This Student Got a Chance to Shadow an NBA FOX Sports Reporter

As the largest marketplace for college students to find jobs, WayUp loves pairing smart, ambitious students with amazing opportunities that will take their career to new heights. Through our Shadow for a Day Campaign, students applied to win a lunch with Fred Katz, an NBA FOX Sports Reporter — the lucky student who won, Justin Udry, wrote a post about his experience. Check it out!

When I first came to Columbia from a small city in Wisconsin, I was overwhelmed by how many different opportunities there were for everything. From the best restaurants to the most recognizable spots in the world, New York City beckoned to me to do everything and do it all right away. While it was positive in pushing me to try new things, it was a bit of a shock economically. I had to learn how to budget effectively fast, and a big part of that included finding a job.

I heard about WayUp through an ad on Facebook and checked the job postings there every once in a while, eventually becoming a campus rep and then finding my current job as a PR intern at Haymaker in Brooklyn. When I saw another WayUp Facebook ad for an opportunity to have lunch with a FOX Sports reporter, I figured I would give it a shot. I didn’t have much experience in journalism beyond PR research, but read the FOX Sports blog frequently and recognized Fred Katz’s name as one of their main NBA reporters.

So, I applied – answering on my passion for sports and the economics behind them, I became invested in learning more about the NBA and how journalists keep up with a league that has games daily (and writing longer answers than those scanning the responses were probably hoping for). A week later, by some stroke of luck, a Team Member from WayUp contacted me with the good news that I had won.

The next day, I met Fred downtown at Minetta Tavern, for what I was assured was the best burger in the city, as well as an opportunity to bombard Fred with questions. As expected, both burger and business were stellar. I came into the meeting with no knowledge of sports journalism beyond the fact that it sometimes involved sitting in a crowded press room asking disinterested coaches and athletes questions that usually generate the same answers. Fred was super talkative and excited to share a ton of info on how that world works, from the hard work getting in the industry to forming relationships with players to wording questions in the most precise way possible preventing the same boring answers every time (or a Cam Newton walk-out). It was also interesting to learn that for a sports journalist, the job is 24/7 with no holidays. When there isn’t a game being played, there are trades, staffing changes, injuries, off-court incidents, and any other miscellaneous ways NBA stars find to make the headlines, happening at all hours of the day. For some this would be off-putting, but for Fred it was easy to tell that he genuinely loved what he was doing.

Taking the time to talk to a leader in the industry, especially one that loves his job, inspired me to look deeper into career paths, and past what traits might seem undesirable in different jobs for different reasons. Journalism is no easy field; it’s difficult to get started in, competitive, and around-the-clock, but for those who really love writing, the satisfaction they get from their craft far and away outweighs the tough work.