In preparation for Elaine Teng and Dotun Akintoye’s visit I have prepared these questions.

Elaine Teng:

1. What is your typical day to day like?
2. Do you have specific people you edit, or does it change all the time?
3. How did you end up in Journalism after getting a degree in European Studies?
4. What’s the biggest difference between your editing experiences at The New Republic and ESPN?
5. What made you want to cover esports?

Dotun Akintoye

1. How did you end up in Journalism?
2. What’s your favorite story you’ve worked on?
3. Do you prefer editing duties or writing more? Why?
4. What made you so interested in boxing? Has the deal with Top Rank Boxing helped you get access at all?
5. What is it in a story that makes you want to write it?

Story proposal: Cover the inequalities between the U.S. womens and mens national soccer teams and how it took an outside entity to ensure the women get bonuses, despite them being the more successful team.

In preparation for Steve Fainaru and Mark Fainaru-Wada I have prepared these questions.

1. What was the most difficult part about writing the book?
2. With the developments since writing the book with Junior Seau and Aaron Hernandez both being found to have CTE, have you thought about any updates on the book to include more recent cases?
3. Is it frustrating that it took so long for the NFL to recognize the reality of CTE?
4. What are some other issues that you are each passionate about?
5. How much do you think the book affected the leagues decisions on rule changes recently?
6. Do you think without the book there would have been as much acknowledgement by the NFL?
7. Who was the most important person, aside from the two of you, in writing this book?
8. Was this the most rewarding project you’ve ever worked on? If not, what was?
9. What was the biggest lesson you learned from writing this book?
10. Did it bother you that ESPN didn’t want to produce the documentary?

In preparation for David S. Kraft’s visit to our class, I have prepared these questions.

1. What is the toughest decision you have had to make while working at ESPN?
2. How did the infamous Jeremy Lin headline get published and what was the first thing that was done to remedy the situation?
3. Was what you learned during the Sulzberger Fellowship difficult to adapt to, or did all the changes make sense right away?
4. What was the most important thing you learned during that fellowship?
5. How does ESPN’s commitments to leagues they are partners with affect the coverage of those leagues when it comes to sensitive issues?
6. How do you feel about that?
7. Are there any areas you definitely stay away from when providing coverage?
8. Do you have any say when it comes to new partnerships, like the one with the UFC?
9. What is the most difficult thing about managing a copy desk?
10. What are you doing to get more women readers?

These are the questions I have prepared for our class with T.J. Quinn and Bonnie D. Ford:

T.J.:

1. Some of your stories, you are not the one author, what kind of issues, if any, arise when working on a piece with another writer?
2. In the Jonathan Turner story, what was your opinion on the detective after you were done doing y0ur research? Did it change from your opinion before you wrote the story.
3. If you still had your HOF vote, would you have voted for Mariano on his first ballot?
4. Since we now have had a unanimous first ballot hall of fame inductee, do you think it opens the floodgates for more players, or will we not see it again anytime soon?
5. What do you think the legalization of sports betting and leagues making partnerships with casino’s and sports books? Does it create too much room for corruption, or is legalizing it making it easier for the game to stay clear of corruption?

Bonnie:

1. How do you think sports media has done as a whole at becoming more open and accepting about talking about mental health?
2. What do you think journalists could do better when it comes to providing coverage on mental health issues?
3. When it comes to Lance Armstrong and his scandal, it was obviously a massive story that greatly hurt the credibility and reputation of a person who many considered a hero. Did this make it more difficult to write the stories you did about the scandal? Why or why not?
4. How do you think of everywhere to get information and get access to that information for stories like the one on the environmental conditions in Rio? It’s hard enough to get info in the U.S. never mind reliable info on a country like Brazil.
5. In regards to the story on Petra Kvitova, she obviously doesn’t like talking about the night of the injury, but did you try and get that info from her? If so, how did she react?

In preparation for Katie Barnes speaking to our class, I have compiled this list of questions.

1. When you did your story on Amanda Nunes ahead of UFC 207, how much time did you spend around her?
2. Obviously since your interview with Amanda Nunes, she has become the consensus greatest woman mixed martial artist of all time and joins only Conor McGregor and Daniel Cormier as just the third ever “double champ” in UFC history. Have you thought about doing another story on her, with that now being the case?
3. Having written many stories on the LGBTQ, how do you handle approaching athletes and other important figures in sports to open up about themselves in such a big way?
4. How do you make the decision to include information about yourself in articles, like you did in your article about Sue Bird, “I cried when Sue Bird told the world she’s gay”.
5. Are there every any issues that you will stray away from covering? If so, why?
6. Working for ESPN, you still manage to write about some popular culture, how do you decide what to cover?
7. I saw that you write for a few other publications, how do you balance the work of all these?
8. What is your favorite topic to cover? Why?
9. Who is the most interesting/your favorite story you’ve ever written?
10. What do you think is the biggest issue in sports journalism today?

I think the follow up story on Amanda Nunes would be a great read, with all the development sin her career.

Being a sports fan is one of the great joys in life. The excitement and entertainment from the highest level of competition is unmatched and always will be.

As a sports fan there is plenty of things I want to do before I kick the bucket, but here are my top 10.

1. Sit ringside at a UFC event.  I have been a fight fan for years now, from the early days where Chuck Liddell and Tito Ortiz ruled the octagon, to todays modern UFC highlighted by stars like Conor McGregor, Max Holloway, and Jon Jones. Sitting cage side at a UFC event would be my top thing to do as a sports fan, especially if it involved a legend like Jonny “Bones” Jones or my favorite fighter Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone.
2. Throw out the first pitch at a Red Sox game. This is something my sister in law’s best friend got to do once and ever since I realized regular people could get the chance its something that I have wanted to do.
3. Be at the clinching game of a championship series or game for one of my favorite teams. This is probably one that most sports fans have on their list, but its something that would be a memory to hold onto for a lifetime.
4. Play a 18 holes of golf with Jordan Spieth. I love golfing and being able to play with one of the best young golfers on tour would be a dream come true.
5. Call an MMA fight card with Joe Rogan. Being able to commentate any event would be cool, but sitting next to in my opinion, one of the funniest and coolest people in the world and do the commentary on fight night would be an all time great moment.
6. Have a catch with Pedro Martinez. This is pretty self explanatory, getting to play catch with one of the greatest pitchers of all time? Sign me up.
7. Ride along in a Nascar race. Kind of an oddball one here, but I think being driven around a speedway at 200+ MPH would be pretty cool.
8. Hangout with Mike Tyson. All personal drama aside, Iron Mike is probably one of the most interesting people in sports history, from being the youngest heavyweight champion ever, to biting Evander Holyfield’s ear off, an evening with the champ would be unforgettable.
9. Go to the Olympics. I’m not a huge fan of all the Olympic events, but attending the historic games would be well worth it and something not a lot of people will ever get to do.
10. Shoot hoops with Larry Bird in his prime. Larry legend was one of the best trash talkers ever, I would love to play ball with him and have a little playful war of words with the best to ever do it.