Resources for sportswriters working on their craft

This post is a copy of an email that went out to the current Sportswriting Internship class this morning. The first item is a bit awkwardly self-referential in this context, but we’ll live with that. The Bleacher Report resources, such as the Style Guide, are aimed at B/R writers, of course, but are visible to anyone.

1. B/R Blog

The Bleacher Report Blog is written and edited regularly by Writer Development manager King Kaufman. He’s a fount of knowledge, so check categories like Writer’s Tips and Textbook early and often. I also encourage you to comment on posts, as every B/R Blog contributor would be a great contact to have going forward. You can also follow all the latest here on King’s Writer HQ Twitter feed.

2. Writer Tutorial
A comprehensive how-to guide for pleasing readers.

3. B/R Style Guide and B/R Stylebook
The AP has one, ESPN has one and you better believe Bleacher Report has one. The Style Guide is a set of standards for the writing and design of documents on B/R. It provides uniformity in style and formatting across the site. Like many news and editorial organizations, our Style Guide is constantly updated to accommodate changes in convention and usage.

The B/R Stylebook is a supplement to the Style Guide and an absolute must for anyone writing on the site. It’s a combination of the Style Question Clearinghouse and the Spelling, Hyphenation and Capitalization Dictionary in one convenient, searchable page (using ctrl+F on a PC or command+F on a Mac). If you’re ever confused on the proper way to capitalize or hyphenate a word/phrase (e.g. “Is it a ‘three point’ shot or a ‘three-point’ shot?”), or have a specific style-related question not found in the Style Guide, odds are it’s in the Stylebook.

4. B/R Community Forum
No community is stronger than the links between its individual members. You can study peer articles to determine what works and what doesn’t, or pass on your own veteran counseling to some wide-eyed rookie—don’t forget the help you received when you were in the newbie’s shoes. Your fellow writers will be instrumental in helping you acclimate to your new roles. Anyone can read the Forum. You have to sign up to post.

5. B/R U
Bleacher Report University. It’s like the sportswriting internship, except you’re the instructor and the student. B/R U is not so much a writing course as an introduction to the fundamental principles of successful online sports journalism. It’s a self-guided course of eight writing assignments.

6. Content Standards and Attribution Guidelines
C’mon, you know these…

Links outside Bleacher Report

7. CuePrompter
A free service that turns your web browser into a teleprompter with zero extra software or downloads. Perfect for recording a Video Spotlight from home.

8. Wordcounter
Ever curious about how many times you use the word “Linsanity” in your Knicks articles? This free/no-download word counter will tell you if you’re redundant or repetitive or redundant.

9. Readability Calculator
This free/no-download tool tells you how smart readers must be to read your writing. It judges your work according to the number of polysyllabic words and long, complex sentences. So you’ll score better when you use simpler diction and write short sentences.

It also displays complicated sentences (with many words and syllables) with suggestions for what you might do to improve its readability. If that isn’t enough, there’s also No. of characters, words, sentences, and average number of characters per word, syllables per word, and words per sentence.

10. The Alphabetizer
Does it need any more explanation? It’s got some other funky tools like Randomization, Remove Duplicates and Reverse List, too.

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Greg Pearl is an editor in Bleacher Report’s Sportswriting Internship Program.