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Meet David Furones of South Florida Sun Sentinel in Broward County

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Today we’d like to introduce you to David Furones.

Thanks for sharing your story with us David. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
A lifelong dream of getting to write about sports for a living accompanied by the ambition necessary to fulfill that dream in a competitive field has me to the point where I am currently the South Florida Sun Sentinel’s Miami Hurricanes beat reporter. Obviously, I loved sports growing up — from Little League baseball to playing basketball and football with neighborhood friends in southwest Miami. Always watching the local teams on TV and consuming media surrounding them, I took pride in being advanced for my age in how much I knew about sports. Every kid like me had a dream of one day playing a professional sport for a living, but I always say, once I realized that was unrealistic, I started wondering what other jobs could be done around sports. I became enamored with the role the media played by watching ESPN non-stop, going straight to the sports section when I got my hands on a newspaper and really analyzing how commentators would call live games.

As a student, I always enjoyed math more than English, but I realized through essays that I wrote in high school that I was a decent writer. I figured I might just have a shot if I combined my passion with that ability and devoted myself to it. After attending Southwest Miami High, I earned my degree from the University of Miami as a double major in journalism and sports administration. Writing for the school paper there, I also started freelancing with the Miami Herald by senior year, thanks in large part to taking Michelle Kaufman’s sports reporting class at UM the semester prior. I also interned for CaneSport.com, Rivals’ website that covers Hurricanes athletics. I was on track, but opportunities for a full-time sports reporting position in South Florida just weren’t there upon graduation. I continued to freelance.

Starting off as someone that would get a middle-of-the-pack high school football game every Friday night with the Herald, I started getting better games and bigger assignments over time. I would write for a number of different media organizations, just picking up assignments wherever I could. While doing that, I worked full-time as an administrative assistant at UM’s Wellness Center, where I also worked as a student employee while I attended the university. I did that by day and was a sports writer on nights and weekends, sometimes using lunch breaks to write. It took nearly four years from graduation before I could accept my first full-time sports reporting position, but I always kept at it because, over those years, I only grew. I knew I was trusted by all editors who offered me assignments and received encouraging feedback from colleagues. On social media, specifically Twitter, I was also making a bit of a name for myself for my coverage of high school football and college football recruiting that I felt could propel me.

Finally, an opportunity came up at the South Florida Sun Sentinel in 2016. I was hired to be one of the two writers covering high school sports in Broward and Palm Beach counties, mostly Broward. It was a tremendous opportunity to hone my skills at taking responsibility of a beat, and between this and my previous freelancing experience, I’ve covered some incredible young athletes in talent-rich South Florida, many that became stars in college sports and even the pros. After two-plus years, another writer at the Sentinel left for another opportunity, and I was promoted to covering FAU football — with the polarizing Lane Kiffin as head coach — and had backup duties in our Miami Heat coverage. That gave me the opportunity to see what daily NBA coverage is like over the 2018-19 season, which also happened to be Heat star Dwyane Wade’s last. I got to be on hand for much of that season, which took on a personality of its own as Wade’s “One Last Dance.” I even traveled for eight road games that season, nearly all of which were his last game in a given city.

Last summer, another Sentinel writer took another opportunity, and that opened up a second promotion and the Miami Hurricanes beat for me to jump right in. I feel my familiarity with the program has made me a natural for this role, and I’m excited to head into a second season covering UM full-time. Along the way, I’ve had the tremendous pleasure of covering such events as the last Super Bowl between the Chiefs and 49ers that was at Hard Rock Stadium, the 2017 MLB All-Star Game at Marlins Park, multiple Orange Bowl games and two College Football Playoff semifinal games that took place in Miami.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
It wasn’t always smooth. Working a full-time day job and finding enough freelance work to remain active and relevant in the local sports media those years before I was hired by the Sentinel, that was no breeze.

Sometimes, between the two, I worked 14-16-hour days, went to bed and got up the next morning to do it again. I was hardened by those experiences. Whenever things get tough in my current role, I can’t bring myself to complain because I remember what it was like to — not only have to work that hard to get where I am — but to have to wait my turn. It has given me a deep appreciation of having this opportunity to write about sports for a living.

I also hope my journey could inspire or motivate someone in whatever field that is either currently graduating and diving into an uncertain workforce or was set back due to the economic effect of the coronavirus pandemic.

We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
I work as a sports reporter covering University of Miami athletics for the South Florida Sun Sentinel. I first made a name for myself in the local sports media for my coverage of high school football and college football recruiting in this hotbed of football talent that is South Florida. I also covered Florida Atlantic (FAU) and the Miami Heat as a backup writer before leaping into my current role of spearheading our Miami Hurricanes coverage.

Any shoutouts? Who else deserves credit in this story – who has played a meaningful role?
First, when I was still a student at UM, Miami Herald sports writer Michelle Kaufman taught me how to do this job, as she does for many others through the class she teaches. Her support also helped me first get in contact with the Herald about freelancing. There, editors like Jorge Rojas, Alex Mena, John Devine and Scott Magoloff and sports reporters like Andre Fernandez, Manny Navarro, Susan Miller Degnan and Walter Villa helped me grow.

Hired by the Sun Sentinel in 2016, I’m grateful that then-sports editor David Selig gave me that opportunity to be a full-time sports reporter. He and other editors like Kathy Laughlin, Keven Lerner, Steve Svekis, Kenny Rosarion and Teri Berg provided me leadership, support and advice. Working alongside Sentinel sports writers both current and former like Ira Winderman, Omar Kelly, Dave Hyde, Tim Healey, Safid Deen, Wells Dusenbury, Shandel Richardson, Christy Cabrera Chirinos, Matthew DeFranks, Adam Lichtenstein and Khobi Price has also been instrumental.

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Image Credit:
Wells Dusenbury / Sun Sentinel, Susan Stocker / Sun Sentinel, John McCall / Sun Sentinel, Ryan Kuttler / Kuttler Photo

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