By: Averie Griffin
For this assignment I shadowed Brian Hansen the JMU Women’s Volleyball team Sports Information Director. Upon arriving he let me know
“No cheering in the press box.”
This makes sense due to the fact that there are people from opposing tea
ms sitting with each other and it would be inappropriate as well as unprofessional to have people cheering the victories and losses of the other team. Volleyball is a very fast paced game so upon arriving and seeing just a bench a long table with chairs set up I was curious to know how they were going to keep statistics.
I asked Brian and he pointed to a pair of headsets he told me I would be wearing them. I still wasn’t sure what I would be listening to but played along anyway. After the three JMU seniors were honored and congratulated the game got underway, thank goodness I had put on my headphones because immediately I heard Brian’s voice calling what was happening in the game.
“13 to serve, dig 5, set 4, attack 12…kill”
This cryptic language went on throughout the entire game. Brian stood behind me so that he could see the court well and have the best idea of what player was doing what. While I wore the headset I had no responsibility, but to listen. However, his assistant Devon was inputting that information into a special program onto the computer. I also noticed another person wearing a headset physically writing what Brian was saying.
“Why did they need two people writing the same information?” “The handwritten one is a backup in case the information is lost on the computer or something goes wrong” I guess even with all of our technology there’s nothing like good ol’ fashion handwriting to add that extra assurance. What I learned from the shadowing was probably just how stats are taken at a volleyball game. I had been to other JMU athletic events and had the opportunity to sit with other SID’s and watch stats being taken, but never a volleyball game. It was interesting to me how they did it but in reality I cannot see them being taken any other way.
You need a person simply observing and calling out the plays because they are that quick and can be extremely long. The second person has their eyes on the computer screen the entire time purely listening. They don’t have time to ever actually look up and watch the game, which was surprising to me.
. I know that Brian takes the information that he gets from the game and as an SID computes that information into useable stats for player information and media guides so he can track the games and the record of individual players. Upon timeouts match and set scores and stats were printed and handed out to both teams so that they could know exactly what was going on in the game by the numbers and possibly make adjustments. I’m not sure there is another way to do it unless maybe Brian could watch the game on a monitor so he could sit and watch a screen instead of stand the entire time and watch the actual game
I do not think I would want this job. While I want to work somewhere in the sports industry I do not want to do anything that would require me to be there on game days
I enjoy sports in a sense of being able to be a fan. I would not want to have Brian’s job because while he is so deeply involved in the sport he can’t ever actually just enjoy a game. To him the game is business and he has an important responsibility the entire time he is there. I would like to work more in the front office sense of a sport organization, not have responsibilities on game day before, after, or during the game, which probably takes me out of a position in Sports PR altogether.