Just a few minutes ago, I finally submitted the final draft of Just Watch The Game, the book.
The purpose of this website that I started in March was to promote and sell the book. I can honestly tell you that I never expected the site and the blog to generate so much traffic.
My original intention was to release the book this Summer but I was advised by the distributor to wait until October/November because 90% of books are bought during the Christmas season.
I finished the book a few months ago and have been tweaking it a little bit since then. Writing it was easy.
The difficult part is publishing it and promoting it.
I haven’t been posting as much as usual here the last few days because I’ve been dealing with getting the book ready to be printed. That involved getting pictures scanned, going over the design with the printer and fighting with my computer.
If I were not bordering on computer illiterate, I’m sure it would have taken me 1/5th the time.
My two brothers gave me the idea for the book and at first I dismissed it.
Then I went to Barnes and Noble and checked out the Pittsburgh Sports section and decided that I could write something much different from what I saw there.
There are a lot of good local sports books, one if which is “Steeler Nation” written by Jim Wexell–who helped me tremendously when I was looking for advice on how to self-publish mine.
But almost all of the books that I saw were celebrations of Steelers Super Bowls and Penguins Stanley Cups. Those books are great and they’re all well done. There really haven’t been many (if any) local sports books that take a critical look at recent Pittsburgh sports history and sports culture.
Just Watch The Game does.
My brother Bill told me that the way to get started on a book is with an outline. (He reviewed books and worked as a newspaper editor for 30 years.)
He told me to write down everything that I thought I could use from my experence to make an interesting book.
It was when I started writing everything down that I realized all the places I had been, things that I had seen and people I had met.
How many sportscasters get assigned to cover a local team in four Super Bowls, a World Series and four Stanley Cup finals?
I believe that I covered the best pro football team of all time and the most talented hockey player ever. As a fan, I was around for the greastest home run in Major League Baseball history and I saw the most famous play in NFL history in person.
I also spent three years riding buses as a minor league baseball announcer. I spent a day in Wichita, Kansas working as Satchel Page’s driver.
I had Bob Feller work as my color man on two broadcasts and spent time with other Hall of Famers like Carl Hubbell and Ernie Banks.
I co-hosted a week’s worth of World Series pregame shows with Bob Prince and I had two amazing up close and personal encounters with Howard Cosell.
I started in local TV news when they were shooting stories on film and lasted long enough to make it into the digital age.
I don’t know how many books I can sell and, to be honest with you, I’ll be happy to sell enough to break even. I enjoyed writing it because it gave me a new appreciation for the career that I too often took for granted.
The book is in my computer and will be going to the printer soon. I hope to have it available as an e-book also.
When I do, I’ll let you know.