Ring Posts Blogger Kevin Eck Profile and Interview Part One
Jabandgrapple.com recently sat down with Kevin Eck, writer for the Baltimore Sun’s terrific Ring Posts wrestling blog. This is Part One of our profile and interview. For Part Two click here.
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Pro Wrestling reporting has long been characterized by the Bill Apter’s iconic magazine Pro Wrestling Illustrated and the you-are-an-insider conceits of Dave Meltzer’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
Both are still around but the immediacy of the Internet, the deluge of televised wrestling, and the power of Internet fan communities have made PWI a walking dinosaur. The Wrestling Observer, still subscription-based and recently merged with Figure Four Weekly, is also a victim of an information overload; its insider knowledge and spoiler results are available elsewhere. Both are still terrific publications but they are both caught in the Old Media/Print Age.
Kevin Eck’s Ring Posts blog (http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/sports/wrestling/blog/) emerged a little over one year ago and quickly established itself as the New Media heir to the proud pro wrestling journalism throne. It is especially surprising that this New Media successor would come from an Old Media source, the Baltimore Sun; a venerable 175+ year-old broadsheet whose journalists were recently characterized in The Wire as resistant to blogging and stuck in a Buzz Bissinger world.
What’s not surprising is the author behind the byline: Kevin Eck. Mr. Eck is a lifelong wrestling fan, former editor of WCW Magazine, one-time writer for the pocket-sized and now-defunct Wrestling Digest (his articles are here), and 20-year veteran of the Baltimore Sun sports desk. Eck brings an intelligent, journalistic approach to our beloved sports entertainment. His frequent Q&A’s with pro wrestlers are already legendary and his encyclopedic knowledge of the sport is astounding.
The Ring Posts blog resides in Baltimoresun.com’s sports section and in a short year has outpaced many of its more athletically-accepted counterparts. Kevin explained in a phone interview with jabandgrapple.com, “We have roughly 40-some blogs across the board on baltimoresun.com and Ring Posts is always in the Top 10 in page views and is often in the Top 5.” He continued, “There may even be some people here who may write more traditional sports or serious blogs that roll their eyes at how well the wrestling blog does but you’re always going to get that with wrestling. People who aren’t wrestling fans - to them it looks like the most absurd or ridiculous thing. To say that these guys aren’t athletic is ridiculous. I think Kurt Angle is a lot better athlete than Kurt Busch.”
Nevertheless, one of Ring Posts’ best parts is the serious look it takes at the industry. Eck, who also works as the Baltimore Sun’s assistant sports editor overseeing high school sports, treats pro wrestling with the same earnest and devoted deference as football or baseball writers treat their subject. He doesn’t don a mask, he doesn’t use an insulting pseudonym, and he doesn’t insult the reader.
“There are plenty of wrestling sites out there that are ‘inside’ but the mainstream stuff is either not very good or it talks down to the reader. (With the blog) I try to bring (pro wrestling) a certain respect.” He admitted however that perhaps the blog “isn’t held in real high esteem (by newspaper colleagues) but I know that the people at Baltimoresun.com like the amount of traffic the blog is bringing to the website.”
Click Here to continue reading. Follow the link to Part Two.
Tags: Baltimore Sun, Bill Apter, Blogging, Buzz Bissinger, Dave Meltzer, Journalism, Kevin Eck, New Media, Ring Posts, The Wire, wcw
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