally can’t find anywhere else, since nobody else is there to generate them.
I believe there is tremendous value in being around the team 100 per cent of the time, rather than just 50 per cent, and I hope it shows in our overall body of work.
I’ve got a feature, for example, that I think you will find fascinating planned for a six-game, 11-day road trip I’ll be on later this month through Pittsburgh, Nashville, Minnesota, Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Dallas.
I better bring some lozenges, because I’m likely to be a bit hoarse by the end of the journey.
Programming note – Memo to Jamie B: You won’t be hearing my voice in any Jets road interviews next week!
Kenny has you covered on that trip as the Jets play a trio of hockey heavyweights in the New York Rangers, Tampa Bay Lightning and Florida Panthers.
I’m off on some holidays, which means I will also be silent in this space until my return on Nov. 21.
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