The Romance of Journalism

I have a famous namesake.

Jeff Pearlman spells his last name with an “a” but there have been a few times where we’ve been mistaken for each other.

Jeff and I both write. He successfully, me not so much.

The “other” Jeff is a New York Times bestselling author who has had his work made into an HBO series “Winning Time” which tells the story of the NBA’s “showtime” Lakers. Me, I’ve been on local TV, despite having a face for radio.

Jeff and I know each other. He reached out a few years back when he ran for local office in New York.

I think he wanted to know if I had any left-over campaign signs. Anyway, we struck up a friendship and Jeff interviewed me for his series called “Quaz” (don’t ask me what it means). The Quaz covers a range of people from John Oates (the quiet half of Hall & Oates) and ESPN anchor Linda Cohn (my childhood friend and big sister of a close friend) to business leaders and girlfriends of the Kevin Arnold character on the Wonder Years. Let’s just say it’s an eclectic and fun collection. I’m proud to be a part of the canon. Here’s a link: https://jeffpearlman.com/2016/03/01/jeff-perlman/

Anyway, these days Jeff is doing a lot of things from writing his next bestseller, a bio of Tupac Shakur, to building a Tik Tok following (over 200,000 followers) and hosting a beautiful podcast called “Two Writers Slinging Yang.”

Rarely can you describe a podcast as being beautiful, but “Two Writers Slinging Yang” is a warm tribute to journalism and journalists. What I love about it is that Jeff features those who toil in the trenches. We see plenty of “celebrity” journalists on cable TV and other podcasts, but Jeff shines a spotlight on the journalists who rarely get (nor seek) shout-outs.

Examples include Scott Agness, a beat writer who covers the Indiana Pacers and Indiana Fever and Sarah Leach, a crusading editor of the Holland Sentinel who was wrongly fired by the evil corporate overlords who have put a nail in the coffin of local journalism throughout our land.

Jeff describes “Two Writers” as a labor of love, a chance to celebrate writers he admires.

My favorite recent episode is an interview with a young journalist named Sam Pausman, a writer/photographer for The Wrangell (Alaska) Sentinel. Sam relocated 4,284 miles from Maine to rural Alaska to take his first journalism job for a weekly paper in a town of 2,000 people.

The podcast focuses on Sam’s efforts to connect with people he doesn’t know in a community he doesn’t know in a place far, far from home.

Sam’s an earnest young reporter, dogged and sincere in his desire to learn his beat and serve his readers.

Sam doesn’t own a car, lives over a bar/restaurant and does it all—including schlepping papers and learning to love the local cuisine.

I was swept away by his story, and I related to large parts of it. I too moved (1,321.1 miles) to take a job at a newspaper soon after college. I too worked hard to connect with people I didn’t know in a community I didn’t know.

I also schlepped papers at my first full-time newspaper job from the officers of the Valley News in Vestal N.Y. to the post office after we spent hours putting mailing labels on the front page over pizzas with my co-workers in a musty room in an old school. I never had more fun.

At the time, I felt journalism was a calling. My calling. I’ve since had a few others. But I look back at those old newspaper days with great fondness. I saw myself in Sam and thanks to Jeff Pearlman I got to meet him via Spotify.

I think about my old newspaper days often. I worked in newsrooms brimming with characters. They were smart, creative, sarcastic, funny and tough. They taught me so much.

In the newsroom of the old South Florida Newspaper Network I remember the presidential election of 1992, when Bill Clinton was elected. I worked near two old scribes—Syd Magill and Al Kaufman who had seen it all. If the young reporters said something stupid—as we were prone to do—they corrected us. Syd with a smile and a pat on the back. Al with a cutting remark. I adored them both.

For the life of me, I can’t remember what happened to Syd. I just know that he left the paper before I did. But I do remember the day that Al was laid off, by the same corporate B.S. that Jeff Pearlman often laments on his podcast.

Seeing Al pack up his desk and say goodbye to a career he loved hit all of us hard. Shortly thereafter I decided to leave of my own volition to start my own publication and become an entrepreneur. I wanted to control my own fate, even though being on your own is a lonely, hard and risky choice.

I have no regrets, but more than a few scars. I was a lucky one—it worked out for me. It didn’t for many of my old colleagues, one of whom ended up living in a car in a Boca parking lot. I met him for a cup of coffee one day, having not known about his rough road since we parted years before. He showed up with a broken arm—someone had reached into his car window and tried to rob him. He fought back and broke a bone.

“Jeff,” he said. “I can’t afford to lose what little I have. I have nothing more to lose.”

Those words stung. He offered to sell me his autographed photo of Muhammad Ali. “The Greatest” had come to Deerfield Beach back in the day and I remember when my colleague went out on that assignment. I was jealous, I wanted to meet Ali.

Of course, I didn’t want to buy his prized possession. And he turned down my offer to help. I never saw him again and I don’t know what happened to him, but I think about him—a lot.

If you’ve been in journalism in recent times, you saw the best and the worst of this important but often maligned profession.

My namesake Jeff Pearlman shares it all. He shines a spotlight on the people doing great work and the people who have been bruised by this business.

A guy like Sam Pausman, talented, sincere and courageous deserves success. I hope he finds it. We need journalists. They are not the enemy of the people; they are the shining lights of Democracy.