All Good Things Must Come To An End

When I started, I didn’t know when it would end.

I wasn’t sure if it would be just a few months, a year or maybe a bit longer. Never, however, did I expect it to last this long.

Never did I expect this site to grow into what it has become. To forge the relationships I’ve created with my bosses, my colleagues, my writers and my readers.

And for that I’m forever grateful. Many thanks are in store and I’ll get there at some point.

It all started in February of 2013. I was in college at the time and made the decision to focus on a career in sports media. I saw a tweet about joining the FanSided Network so I thought I’d give it a shot. I applied and was shipped on over to Climbing Tal’s Hill, our sister Astros site.

The editor of the site, Greg Thurston, whipped me into writing shape right away. I covered many things at CTH, but the one thing I loved covering was the Minor Leagues. I wrote a MiLB recap every night, which meant staying up until 2:00-3:00 AM ET as the Lancaster JetHawks were wrapping up West Coast play. Fun times when I had to wake up by 8:15 AM to start my classes.

Around August time I heard of an opening at House of Houston. It was a new site looking for its first editor. As someone that loves the Rockets and Texans almost as much as the Astros, it was a no-brainer move. I started slowly in September with October 1st being my first real day on the job.

After training from Greg and my new boss Joel Wagler, I felt I was ready to take command. I hastily began recruiting like John Calipari and Coach K, begging many people that I felt were talented to join my squad. I’m proud to say that over my three years here we’ve had over 60 writers join the site. Many have come and gone, but several have them have become key fixtures within Houston sports media.

Three years and over 3,500 House of Houston posts later, my time has come to hang up the cleats. I’ve mentioned Greg and Joel already, but I owe so much to so many others. First, Marcus Chavez and Brian K. Patterson. Marcus was my first co-editor and really spiced things up around here. Brian started as a writer but was the obvious choice to replace Marcus when he decided to move on. Both of them made my job incredibly easier and for that I can’t thank them enough.

As Editorial Director of the local sites, a new venture by FanSided at the time, it was Joel’s responsibility to make sure ALL local sites were running smoothly. For Joel, that meant dealing with 10-to-15 of me. And while I may be biased, I believe he did a tremendous job handling all of us, always answering our questions quickly. Thank you.

When Joel moved up within FanSided, it was Chris Headrick’s turn to deal with me. Like Joel, Chris was always there for any issues that arose. Thankfully for Chris, Joel already me settled in comfortably so I wasn’t able to pester him like I pestered Joel. Thank you, Chris.

We’re all a team at FanSided and all editors look out for one another. While I may have been one of the longest-tenured editors at FanSided, I always learned new things from the newer editors. Thank you to all of y’all.

Editors aren’t editors without writers. From my first writer to the last, you all provided me with the opportunity to better my craft and learn from each and every one of you. You all were a pleasure to work with.

But at the end of the day, there’s no need for an editor or writers without readers. There are hundreds of thousands of you out there. Some come every day and some come once in a while. Each one of you made it possible for me to stick around and more importantly made my bosses happy. You know what they say…happy boss, happy life. I think.

All good things must come to an end. Just ask the 2015 Astros. They had a great thing going and then in the 8th inning of game four of the ALDS they decided that good things must come to an end. Just ask the 2015-2016 Houston Rockets. After a Western Conference Finals appearance the previous season, they decided to completely disintegrate the following season. And then there’s our Texans. They usually just build up your hopes only to destroy them all within one 60-minute game. Almost impressive at this point.

I may be leaving, but Houston sports won’t leave me. As a 24-year old, I’ve never witnessed a Houston sports championship. Yes, I’m aware the Aeros, Dynamo and Comets have all won and are most definitely Houston’s best sports franchises in terms of success, however, I bleed Astros, Rockets and Texans. Those are my teams I live, but mostly die for. Those are the teams that constantly build up my hope only for all of it to come crashing down. It builds character they say.

I want y’all to know, I’ll always be around. My Ben Tate wishy-washy rants may be gone. My calling of the next Texans loss being the worst in franchise history may be no longer on House of Houston. But my presence on Twitter will still be felt. I’ll no longer be found at @HouseofHouston on Twitter. That will belong to the next editor of House of Houston (still to be determined). However – and here comes the shameless plug you’ve all been waiting for – you can find me and all of my hot and horrible takes at @YoniPollak.

Trust me, when one of our teams finally win I’ll be heard. It may be the sound of me crying on the floor of wherever I am or the sound of me typing away on my keyboard trying to find the first flight home for my first championship parade. I’ll still be attending games in the New York area or driving to Gillette Stadium to witness pathetic showings (or non-showings) of our favorite football team. I’ll still be around and heard, just not on this platform.

People have asked me why now? Did anything happen? Are you sure? Well, to answer some of those questions, it was simply time. Unfortunately, real life happens and you find yourself needing more than 24 hours in a day. As an editor, you need to give your time to the site. As the last few months went by, I wasn’t able to give over the time I had given over the last three years. It wasn’t fair to the writers or the readers to give less than 100 percent as I felt I had been recently. After much collaboration with friends, colleagues and others, it was simply just time to let go.

I’ll miss this so much. I’ll miss talking with my bosses about editorial strategies. I’ll miss discussing different topics with my writers. But most importantly, I’ll miss the interactions with the fans. I’ll miss the comments on my Jeremy Lin articles telling me I’ve been hired by the Rockets to promote the Rockets agenda (still waiting on that money, Les). I’ll miss the constant random retweets of my tweet saying the Astros won by drafting Mark Appel over Kris Bryant. Actually, those will probably still occur often.

But seriously. The readers made this site what it was. Y’all made it a blast to come to work every day. Thank you for your constant comments, suggestions, feedback, criticism but most importantly, those page clicks.

Thank you!