Hello sports rookies, established vets, fanatics, and even self-proclaimed living sports encyclopedias, such as myself, to my newly established Ace Sports Status blog!

My name is Eric Yates, I personally refer to myself as a sports ace, if you will, and in turn I moniker myself as Ace Yates. I am a sports enthusiast and purist when it comes to all forms of football, baseball, basketball. However, I dabble in Hockey and Soccer part time as I find it harder to keep up with currently. As a man that is both blessed and cursed with a ravenous mindset with my ADHD, I find myself constantly having personal takes on sports in my head and I love to share my takes, whether good or bad, to others and have always believed in my sports agenda to start a blog on it, such as I am doing now.

More about me:

• I am a 23 years old man born and raised in the 803, the capital of Columbia, South Carolina.
• I humbly graduated from THE University of South Carolina (GO COCKS! #forevertothee)in the class of 2018 with majors in Finance & Real Estate.
• ?

You may ask yourself, “Ace, what teams would a South Carolinian like you possibly root for considering pro sports have never laid a foundation within your state?” Well, here are my personal sports affiliations when it comes to favorite teams:

• Football: Pittsburgh Steelers (Grandfather hails from Pittsburgh) I bleed black and yellow. Secondary NFL team is Carolina Panthers #KeepPounding. When it comes to college football of course I support my alma mater in the South Carolina Gamecocks
• Baseball: Pittsburgh Pirates (see the them?) what disparity I have endured, is unfathomable, but I am unwavering in my Pirates #raisethejollyroger. SC holds a multitude of minor league affiliates that I root for: the Columbia Fireflies (I can’t explain how pumped I was when Tim Tebow came to play for us!), the Lexington Blowfish (formerly known as the Columbia Bombers where David Wright developed) the Greenville Drive and the Myrtle Beach Pelicans round out my minor league teams I tend to root for.
• Basketball: The sport that I love to watch (and play, 2K please help your fan base) but just have no dire fandom for any particular team. However, I have love for the Charlotte Hornets, Philedlphia 76ers, San Antonio Spurs, NY Knicks, and Brooklyn Nets in no particular order. Of course I am a Gamecock Basketball fan (that men’s 2016-2017 Final Four run was one my favorite sports runs of my lifetime. Plus our lady Gamecocks are tops in the nation) but I also am a considerable UCONN men/women’s team fan as well.
• Hockey: A sport I haven’t fully indulged in, BUT I am a hardcore Pittsburgh Penguins fan. While my second favorite has to be the Detroit Red Wings.
• Soccer: I don’t follow the MLS or Premiere League too much for that matter, don’t get me wrong I used to play soccer for 14 years growing up, but it’s never been a top priority for me. However, I of course being a US native love our international soccer team.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

• Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
• What topics do you think you’ll write about?
• Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
• If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.