It’s strange being off the road

The red rocks and forests of Sedona, Ariz., the lakes and gardens around San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park and the mountains framing downtown Vancouver all have least one thing in common: Pictures of them are sure to irritate your spouse back at home.

Of course, personal experience also has taught me that any faux angry/jealous responses are fairly easily mitigated by a variety of gifts that now adorn our closest, with my wife often having to tactfully explain that her scarf came from Montreal or a certain pair of earrings from Nashville.

Traveling to cover a professional sports team provides an interesting dichotomy, the thrill of experiencing some of the coolest cities in North America mixed with significant time away from your wife and kids — those gifts a small penance for routinely missing family functions. And when the carousel suddenly stops, yeah, that’s a pretty big adjustment, too.

We’ve talked about setting a schedule and creating a home office, but this week I thought it would be interesting to write about the travel and why doing this job without it feels like eating cereal without milk or playing golf with only a 9-iron and putter — it’s incomplete.

Traveling has become a way of life for us as a family. It also has become one of my favorite hobbies. And I firmly believe it provides reporters the avenue to do this job the right way.

Before I explain some of the nerdiness this whole drill creates, I think it’s important for readers to understand the value of being there and building relationships with those you cover.

When you meet a player for the first time, there’s the inevitable small talk. My outlet/ job. His travel or living arrangements. How things are going thus far. Basic stuff. Eventually, another question comes up: So, you’ll be on the road with us?

I’m not stupid or naive enough to believe that pro athletes are happy that we chase them from city to city, but I’ve seen enough to know that they respect when you’re there every day and try your best to do the job the right way.

Reporters who travel to cover teams always are treated differently than those who don’t, and I’m firm believer that’s how it should be.

For example, if I need to ask a question of a player that I’d rather not pop in a scrum — potentially donating a story to the masses — I’ll pull that player off to the side, hoping I’ve built up enough reporting capital with him and the team’s media relations official to when both sides can trust that I will handle this in a respectful and ethical way.

Put another way: Being on the road allows you to bend the rules, gain greater access and report/write better stories.

My Josh Bell takeout from last summer happened in Houston. A story on Joe Musgrove’s athleticism and obsession with working out occurred in Cincinnati. Hockeywise, I started 20 Thoughts because of the many random nuggets I’d discover on the road, the type of stuff that otherwise might not have found a home.

It’s an essential part of doing this job the right way, and one of the many great things about the Post-Gazette is that I’m not the only one who thinks like that.

My bosses see the value in reporting the proper way. They also trust me to book things appropriately and smartly, and they don’t force me to take multiple-stop flights or stay an hour away because it’ll save a few bucks.

We’re there, we see the value in being there, and it’s my responsibility to ensure we do everything possible to stay there, which is where I think the obsession with travel was developed.

As sportswriters, we all love Marriotts, for the points we’re able to accumulate and extra service/amenities we’re able to attain. It’s simply a way of life, the same for trying to find the best rate.

Josh Yohe of The Athletic is a good friend, and we talked a lot about travel on the hockey beat, comparing Marriott rates and flight plans and often sharing tips. Whenever I’m scheduled to go somewhere, I always monitor the available rate and rebook every time it drops, feeling like every dollar saved was some sort of small victory.

There was a real sense of accomplishment a few years ago when I covered a Penguins game against the Blues and completed my lap around the league, setting foot inside all 31 buildings.

Before I took over the baseball beat, former Post-Gazette reporter Bill Brink sent me a travel scouting report that offered intel on nine MLB road cities. It was nearly 1,400 words long.

Obsessing over travel has been fun. It’s an ongoing conversation for many of us in the business, to the point where Yohe and I started listing our top five NHL hotels earlier this quarantine period.

“I’d go to Newark right about now,” Josh wrote, showing a sense of desperation echoed by many who do what we do for a living.

Not traveling has made me realize how much I miss the entire process — taking an airport parking shortcut another former colleague, Sam Werner, showed me; wishing more airlines were like Southwest with MLB.com’s Adam Berry; or finding my favorite Grateful Dead show from whatever city I was in.

I also miss the access. As much as I appreciate Zoom calls and the players who are willing to talk during this time, there’s simply no replacement for being there, even if it sometimes means not being home as much as you would like.