1 on 1: Scott Stone – Interview

On Thursday of last week, I had the privilege of sitting down with the Miami Dolphins Senior Director of Internet & Publications, Scott Stone.

Scott is entering his 19th season with the team, a tenure spanning all of the Fins head coaches except George Wilson. At the age of 13, Scott began his “sports” related career working with the Fort Lauderdale Strikers soccer team performing a variety of tasks in the front office. Eventually working as a press box runner for the team, Scott joined the Dolphins when Chip Namias, the Strikers’ PR Director, left to join the Dolphins in 1983.

While attending St. Thomas University’s sports administration program, Scott served a one-year internship with the Dolphins’ media relations department in 1988. He joined the team in a full-time capacity in March of ’89 as assistant to the new Media Director, Harvey Greene.

His office is located at the Nova-Southeastern University training center that the Miami Dolphins call home. Scott also oversees the Miami Dolphins home Web page, http://www.miamidolphins.com/. He is also responsible for the design and production of the team’s publications, including the media guide and game program.

^{Phinphanatic: Scott, first, thank you for taking the time to speak with me. On the information side of things, how do you receive your information?}

^{Scott: The majority of our news content in generated through our media relations department. That department is where we disseminate all of our information, both internally and externally. With breaking news, we are given some lead-time so we can prepare the web site. For example, if it is a major announcement or if there is a press conference, we need that time to get set up so that we can cover it live. If the news does not require a press conference, we still need some lead-time to make sure we deliver the news in the timeliest manner possible. However, there are going to be times when receiving that lead is not possible.}

^{PP: So say for example, Ted Ginn is going to sign his contract on Saturday, would you know about that Saturday or would you have advanced knowledge of that signing?}

^{SS: It depends. As an organization we only report a player signing when, in fact, the player has actually signed his contract. We never announce that a player has “agreed to terms.” So, pretty much we make the announcement not long after the actual contract is signed.}

^{PP: Is Ginn close to signing?}

^{SS: (laughing) I have no idea and if I did, I could not tell you.}

^{PP: Of course not. But I have to ask.}

^{SS: Of course.}

^{PP: You have been in this line of work for 19 years now. How has football changed from when you started to where it is now?}

^{SS: Well, a lot. I remember when there was this thing called the off-season. Now, football is 365 days a year – and that is a great thing. I started in the League when there was no free agency. We were pretty much off the front page between the end of the season and the draft. Now with free agency, the draft, mini camps, rookie camps, off-season conditioning, we are pretty much in the news every day. The other thing that changed was the role of the media. Back when I started, two people were responsible for media relations. Because of the growth of the Internet and sports talk radio you could not survive with two people. Look at this interview. With fan sites, blogs and all other forms of Internet media, it goes to show that everyone is a reporter now. It is bigger than I ever thought it could be.I’ll give you another example of how much it has changed. I remember back when we were over at our old St. Thomas training site. There was the school’s swimming pool right outside of our weight room and behind that was a crabapple tree. It was right in front of that tree where Coach Shula would conduct his interviews to the media, ABC, NBC, CBS, while sitting on a pool chair with a swimming pool and Co-eds (walking) behind him. It was a much more simple time.}

^{PP: Since we are talking about the changes in the NFL, more seem to be on the horizon. There are rumors that the NFL wants to take over the individual team web sites. How does that effect what you do and what have you heard?}

^{SS: I do not know. I will not speculate on that because it is still being discussed.}

^{PP: Fair enough. Let’s talk about Nick Saban.}

^{SS: (laughing) Yeah, like I am going to touch that one.}

^{PP: I have to try.}

^{SS: I will say this; in general, all coaches are similar. They are in great moods when they win and not so when they lose. You wouldn’t expect anything different.}

^{PP: O.k. I knew that would be a bad subject. Let’s try this. You have seen every coach but the first one. Who was your favorite?}

^{SS: Don Shula. It was an honor to work with Don Shula. I learned so much from him in regards to management. The biggest thing was the ability to stop small distractions from becoming large ones.}

^{PP: Did you have daily contact with Shula?}

^{SS: Yes. When he was coach, I was still in our media relations department. We worked in concert with him in all areas from his daily press conferences to setting up his weekly conference call with other team’s media. We were a small office back then so when Harvey (Greene) was out advancing a road game, I would be responsible for everything. If it were a home game, we both would do it.}

^{PP: That had to be great.}

^{SS: It was an honor. In my current position, I do not have as much daily contact with the coaches.}

^{PP: How about Cam Cameron. What is your impression on him?}

^{SS: Everything he does is in a first-class manner. Again, I don’t work on a daily basis with the coaches.}

^{PP: I think I will move on from the coaches. You have a job that pretty much any Dolphins fan would want. What are some of the benefits to having your job that could make the rest of us more jealous?}

^{SS: Wow, it is hard to come up with just a couple. The biggest is being at the game. Being in the locker room after a win is always great and, when I was in media relations and traveled to road games, there was nothing more fun than winning in Buffalo . Another thing is the knowledge that whether it is my position, or our team president Bryan Wiedmeier, or the person who delivers our mail, we hold positions that are shared by only 31 other people in the world. That’s pretty cool.}

^{PP: Do you have contact with the other 31 teams?}

^{SS: Oh yeah, we have annual meetings; we discuss new ideas, and swap content during game week. I also do the publication side, so in producing the game program, for example, we have a lot of contact, we need opposing coaches’ bios, headshots, interviews. Those type of things.}

^{PP: Of the ex-players, who would you say does the most for the organization now?}

^{SS: Nat Moore and Twan Russell. They both have key positions with the team. Nat is in charge of our alumni association. We have one of the best alumni associations in the league by far and Nat Moore handles all of that. Twan also works daily with the team. He handles the team’s youth programs. He runs our football camps and junior training camps. So, we work with both of them very closely.}

^{PP: Scott, I know you have to go, so I will let you get out of here. Thank you very much for this opportunity.}

^{SS: No problem. If you need anything else let me know.}

^{We hope that you have enjoyed this Phinatic Pheature Interview with Scott Stone of the Miami Dolphins. Obviously some of the questions that I wanted to ask could not be answered. Scott was gracious in taking his personal time to speak with me.}