State Of The Blog

 

TL;DR- It’s 11:59 MST, I’ll just slide this post in. As I try to do every so often, I’m blogging about my blog, just as a status check. 50+ posts last year. Thanks for reading.

“I was reborn when I was broken
I wouldn't believe, I wouldn't believe, no
Been through a storm, no use in hoping
That you would come rescue me
Somehow your love set me free” – Maxwell (Lifetime)

I’m trying to get better at this whole “blogging” thing. When I first started, I wasn’t particularly good at it. But I try to improve my skills every time I sit in front of my keyboard and go to work. The way I see it is if I want my little corner of the internet to be worth anything, I need to have a voice that I can be proud of. I’ve liked my blog and have written intermittently since my sophomore year of college (more than 5 years ago) and before that I put poetry online. 2013 was the first year that I was really proud of what I wrote.

2013 was the first time that I realized how much the blog meant to me. 2013 was largely a devastating year in my life. (Flood, rejection, seeking a new career path, etc.) I didn’t write a ton in 2012. In 2013, the blog represented normalcy. When things were going poorly, I needed normalcy. Other than when I kept a journal when I was in elementary school I don’t think I’ve ever had so many times where I thought “I should write about this”. While I had 50+ posts that were released, I had a lot more that didn’t make the final cut, which I’m proud of, because at least I know I didn’t rush things just because.

What I decided over the last few years was that I wasn’t going to try to be first or even early to the party when it came to discussing things. What I try to do is release something different from what other sites and bloggers are writing about, or at least to have my own take on the events of the NBA, NFL and other sports. I’m never going to be able to be first to the Jason Collins story or talking about the draft, so I’ve tried to “stay in my lane” more. I used to do predictions, but I’ve found them (especially in hindsight) to be pretty useless, except for my beginning of the year predictions.

I realize that I still make lots of mistakes. I’m still prone to parenthesis abuse when I have an idea that doesn’t quite fit and I don’t take the time to make the sentence flow better. I still sometimes want to rush to the keyboard when something interesting happens. I still have some posts that are poorly written and more that were poorly edited. I’m making more of an effort to have a second pair of eyes check things. I still have weird topic sentences and rarely double check them when I go off the rails. I still have to get better at linking to uncommon references.

But past mistakes are fine, even if I occasionally repeat them. I’m just going to make sure that I improve on them. Part of the reason why this blog exists is because I wanted to become a better writer even if I rarely consider myself to be one. Part of the reason why this blog continues to exist is because I have a lot of information to share and since I’m going to spend hours every night watching games, checking out box scores and following media reactions to sports I may as well write about it and share that knowledge (in smaller pieces).

In 2013, I wrote more than 50 posts. I’m satisfied with the way that they came out. I found a format for my “weekly” NBA posts. (Admittedly, weekly is more of a mission statement than an actual deadline). I liked my post about wardens in habeas corpus proceedings. I enjoyed writing about the Jason Collins story (which was written largely while I was in court observing). I liked my 808’s and Heartbreak post. My favorite might be the James Harden trade post, where I put a couple of days into fact-finding to support what I saw from watching a lot of Thunder basketball, then I put some time into fact checking to make sure that I wasn’t skewing the facts.

My plan for 2014 is to get a bit better at writing. I want to edit more of my writing so that the pieces online are of better quality. I want to find a way to write during the summer. Either I need to find stories to talk about between the end of basketball and the beginning of football or I need to have more work on an entirely different subject. I hope that I find a way to continue to make this worth reading. Thank you for reading.