Editorial Standards

These standards describe how Sandman Sports produces its coverage. They apply to every article, podcast, and feature published on this site.

Sourcing

  • Primary sources first. Where possible, we cite primary sources — official team and league communications, on-the-record interviews, court documents, and public databases.
  • Named attribution. Sourced facts and quotes are attributed to a named person or named publication. We use anonymous sources only when the information is significant, when it could not be obtained on the record, and when we have verified the source's credibility.
  • Statistics. Sports statistics are sourced from official league data feeds and noted providers. When we cite advanced metrics, we name the provider and link to the source where possible.
  • Aggregation. When we summarize reporting that originated elsewhere, we link to the original source and name the outlet. We do not present aggregated reporting as our own original work.

Fact-checking

  • Before publication, writers verify factual claims — names, dates, scores, statistics, quotes — against primary sources.
  • Editors review submitted articles for factual accuracy and clarity before publishing.
  • When we discover an error after publication, we follow our corrections policy.

Opinion, analysis, and prediction

Much of our coverage is analysis or opinion: power rankings, picks, betting analysis, hot takes, and predictive features. We label these clearly and we hold them to the same factual-accuracy standard as straight news. Disagreeing with a prediction is fine; the underlying facts the prediction is built on must still be correct.

AI-assisted writing

  • Sandman Sports articles are written, edited, and reviewed by humans on our editorial staff. Each article is bylined to a real person who is accountable for its contents.
  • We may use AI tools as writing aids — for research, drafting outlines, summarizing public data, copy editing, or generating illustrative imagery — but a human writer or editor is responsible for every claim, quote, statistic, and recommendation in the finished article.
  • We do not publish fully automated content. We do not publish AI-generated quotes attributed to real people.

Independence

  • Editorial decisions are not influenced by advertisers, sponsors, or commercial partners.
  • When a story relates to a sponsor or business partner, the writer discloses the relationship at the top of the article.
  • Our betting and picks coverage is editorial — we do not accept payment in exchange for picks, ratings, or favorable coverage of any sportsbook, operator, or service.

Diversity of viewpoints

We cover a wide range of sports and audiences, and we believe our coverage is stronger when it reflects a range of perspectives. Our masthead is published at /masthead/.

Last updated: 2026-05-23. See also our corrections policy and ethics policy.