Completely agree. Been a subscriber to The Athletic since June and it’s fantastic. For those that are only into Northwestern sports, it’s probably not worth your money as they unfortunately don’t put out much NU content (as you would expect, we just don’t have a big enough fan base to warrant a dedicated writer). But if you are a big sports fan, especially professional sports, it’s easily worth the subscription. Pieces like the NU basketball one linked are more the norm than not. For example, in season, every Chicago sports team will have 1-3 articles written about them per day, and most of them have great content that is in depth and engaging.
I agree with everything you've said, Jonny. The general college basketball coverage is as good, if not better, than anything out there.
Locally it's junk. The local end of the Athletic covers Dan McNeill better than it covers any of the college basketball programs.
I've traded emails with Jon Greenberg, the Athletic's local editor, about NU and local college coverage. I dont believe for a second there's not enough interest to have one guy dedicated to all the local college football and basketball programs - especially for a general upstart which is what the local version of the Athletic is.
Pre-season, mid-season and end-of-the-year for NU, DePaul, Loyola, Illinois with some mid-major mixed in? Put that on top of some local college football coverage. There's PLENTY for one writer.
His argument was it doesnt receive the hits, but I'd really like to see the comparison to the hits on another 20-40 win Bulls season. And they often have two writers.
There's also a sports journalistic standard that goes beyond marketing where the bar is falling lower and lower.
