Tracking Blogs: The Big Lead

(Pic: Screen Grab courtesy of Street and Smith's Sports Business Daily, http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/article/119240)

For the assignment, I chose to follow the blog “The Big Lead,” located at www.thebiglead.com. It covers sports predominately, but it incorporates elements of popular culture such as music, movies and politics into its postings as well. The blog is run by co-creator and primary writer/editor Jason McIntyre who manages the site from h.is Brooklyn home.

This blog is easily my favorite on the internet. Like many blogs, the stories are written in a very sardonic tone, often making fun of athletes and entertainers after reporting the news about them. But the difference is between the Lead and those sites is that the Lead has writers that offer up detailed and informative analysis of sports that is insightful, whereas most other sites simply rely on lampooning the athlete or situation.

The vast majority of the postings disseminate the breaking sports news of the day.The blog typically has around ten postings, breaking the news of the day or touching upon interesting topics that are floating around the sports world. At noon and in the late afternoon daily, they do the “AM and PM Roundups.” These are a collection of about a dozen links to videos, stories on different sites and other assorted items. The roundups almost always have a picture of an attractive model or actress at the top of the post followed by the links. The roundup is great, as it is a quick recap of all the things a sports fan would have to need to know to stay on top of the events of day.

This a a great site to visit for any dedicated sports fan . It is very well written, and it provides excellent analysis on almost every sport and other topics ranging from the primaries to media coverage to T.V. shows like The Wire (as evidenced by their 2008 Culture Bracket where they asked readers to rank current events and personalities). As an aspiring journalist who is fascinated by media coverage and the reasons for why the media covers certain events the way it does, I feel that the site is so interesting because it understand its demographics and always chooses the right posts for its readership. If you love sports and witty writing, then you should go visit the Big Lead immediately.

(Updated March 15th, to include the name and residence of the editor, as Mr. McIntyre revealed his identity on March 13th)