An open letter to the thousands of you who follow sports at HobbsDailyReport.com:
Thank you for your interest in local sports coverage and specifically in HobbsDailyReport.com, our website launched in April 2017 that is still going strong (more than 1 million page views).
We’ve been fortunate – no one in my small family has experienced COVID-19 – but we have been slowed, of course, by its impact on local sports and a few other manageable personal health concerns.
Local high school sports resumes in November with volleyball and cross country and we will be in contact with schools and coaches in hope we can provide a daily schedule, nightly results and details and conference standings and more.
Chris Hobbs
It also won’t be long before we prepare for our traditional coverage of high school basketball and then football games in February.
We report on ALL sports played in the South Fork 2A, Northwestern Foothills 2A and Northwestern 3A-4A.
I am drafting this today to reach out to you, our readers, and ask for emails to chobbs001@att.net on things you would like to see and what specifically you enjoy at our website.
This will be my 45th consecutive school year covering high school athletics in the Greater Hickory area. My first year was 1976, and I followed area sports for six years or so before graduating from high school in 1976. I have, for instance, been around Bandys High football for 50 years.
I am also very proud to say that I have now worked in six different decades (70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, 2010s and 2020s) and, to my knowledge, I am the longest-tenured sports writer in Western North Carolina still active.
I’m also second statewide to only Earl Vaughn of Fayetteville (https://www.cityviewnc.com/) among those still active (48 years), though both mine and Earl’s roles are no longer in newspapers.
I generate all of the content and copy (approaching 6,000 different posts) and serve as editor and content coordinator for the website.
Our website was designed and is maintained by Chad Austin of Hickory, and you continue to read extensive content at the site courtesy of our main advertisers – Dwayne Wilson Insurance (https://www.dwaynewilsoninsurance.com/), Burke Mortuary (https://www.burkemortuary.com/) and The Athletes Lab (https://www.athleteslab.org/). These men include former local prep athletes whose support of the same opportunity for today’s youth helps continue the tradition(s) of high school sports in our region.
Thanks for reading and I hope you will reach me via email with your thoughts.
Be safe.
Wear a mask.
Social distance.
Warmest regards,
Chris Hobbs