Arndt: Why I’m leaving The Athletic and taking post-game coverage to CanucksArmy

It’s kind of weird writing one of these articles. Part of me wonders who would want to know about my considerations about changing employers. There weren’t exactly a number of people wondering why I decided to make the big leap from Video Update to Blockbuster back then, but maybe that’s just because social media didn’t exist back then.

For the record, Video Update was a far superior job, but the prestige of wearing that blockbuster blue and yellow shirt definitely brought… well, I don’t know what it did, but I was sure the Subway employee would give me nodded with newfound respect after switching brands.

But as Ben Kuzma told me recently, writers write.

So that’s what I’ll do.

Also, I’ve always thought of my writing as like talking to a buddy about sports. I want people to sit back, scream, debate, laugh and essentially have fun as we try to break down the highlights of a 1-0 loss to Arizona (Botch knew that 1-0 loss would turn me into a writing warrior would toughen, and he was right). So it’s only natural to force my friends to listen to me why I changed jobs while politely glancing at their phones when they think I’m not looking.

So why did I switch back to CanucksArmy after years of working my way to the top of the greasy pole? If you had told me a year ago that I was going to make this switch, I would have yelled at you to leave me alone before trying to push you down a flight of stairs. But here I’m not only happy to make the move, I’m downright excited.

Now, this isn’t some telltale, bridge-burning sort of memoir about how The Athletic got me dirty. There are no stories where they require me to write behind my computer in a full suit and submit my TPS reports in triplicate every third Friday. Were there entrepreneurial hurdles that were sometimes difficult to overcome? sure was. That comes with every big company’s territory, where the more people involved, the less likely they are to “get you,” especially an item as untraditional as The Armies. It’s hard to find someone high up in the chain of command to explain why sometimes I need 13,381 gifs in one article, you know?

Did I love my time at The Athletic? damn yes I’m not making things up when I say I’m honored to have had the opportunity to work with Thomas Drance and Harman Dayal, while Naoko Asano and Israel Fehr edited my work to make sure I didn’t say anything too stupid. This first year with Drance and Harman has been the stuff of dreams, free of COVID restrictions and as a full entity to produce the best game night content we could. Teamwork was alien to me because when I worked my way up in the writing world, it was still a street fight with other writers. The Snark should have been SEEED back in the day when a squint or an audible sigh was tantamount to a declaration of war on the press box neighbors. So a cohesive threesome that worked together like that? It was a dream!

And frankly, if you’d told me I’d end up writing for The Province and The Athletic when I started, I wouldn’t have believed you. No, I wouldn’t have pushed you down a flight of stairs, but I would have found it incredible that I could have written on two huge pedestals. Imposter Syndrome is a damn good drug, let me tell you.

Which brings us back to the question? Why go back to the CanucksArmy?

Well, for one thing, they’re not the little blog that could anymore. We all knew the power of CanucksArmy in 2012 when about half of the site was eventually shut down by the NHL. But they have continued to grow and become a strong, powerful voice in this market. The rush that Quadrelli and Faber have shown since day one is downright inspiring. To see them build a group of young, bright writers and legitimize CanucksArmy to catch up with the other big outlets is the stuff of legends. It’s no longer a step backwards to work for CanucksArmy as they are ready to go toe-to-toe with any outlet. It’s like actors now see television as a legitimate vehicle for their careers, rather than a death sentence aired after Family Ties. Wait, Quadrelli is texting me to update this reference… ok – instead of being aired to iCarly.

Not the reboot. The original.

Made!

Quads and Faber are also a big reason I wanted to work here to be honest. The plans we have for matchday coverage remind me of my freshman year at The Athletic but even better. We have an all hands on deck approach, bringing Faber in the room to look for gold quotes outside of the regular boring scrums, quads are the Chloe for my Jack Bauer on the edit side of things and I do , which I always do: talk about Luke Schönn for half an article. With GIFs!

I want more videos, more entertainment, more fun, and CanucksArmy is where I feel I can best do that. Don’t get me wrong, you’ll have a hard time finding someone who takes the sport more seriously than I do, but there’s a healthy balance of laughing, crying and screaming at what you’re seeing and whatnot is something of that I believe I can excel at.

Sport is supposed to be fun, but so is life and death, you know? The secret is finding that balance in coverage.

I also want to continue Jason Botchford’s legacy of using whatever power I have to bring forth some new writers. While I’ll be covering the majority of Canucks games, Faber and Quads (see how I went from Quads and Faber to Faber and Quads? This is just the beginning of my Quadrelli editing nightmares) will do some stanchies, and I want to too a few from other writers from CanucksArmy to try it out. I’ll never forget when Botch told me I was writing The Provies for the first time and what that meant to me. I can only hope to give a new writer some of that feeling, give them a big platform and see what they make of it.

I also wanted to join CanucksArmy because, honestly, it was inspirational as hell to watch Don Taylor, Rick Dhaliwal, Blake Price, Matt Sekeres, Rob Fai, Jeff Paterson and okay even Andrew Wadden all excelling after 1040 closed . They doubled down on local coverage and people responded. Do you have an opportunity to delve into the local side of things and try to build a brand that is 100% for that market? That’s something I find so very exciting.

And you know what? I like the idea of ​​finally being the starting goalkeeper. Honestly, I’ve felt like a backup goalie for these articles for so long that I kind of want to give my all to lead the charge, and I’m going to get that shot here with CanucksArmy.

I’ve been told to wrap this up, so let’s just end with that.

There is nothing in my career that I have found more rewarding than writing The Provies/Athletties/Armies. Being able to connect to this market and make people feel like they are a part of everything, nothing can beat that feeling. Every time someone mentions something like “I’m not in Vancouver, but I read your article and it feels like I’m there,” I beam.

That’s what I’m always striving for. That’s why I’m writing about the Canucks.

I want to cover this team and make it fun, make it important, make it relevant, and most importantly, make it feel like we’re all part of an odd family that screams all the time, but at the end of the day, we really are in the same team.

I can’t wait to cover the Canucks this season at CanucksArmy and I hope you enjoy the ride.