It’s important to say “hello”
before you can say “goodbye.”
My friends and I like to go
back and look at our introduc-
tory emails we sent before
becoming Daily Sports Writ-
ers. Mostly, they make us laugh,
reading through the awkward,
all-too-formal interactions. But
they also hold fragments of the
people we once were and, for
better or worse, fragments of a
person we’d never become.
Here’s mine:
from: Nicholas Stoll nkstoll@
umich.edu
to: Ethan Sears searseth@
umich.edu,
Max
Marcovitch
maxmarco@umich.edu
date: Aug 28, 2019, 3:49 PM
subject: Sports Reporter
Hello, my name is Nicholas
Stoll, I’m an incoming freshman
this year, and I’m interested in
covering sports for The Michigan
Daily. I’m going in as an English
major, and I’m interested in pur-
suing journalism as a career in the
future.
I know the site
says that there is
no actual applica-
tion, but I feel it’s
important to men-
tion that I’ve played
many sports in the
past and that I am a
hard-worker.
Please send any
important informa-
tion, such as meet-
ing times and locations, my way.
I’m looking forward to hearing
back from you.
Thank you for your time,
Nicholas Stoll
For those who know me, you
probably already found some
things in that email that are
amusing. First off, I go by “Nick,”
yet somehow my formal intro-
duction and my unwillingness to
correct anyone through the first
few sports meetings have led to
the “Nicholas Stoll” byline that
I’ve stuck with for four years.
Not to mention, I’m graduat-
ing in a few weeks with a busi-
ness degree, just three English
classes on my transcript and no
journalism career in my future.
Then there’s the obvious that —
beyond any touch-football expe-
rience — my sports history has
no bearing on my success here.
Before stepping foot into 420
Maynard, those are the things
I thought were important. But
after four years, I know how
off-base I was. Still, there are
important things to take from
this email.
The person that responded to
me, he’s one of my best friends.
The sports section I joined, it
gave me a home with even more
friends to cherish. The excite-
ment I had to write for this sec-
tion, I still have it (if not more).
This is where I started my
journey at The Daily. My start-
ing point is different from yours,
and yours different from every
other. But this is where my story
began.
This was my “hello.”
***
The first event I covered was
a Michigan men’s soccer game. I
was brimming with excitement
but still too awkward to show it.
So, on my solo elevator ride down
from the press box, I snapped a
quick selfie to send to my mom —
glasses, braces and credential all
prominently on display.
I carried that excitement with
me into State News practices,
picking up more stories, meeting
my best friends in the world and
falling in love with the news-
room. The Michigan Daily was
where I laughed, smiled, cried,
yelled, cheered and laughed
some more.
The newsroom was my home.
Until, of course, it wasn’t.
COVID-19
kicked
us
out
and barred the doors shut. The
TVs remained off. The decks of
cards stayed in their packets.
The newsroom continued to be
empty.
That summer, I clung on to
what I had left of The Daily,
running for Summer Managing
Sports Editor (MSE). And while
we did what we could — and I
appreciated every Zoom call and
text with that year’s summer
staff — it just wasn’t the same. It
didn’t feel like The Daily.
As summer turned into fall,
and fall into winter, the excite-
ment within me that previously
poured over slowly faded. I
wasn’t motivated to do a beat, to
write at all, really. And as I sat at
home, The Daily stopped being
home.
I contemplated quitting — not
entirely, but taking a definite
step back. I planned to stay on
as an editor, but I felt that I was
done writing. I didn’t want to let
go of everyone just yet, but I had
a foot squarely out the door.
However, I wasn’t just about
to quit on The Daily, I was about
to quit on myself.
My mental state was as bad as
I could remember. I didn’t have
faith in my work, my worth or
anything else for that matter.
I was just going through the
motions, and anything else felt
like too much to take on. A beat
was out of the question.
Then Ethan, the same MSE
and best friend that replied to
my email, called me.
“You’re doing a beat.”
It wasn’t a question.
“You’re too good of a writer.
You need to be on a beat. You’re
doing softball.”
Then Kent — the MSE at the
time, my former co-Summer
MSE and my future roommate
— called. He echoed more of the
same.
Neither of them knew how
much I needed that call — how
much I needed that push. That
push put me back on track. Cov-
ering a softball game in-person
was the happiest I had been in a
while. I loved my beatmates, and
I remembered why The Daily
was special. Like an overfilled
pitcher, my excitement was
pouring out all over again.
Thinking back on it, I can’t
believe I almost walked away.
I almost said “goodbye” far too
early.
***
Honestly, it still feels too early
to say “goodbye.”
In many ways,
The Daily sports
section
is
my
home.
Every day I
wake
up
and
head downstairs
to find The Daily
sports section in
my living room.
The
people
I
eat
with,
live
with and share
a house with are people I met
on The Daily. As MSE, I spent
more time in the newsroom than
anywhere else, fully living and
breathing 420 Maynard.
I made it my personal mis-
sion to make sure everyone else
who walked in the doors felt the
same. I wanted them to come
in and fall in love like I did, and
— unlike me — never want to
leave. I wasn’t always success-
ful. Some people walked away,
and each time I still wondered
what I could’ve done to stop it —
what call, what text, what words
I could have said to keep them
here.
I’ve accepted that I may never
know what I could have or
should have done. Instead, I like
to look around the room and see
the smiles of the people I know
who stayed. Recently, I’ve been
seeing new smiles that I don’t
recognize, filling me with joy
and reminding me of the bitter-
sweet reality that my time has
passed.
Hopefully, they’ve found their
home, too.
If they have, they’ll find it just
as hard to say “goodbye” as I do
right now. So instead, I’ll leave
The Michigan Daily with this:
Thank you for your time,
Nicholas Stoll
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
14 — Wednesday, April 19, 2023
SportsMonday: Hello, goodbye
NICHOLAS STOLL
Daily Sports Writer
Sports
SportsMonday:
Looking back on a list
I’ve had a file on my laptop
since the first semester of my
freshman year. I’ve been wait-
ing to open it again until now.
See, college moves fast —
way too fast — and I was lucky
enough to recognize that pret-
ty early on. I wanted a way to
remember every-
thing,
beyond
mere photos and
fables. A diary
wouldn’t
work,
because
I
had
tried that before
and lacked the
dedication to see
it through. Ditto
for a journal.
But on Dec. 11,
2019, I needed a
solution. I had
just experienced
my first last night of produc-
tion at The Daily. I hung out
at 420 Maynard well into the
early morning, eating NYPD
and playing chair monkey. At
some point, I wandered back to
my dorm at Alice Lloyd, feeling
happy and probably a bit tipsy,
too.
The clock begged me to go to
bed, but something about that
felt wrong. I didn’t want to lose
the magic of that night; I had to
do something, anything, to keep
it alive. So I opened the “Sticky
Notes” app on my laptop and
started jotting down my favor-
ite memories of that semes-
ter, specifically those tied to
The Daily. Soon enough, I had
formed a pretty comprehensive
list.
I can’t remember the last
time that I’ve looked at the list.
Sometimes I even forget that it
exists. But as I struggled writ-
ing this piece — because there
are few things that I dislike
more than talking about myself
— the list became an all-con-
suming thought. It was time to
read it again.
When I went to open it, a
weird
thing
happened.
My
heart started beating fast. My
hands grew clammy. My mind
raced. And as I sat on my liv-
ing room couch, I became oddly
emotional.
My final last night of produc-
tion looms on Tuesday, so it was
a full circle moment as I reflect-
ed on my first. I wondered what
mattered to me at the time, as
an 18-year-old first semester
freshman. What moments were
most formative in developing
my love for The Daily? I sud-
denly needed to know.
I opened the file and smiled.
Here’s what I wrote about:
I wrote about playing a
game of euchre with Kopnick;
about walking to buy drinks
with Ethan; about transcribing
quotes for Max. I wrote about
elections, where I sat next to
Connor and earned the dis-
tinction of “most likely to pass
out on the bathroom floor.” I
wrote about getting a phone
call to go to Denny’s and film-
ing the livestream for State
News; about following Dan-
iel and Teddy onto the floor at
Crisler Center for a volleyball
match. I wrote about wander-
ing into The Daily to watch
LSU-Georgia on an innocuous
Saturday night, only to find out
that Lane, Lily, Ethan and Ben
were there, too.
All of these moments may
seem rather trivial, and maybe
they are. But this is what The
Daily is all about — those ran-
dom, spontaneous memories
that spawn out of nowhere yet
last for a lifetime. You cling to
those innocent walks to grab
dinner and the random invita-
tions to go sledding because
they made you feel valued; they
showed you that there’s a group
of people on this vast, intimi-
dating college campus that
genuinely care about you. And
that’s the best feeling that you
can ever ask for.
In the time between then and
now, I’ve accomplished more at
The Daily than I ever thought to
be possible. Some people knew
what they wanted to get out
of The Daily when they came
in, writing carefully-crafted
emails ahead of time to the
Managing Sports Editors. That
wasn’t me — I wandered my
way to a table at Festifall and
showed up to my first sports
meeting too early, as I didn’t
know the door
code and every-
one was still at a
State News prac-
tice. Talk about
apropos.
But
I
found
a
home
pretty
quickly. I liked
writing
and
I
liked sports, and
that
formula
wound up taking
me pretty far. I
was lucky enough
to be on a beat each year, and
three of the teams that I cov-
ered won a Big Ten Champion-
ship. That allowed me to cover
March Madness and consecu-
tive College Football Playoff
games; it enabled me to write
the game story for Michigan’s
triumphant win over Ohio State
in 2021. I traveled to Florida
and Arizona and Texas, criss-
crossing the country as a “job.”
But I think it’s fitting that the
list doesn’t include any men-
tion of my writing or any of the
games that I covered. It’s all
about the memories that I made
with the people I’ve since come
to love and the places we’ve all
been together.
I didn’t note any of the fea-
tures that I wrote or the games
that I covered. Yes, those
are incredible, unforgettable
moments that I’m so fortunate
to have experienced. And yes, at
its core, The Daily functions as
a newspaper. But as I finish off
my 260th and final story here,
I can say that The Daily is so
much more than the work we
produce.
So maybe on Tuesday night —
or more accurately, Wednesday
morning — I’ll sit down in front
of my laptop, happy and tipsy,
and make another list.
Odds are, it will look pretty
similar to the first.
JARED GREENSPAN
Daily Sports Writer
Thinking back on it, I can’t
believe I almost walked
away. I almost said
“goodbye” far too early.
You cling to those innocent
walks to grab dinner and
the random invitations to go
sledding because they made
you feel valued.
Photo courtesy of Jared Greenspan
Photo courtesy of Nicholas Stoll