Here's what happens to a newspaper when a game that might be an historic World Series clincher is called for rain delay at 11 p.m.
While fans young and old are fretting about sleep and staying up late, we are agonizing with deadlines.
A play by play:
10 a.m. Monday -- department heads meet in publisher Tom Abbott's office to plan a "wrap," a four-page special section to fit around the outside of the full newspaper. The idea is that the Phillies will win the World Series, and we will offer our readers a keepsake edition. But, press runs being what they are, we have to plan the wrap, win or lose, because we can not change the configuration of pages at midnight when the game ends, at least not if we want to be on doorsteps before noon the next day.
Noon -- I call some members of the night crew at home to let them know Monday will not be a normal night's work. Austin Hertzog, who was assigned to lay out the front page, spends the afternoon at home thinking about how to create a great front page for our readers. I begin working with graphics and production editor Bill Coldren on a template for the front page with a smaller Mercury masthead and a way to incorporate the price and UPC code on the front or we will end up giving the paper away.
4:30 p.m. -- Sports and news editors (all four of us) huddle up in my office to make sure the game plan is understood by everyone. To make matters even dicier, one of the advertisers has alternate ads to run depending on a win or a loss. We discuss headlines, photos, what to include. Our goal is to provide our readers with a special edition, but we're working with lots of ifs and buts.
7 p.m. -- We have checked and double-checked headings. Austin and copy editor Kim Cicconi are cranking out the regular pages of the paper; sports copy editor Don Brensinger is planning and putting together the regular sports pages, with Austin and Don poised to tag-team the four-page special edition on deadline.
9:30 p.m. -- I am home watching the game, cheering the Phillies, and the rain is coming down harder. Hearts are sinking faster than pitches.
11 p.m. -- The tarps come out; I pick up the phone. Austin tells me he'll figure something out. We had a "win" scenario and a "lose" scenario. We didn't have a "draw" scenario.
Midnight -- The desk finishes up the pages, choosing the photo of the tarps coming out and writing the outstanding headline "Reign Delay." We go to press at 12:30 a.m.
9 a.m. Tuesday -- I stop at WaWa -- cold, wet and out-of-sorts -- for a coffee and check out the papers along the wall. One, two, three papers have the same photo and the same headline, and they all are sister papers printed on the same press. I wonder for a moment if the pressmen just put the same front page on all editions, but then I see some differences. The coincidence was that several talented copy editors simultaneously picked a great photo and wrote a great headline.
10 a.m. Tuesday -- department heads meet in publisher Tom Abbott's office to plan a "wrap," a four-page special section to fit around the outside of the full newspaper. Today, our dilemma is whether or not the game resumes today or Wednesday.
And so it begins again.