Help Us Help You

The site has changed a lot since I joined as a copy editor a short 18 months ago. You can read more about that in Dave’s Hardball Times recap, but in my eyes, the biggest change has been in the amount of content that we put out every week. Thanks to our influx of wonderful new writers, I get to read more new and interesting things about baseball while editing for the site than ever before. But not surprisingly, as the amount of articles we publish increases, we will also need more help behind the scenes editing and posting articles, compiling some of our daily (and soon to be unveiled) features, putting our Annual together and all the other stuff that goes into making the Hardball Times go.

So if you have some journalism or editing experience and a passion for baseball, we’d love to have you join our staff. At the present moment, we are looking for one copy editor to help with editing and posting stories, and one THT Daily/THT Links editor to help with compiling and posting baseball news and items of interest to the site. Read on for more detailed descriptions of what we’re looking for.

Copy Editor

We’re looking for someone with flexible hours to edit two to three articles two nights a week between Sunday and Thursday. Ideally, applicants should:

  • Comfortable with AP Style
  • Reliable and able to work independently
  • Possess knowledge of basic HTML formatting (i.e. “pre” tags)

Obviously, a passion for baseball is preferred.

THT Daily/Links

This job isn’t completely clearly defined at this point, so we’re looking for someone who can bring ideas to the table. At this point, we would like someone to help out five days a week (Monday through Friday) by working with Dave and I to post either a THT Daily or a THT Links article. The former involves aggregating box scores, results and other baseball information into template, writing brief game summaries and selecting relevant player notes to include. The latter involves browsing the Internet for interesting baseball stories and discussions and, in conjunction with other THT staff, post a daily digest of interesting links with short descriptions.

There really aren’t any defined requirements for this role, other than flexible hours, being able to read baseball stories and use the Internet.

The Bottom Line

Additionally, the entire staff helps with the production of the THT Annual. We’re also particularly interested in anyone who also has experience with Adobe InDesign, graphic layouts, and web development (HTML, CSS, PHP, and SQL specifically), but those are certainly not requirements.

At this juncture, THT is still very much a small, informal group, so perhaps most importantly, we’re not just looking for people who match the descriptions posted above—we’re looking for people who would be interested and excited about helping us put out good baseball content for our readers. As we develop new features and expand, many opportunities may arise, and peoples’ roles on the team change. In the 18 months since I was lucky enough to convince Aaron to take me onto the site, I’ve done everything from edit Bill James’ writing for the Annual to compiling mailbags to talking some baseball on sports talk radio. All in all, it’s been a pretty wild ride.

Want to join us? Send me an email with a rundown of relevant experience and why you want to join our staff. Resumes not required.


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