davidnark Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 I searched through the front page of both Stltoday.com and its sports page and couldn't find anything on the SLU arena groundbreaking announcement. I finally found three sentences burried in the SLU subpage of the sports page. Once again, the PD couldn't even reprint the whole press release or even report any additional information. Billiken athletics aside, this should be a noteworthy story for the PD. Over $80 million is going to be invested in this project, which will create jobs and bring another major entertainment venue to the city. P.S. I did find a great front page story about some kid losing his pet lizard. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NashvilleBilliken Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 That's pretty bad. It's one thing to miss a story on an unknown recruit during the World Cup...it's a valid excuse. But this is huge news for the city. When Belmont (yeah, that little school that beat Mizzou) announced it's new facilities, it was big news in Nashville. Belmont is LOW on the totem pole (UT, Vandy, UT-Directionals, maybe Lipscomb, then Belmont), but they still got a lot of coverage. It was on the news, in the papers, everything. THE athletic school in a major city announcing the groundbreaking for a major addition to mid-town certainly deserves a story. Piss poor... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bonwich Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 Once again, SLU neglected the subtleties of PR. I mean, if they'd only announced that the first event at the new facility would be a Katherine Dunham retrospective, I'm sure we would have played it on 1A. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pistol Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 Couldn't agree more, Nark. This arena is a massive step in St. Louis' Midtown redevelopment project. It affects the city on a number of levels outside of the University, in addition to being a gigantic step for the athletic department and SLU as a whole. With any luck, the P-D will have a big feature on it in the near future, and discuss what it means to the SLU community and to the City of St. Louis and its residents. There should already be discussion in the paper about the arena's events, naming rights, traffic/infastructure, etc. Realistically, it will go virtually unmentioned in the pages of the Post until it opens, when they'll do some small feature with a few photos and quick facts. Of course, as a SLU alum and major SLU basketball fan, I am biased, but how can the city's major newspaper almost completely ignore the building of a 10,000+ seat arena in the middle of the city? An event like this should be relatively big news in any city. I hope they prove me wrong soon, but I've been reading the P-D as long as I could read, and am naturally skeptical. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bonwich Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 My prior sarcasm notwithstanding, Nashville, in fairness, this ain't really big news -- because it's simply a rehash of an announcement of a prediction (which finally came true after at least two or three previous false-start announcements of predictions). P-D coverage that I can find: 6/1 Clayco awarded contract on SLU arena, which breaks ground late summer 5/7 Board approves arena, which probably will break ground in late August or early September 2/19 University board approves arena, ground to be broken by September 8/20/05 Fowler: We would like to be able to break ground in the spring 5/6/04 In December (of 2003), Biondi predicted a spring (2004) groundbreaking for the arena. It was expected to be completed in late 2005 to coincide with the basketball season and the university's switch to the Atlantic 10 conference. That last one sums up our coverage up to that point. The Boy Who Cried Wolf comes to mind as pertains to the PR value of yesterday's announcement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted July 7, 2006 Author Share Posted July 7, 2006 I agree that part of the problem lies with SLU's media relations/sports information group. That group gives the impression that they are OK taking a passive approach with the media, when instead they should be doing whatever networking/schmoozing that is necessary to drive their stories to the front page. If it weren't for Cusumano, I am not sure the mainstream local media would even know we existed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 the fact that this has continued under the levick administration is surprising. cheryl has never impressed me as someone that would take that approach. i used to believe the same, but i beleive levick would infact be very proactive with the media at least more so than under doug woolard. but since it continues, one has to wonder if the post sports dept really does have it in for us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted July 7, 2006 Author Share Posted July 7, 2006 But Roy, aren't the same folks running sports information? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nate Latsch Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 When I heard about this on the news, I was excited. I thought St. Louis U. had finally broken ground on this arena we've been hearing about forever. But, no. This is just another announcement about plans to break ground for the arena. Seriously, can someone give Brad a shovel and let him start digging or something? I'm anxious to see this new arena, and I think it will be awesome for the school and community, but until someone actually starts building this project — instead of just talking about it — it really feels like the thing is never going to happen. - Nate Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tseugnekillib Posted July 8, 2006 Share Posted July 8, 2006 Same topic....three stories: http://slubillikens.cstv.com/genrel/070606aab.html http://www.stltoday.com/sports/slu http://www.belleville.com/mld/belleville/sports/14985143.htm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kevinfootes Posted July 8, 2006 Share Posted July 8, 2006 Why would the newspaper have it in for "us"? Who are your contacts in the SID office that tell you how hard Lecivk is working? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kevinfootes Posted July 8, 2006 Share Posted July 8, 2006 Really, the only announcement made was for the groundbreaking. Everyone already knows it's going up. I think it's probably less interesting to the gerneal public than to SLU fans. We're all excited about it (except for it being way too small and the poor planning involved!). I'm just not sure most other people are as interested. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billiphan Posted July 8, 2006 Share Posted July 8, 2006 >Really, the only announcement made was for the >groundbreaking. Everyone already knows it's going up. I >think it's probably less interesting to the gerneal public >than to SLU fans. > >We're all excited about it (except for it being way too >small and the poor planning involved!). I'm just not sure >most other people are as interested. But Footes, the Post needs to do an above the fold 40pt banner headline announcing the plans to break ground on the arena. If they don't they are clearly showing their hatred for SLU. It's obvious. Just ask Roy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted July 8, 2006 Author Share Posted July 8, 2006 The arena is going up in St. Louis, yet the Bellville paper provides much more information about the groundbreaking and the arena than the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bonwich Posted July 8, 2006 Share Posted July 8, 2006 Aside from the now-public exact date (which was in the P-D yesterday as well), precisely what information in the Belleville story has not been previously reported by the Post-Dispatch? The U. That Cried Wolf strikes again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted July 8, 2006 Share Posted July 8, 2006 i have no contacts or friends in the sid office. and my above post didnt defend the sid office. however, i have seen cheryl levick and many many events working harder than any previous athletic director at slu. she always seems to be saying the right things and greeting the right people. as to the post, we got a beat writer that gallops across europe writing soccer stories even after america was long eliminated and making no effort to even make a long distant phone call to cover breaking billiken stories. we got a sports editor that responds to questions from fans of the billikens with the civility of darco milfoy. so i base my "the post has it in for us" statement on the above observations. i think that is reasonable since the post two main players in covering the billikens obviously couldnt care less about saint louis university. the better question in all of this is how in the hell can you defend the post dispatch? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kevinfootes Posted July 8, 2006 Share Posted July 8, 2006 If you want to say that the SLU coverage is poor, I can agree with much of that. However, it's from the top down and not the other way. To say that the P-D has it "in" for SLU is being paranoid. Questionable editorial decisions don't equate to malice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted July 8, 2006 Author Share Posted July 8, 2006 -What is the first event in the new arena? -When will the men's team play its first game in the new arena? -How many seasons will local stars Lish and Liddell play in the new arena? (While it may be easy for die hard fans to calculate this fact, it probably isn't apparent to the average local sports fan.) -How many persons/year is the arena expected to attract to midtown? -Are existing facilities (i.e., tennis courts, apartments) being demolished for the project? -When will the design plans be finalized? All of these questions were answered in the Bellville paper but were ignored by the PD. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sltom6 Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 Gracious, son, give it a rest already. Your "contributions" to this board are embarassing your mother. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bonwich Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 >-What is the first event in the new arena? Wow. I'm sure all avid sports fans are interested in SLU's commencement. >-When will the men's team play its first game in the new >arena? >-How many seasons will local stars Lish and Liddell play in >the new arena? (While it may be easy for die hard fans to >calculate this fact, it probably isn't apparent to the >average local sports fan.) "The arena is expected to take 18 to 20 months to build (Mizzou's new building took 19 months) and would be ready when players on the current basketball freshman class are seniors. It's possible the building could be done for the end of the '07-08 season, but Levick said officials weren't sure if they would want to move there for a handful of games at the end of the schedule or make a grand debut in the fall." -- Timmerman, 2/19/06 >-How many persons/year is the arena expected to attract to >midtown? 1) Wrong question. Should be "How many people per year does the University project the arena will bring to Midtown?" And a good reporter would point out the corollary, that a very large portion of that total will be supplanted from Savvis Center, making it a very low net gain for the City of St. Louis, which is financing part of the project. >-Are existing facilities (i.e., tennis courts, apartments) >being demolished for the project? "The university plans to wait on relocating tennis courts and tearing down a third of Grand Forest Apartments, used for student housing, until an arena construction schedule is firmly in hand." -- Doug Moore, 5/5/04 >-When will the design plans be finalized? And given that we have a precise date for groundbreaking, this is interesting to whom? >All of these questions were answered in the Bellville paper >but were ignored by the PD. With all due respect to the fine reporter from Belleville, as Truman Capote once said, "That's not writing. That's typing." It's all simply paraphrase of the SLU press release. And as Nate pointed out, the press release is simply an announcement of a date for groundbreaking -- a date that's still six weeks in the future. I won't defend us on all our SLU coverage, but in this case, there just wasn't any there threre. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billiphan Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 >Gracious, son, give it a rest already. Your "contributions" >to this board are embarassing your mother. Who are you? I don't hear your mother doing any bragging either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
huzzah Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 Is Julius Hunter w/ SLU? What role does he play regarding the media? Is he part of the SID? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sltom6 Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 She's standing right behind me and says you seem like a young fool. How 'bout your mama, son? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billiphan Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 >She's standing right behind me and says you seem like a >young fool. How 'bout your mama, son? Your mama is kneeling down right in front of me but I can't seem to understand her. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dennis_w Posted July 9, 2006 Share Posted July 9, 2006 pd has a long history of ignoring or belittling slu bb. if you recall the run in nit under grawer horrigan wrote a piece explaining why it didnt matter and only made slu the 66th best team, when he should have praised grawer for bringing team out of the trash heap Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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