LeBron James story results in mirth and anguish on front pages
I mentioned yesterday that I was already sick of all the hype surrounding LeBron James‘ free-agency. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past 15 hours, you already know he chose to leave Cleveland for the Miami Heat.
Here’s how the story was covered today by Cleveland’s Plain Dealer (click for a larger view):
Can’t read that little text pointing to LeBron’s ring finger? Here’s a close-up:
Sheer genius. I asked Cleveland AME David Kordalski who designed it. David replies:
Emmet Smith and Michael Tribble. It’s proof that two superstars can play nice on the same team.
Heh.
Average daily circulation for the Plain Dealer is 267,888.
Since that page simply can’t be topped, I’m tempted to close down this article right now. However, it’s a Friday and I’m in a good mood. So let’s continue, shall we?
The Gazette of Medina, Ohio — circulation 12,325 — deified James a bit with this nice AP file photo and a wonderfully clean type treatment:
The Chronicle of Elyria — circulation 25,160 — created a similar treatment with a different AP photo and a different shape:
Both of those pages are nice and clean, however. Wonderful work.
The Repository of Canton played up the headline and downplayed a fresh mug of James:
I wish the designer had tightened up the leading a bit. the vertical spacing is just a bit much here.
The local picture of fans watching on TV was by staffer Bob Rossiter. Average daily circulation for the Repository is 61,036.
In James’ actual home town of Akron, the Beacon Journal — circulation 102,981 — built page one around a montage of photos of fans reacting during the announcement on TV (click this one for a larger view):
Montages rarely work and this one shows why: There’s simply too much going on here to give the reader something on which to focus his attention.
The Columbus Dispatch — circulation 170,179 — also tried to squeeze in just a little too many pieces today:
If the designer had eliminated the action shot superimposed in front and kept the tight crop of James’ face, the results would have been much better.
The Morning Journal of Lorain — circulation 22,247 — went the opposite direction, using only one image and using it large:
And you see the problem that created, as well. While the pages by Akron and Columbus were too scattered, this one is too static. The photo is fresh from last night’s TV broadcast but it’s not much more than a glorified mug shot. I’m not sure it merited play across five columns.
Meanwhile, in Florida, the Sun Sentinel of Ft. Lauderdale gleefully proclaimed James’ move to their home team:
The page was designed by Suzy Palma, with direction from Nuri Ducassi. Average daily circulation for the Sun Sentinel is 153,563.
Take special note of the headline on the movie refer, reversed out of blue at the bottom of the page.
Sour grapes was the game plan for all the hopeful cities that tried to attract James but were jilted. One of the more amusing was Chicago’s RedEye:
Approximate daily distribution of the Tribune’s RedEye is 250,000.
Out in the ‘burbs, the Daily Herald of Arlington Heights — circulation 111, 539 — depicted James’ shoe in a wastebasket:
What’s the big idea? It’s a takeoff on a page the Daily Herald published last week:
Daily Herald news editor Neil Holdway writes:
We at the Daily Herald in the Chicago suburbs had to express our disappointment, don’t you know!
The shoe-in-the-can artwork was done again by our news/art graphics editor, Tim Broderick. The rest of the page was completed by Metro News Editor Travis Siebrass and myself.
Not bad. And the ASF material beside the wastebasket was amusingly snarky as well.
Folks at A.M. New York – circulation 345,053 — really, really wanted James to move to the Knicks:
The New York Daily News — after plastering the story all over its pages for days, now — behaved like spoiled children:
Correct me if I’m wrong, but shouldn’t that punctuation be a question mark? Average daily circulation for the Daily News is 535,059.
The New York Post — circulation 535,004 — simply called James a bum:
Both the Daily News and the Post used the same exact headline — and the same exact punctuation — on their back-page sports displays today:
I guess it was simply too easy a pun to make. And too difficult to pass up.
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Most of today’s images came from the Newseum.
Over at SportsDesigner, Rich Boudet has already begun posting additional LeBron James treatments, sports fronts and other items of note. Check it all out here.
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UPDATE:
The Miami Herald didn’t make it into the Newseum today. Assistant presentation editor Chris Melchiondo was kind enough to send it to us:
In addition, here are Miami’s sports front and a poster page that ran inside sports on Friday (click either for a larger view):
Find Cleveland’s sports front and inside coverage over at Sports Designer.
July 9th, 2010 at 1:52 pm
A thought about the Plain Dealer cover: What if they had left off “Gone.” Just had him walking off the page. The page says Gone. To spell it out feels redundant.
July 9th, 2010 at 1:59 pm
Less is always more. Love your blog.
July 9th, 2010 at 2:05 pm
FYI Here’s today’s Portage County Record Courier cover:
http://www.recordpub.com/images/media/20100709/pdf/A01.pdf
July 9th, 2010 at 2:14 pm
Well played, Cleveland.
July 9th, 2010 at 2:27 pm
LeBron to Cleveland: Drop Dead
July 9th, 2010 at 2:45 pm
I saw a version of the Plain Dealer that had the text “7 years, $62 Million, no rings” … did they change it at the last minute? What was the version that readers got to see. I’m curious as to what prompted the change.
July 9th, 2010 at 3:09 pm
Shouldn’t the Plain Dealer cover include James’ left arm? I think the cropping is distracting. I also wonder what the point was in making the type denoting the absence of a ring so small — it looks too small on the printed page too, IMO.
July 9th, 2010 at 3:40 pm
Now you know how we felt when Tribble and Smith left us for Cleveland.
July 9th, 2010 at 4:01 pm
I noticed the small type on the Plain Dealer’s page says something different than what’s on the page shown on the Newseum’s website. Why the change? Is this an earlier or later version of the page?
July 9th, 2010 at 4:03 pm
Sweet page, by the way.
July 9th, 2010 at 4:55 pm
don’t think too hard Jay.
July 9th, 2010 at 4:57 pm
The NYDN cover was INSPIRED. “WHO CARES,” indeed.
July 9th, 2010 at 5:36 pm
Hey, I like New York magazine, too!
Snark aside, it’s a great-looking page by the Plain-Dealer. But I wish folks would stop with the “sheer genius” and “best in history” stuff seen on Poynter, as if this is some newfound design aesthetic and not something that a nationally renowned magazine has been doing for seven years or so, and instead praise them—rightfully, deservedly—for bringing such good design to the predictable and often blah fronts of newspapers (see: most every other front page in this post).
No doubt one day this brand of minimalism will appear as tired as that many-tiny-photos-making-up-one-big-image approach from the Princess Diana days appears now, but we’re not at all there yet. The Plain-Dealer cover is still very cool. Nonetheless, the effusiveness of all this praise plays into two not-unfounded public perceptions: (1) journalists love a good circle jerk, and (2) newspaper people often act as if they’ve discovered something that, in truth, has been out there for some time, and could have been spotted earlier if only they’d been looking. Put better, I hope: my problem’s not with the designers but with the insular professional community around them boasting about how this somehow proves that print is still relevant (and therefore pleasuring themselves).
(sigh) I feel like sh1t writing this, not only because I’ve never designed a page in my now-passed career, nor only because I know and very much like the guys who did it, but because it is a really good cover that ought to inspire other newspaper designers to expand their thinking. I hope that’s not lost within my narrow and dumb griping.
July 9th, 2010 at 10:39 pm
I must applaud Chris, my incredibly talented former colleague for perhaps the most well-thought comment ever to appear in these parts.
It isn’t meant to - and I don’t believe it does - take away from the outstanding work by two other (equally sharp) former colleagues who designed the page, but it makes an excellent point that this sort of work should be more prevalant in our particular brand of dead-tree journalism. And were it, newspapers would be more exciting to look at, at least, if not more relevant.
For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t change a thing about Michael and Emmet’s great work. I just wish it came as less of a surprise to newspaper readers.
July 10th, 2010 at 12:30 am
My question about the PD cover is, who took the photo? And why is there (apparently, as best I can tell) no photo credit? Seems like a simple thing to do for a cover that relies so much on the photo.
July 10th, 2010 at 12:51 pm
A question, rather than criticism: Does the Plain Dealer’s cover lack objectivity. Certainly, it’s not stated, but is it implied?
July 10th, 2010 at 2:52 pm
Sorry, guys. I’m going rogue on this one, and it festered all day yesterday…
I really didn’t like this page at all. I was going to use stronger words than that, but I was afraid people might stop reading before they got to the reasoning, and that would defeat the purpose of posting this at all.
Before I get started, let me just say that no, I don’t automatically hate on pages with lots of white space, nor do I go a-ranting just every time a paper clears the deck for one story — each of which is enough to send some folks into design rage oblivion. I assure you that’s not the case here. Also, I wanted to be clear that I think the elements on this page are good — really good. And the words are great; there’s just not enough of them.Â
But unless the goal was to make help me better sympathize with their readers (in which case: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED), this page failed on a lot of levels.
I felt cheated. And if I were a Clevelander, I’d feel even more cheated. I wanted more from the topic’s home paper. And the way I’ve watched Cleveland/NBA/sports fans gobble up everything they can about this story over the last few days, this abuse of white space felt like a wasted opportunity.
It took the readers for granted.Â
As I understand it, the Plains-Dealer houses quite possibly the best writer on this particular topic — of course they do! The paper easily could have — should have — capitalized on that. These days, newspapers don’t often get the opportunity to have the full attention of  readers — their own and, on this day in particular, likely readers well beyond the borders their normal daily circulation map. So why wouldn’t the paper seize that opportunity? The ring statement was clever, but would have played just as well tucked under/below, with the arrow curved around appropriately, leaving plenty of room to really say something — anything — to readers who just couldn’t get enough.
What a waste.
I know it would be difficult to get ahead of the swarm of web columns, tweets, comments, blog postings, etc., that likely would have been well read by the time  But I want to see the city of Cleveland on this page. I want to hear the voice of the newspaper and have a better understanding of what happened to Cleveland on July 8, 2010. And while I love all the words on this page, I don’t think they acknowledge the fervor I saw on TV, in photo galleries and on the majority of my (and probably everyone else’s) Facebook feed last night.Â
This is not a page of record. Years down the road, with a framed copy of this page hanging beautifully in someone’s office, someone will look at this page and wonder what happened here, and they will be left to infer the information for themselves because nothing on this page definitively tells them.Â
Bottom line: The hometown paper didn’t own their coverage and instead made a page for designers, not readers.Â
But, hey, that’s just one designer’s opinion.
Sorry this got lengthy. Thanks for playing.
July 10th, 2010 at 3:01 pm
Sorry. Should clarify. I didn’t like the Plains-Dealer page everyone was gushing about yesterday, and that’s the focus of my comments above. (Just realized I didn’t really definitively say that. Even editors need an editor!)
Thanks.