Yes. There’s a low cost of living. Yes, there’s great education and healthcare and parks and fun, big city amenities. But why people choose to live and stay in Cincinnati and maybe more importantly, why do they choose to stay? My name is Eric Sztanyo from Keller Williams Realty and teamSztanyo.com, where we are helping you find your home and strengthen your family. I’m a Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky realtor. I’ve lived here for 30-plus years in the Greater Cincinnati area, both in Northern Kentucky and on the Cincinnati side. I wanted to bring you guys something special about why people choose to live and stay in Cincinnati. I heard an interview of Paul Daughtery this morning from another terrific sports journalist, Dan Hoard who covers the Bengals and the University of Cincinnati. Paul Daugherty, who’s been a sports writer here in town for 30 plus years, covering the reds, covering the Bengals. Just a fantastic writer.
Choosing Between Ego and Contentment
Paul began writing here in Cincinnati, I believe around 1988, which is exactly when my family moved to Cincinnati from Michigan. I was six years old at the time. The Bengals went to the super bowl. I didn’t think that was a big deal. And then there was 30-year drought and then the reds won in 1990, wired a wire. And I’m just like, “oh, this is great. We just win everything here.” And then, it’s been quite a drought, but I followed Paul Daughtery’s work all growing up. And I didn’t realize it cause I’ve been reading more of the athletic lately and Paul Dehner Jr. I love his stuff, but Paul is 64 and he’s retiring. And so Dan Hoard did this interview with him and it was a great interview. I definitely recommend checking it out, talking about different players and experiences and stories he’s had over the years from Chad Johnson to Carl Pickens, to people who threatened his life. So it’s a pretty fantastic interview talking about his relationship with Sam White and Paul Brown and Mike Brown, really great interview.
But what stood out to me at the end and particularly for this channel, which is a real estate channel and talking about living here in the Cincinnati area is Dan asked him “Hey, you’ve had multiple opportunities over the years to move away from Cincinnati and you’ve had different job opportunities. Why did you choose to stay here? And so I’m gonna bring in the audio from this interview and let you guys listen. And then I’ll do a little bit more commentary on it.
Dan Hoard:
You’ve had opportunities to leave over the years for various media outlets. Why did you Stay?
Paul Daugherty :
That’s a great question. And this is gonna sound hokey and corny and whatever. And I’m not saying it because I need to make friends cuz it doesn’t matter anymore. I stayed. We stayed for primarily family reasons. I had two chances to go to the LA Times in the early nineties. And I spent a lot of time out there with a real estate agent driving me all over Orange county. I didn’t wanna raise my kids in Los Angeles. I had no desire to have them go to school out there and that’s gonna sound crazy. Cuz people think I’m some flaming liberal, which I am not. And that’s a whole nother podcast, Dan. But I didn’t wanna raise them in Los Angeles. I hate traffic. I didn’t want to get stuck in traffic, my whole freaking life.
“I didn’t wanna raise my kids in Los Angeles.” Very interesting comment. And this is coming from someone who probably made that decision actually in the nineties. And yet when I had a lot of you who reach out to me talking about moving to Cincinnati, it’s a very similar conversation. I hear. I don’t wanna have my kids raised in Los Angeles or Phoenix or Seattle or Chicago or New York or these various places around the country because you’re looking for a place that it’s gonna be good for your kids. That’s gonna be good for your family. Not only the education but maybe the values and the morals you want for your family. Cincinnati is a unique city in this aspect that what you find here oftentimes are families who have lived here. Multi-generationally and it’s not only they decided to choose to live here, but they decided to choose to stay here. So let’s keep going in this interview with Paul Docker and see what else he has to say.
Paul Daugherty :
Respected older columnists that Chicago Tribune years ago. And I asked him, should I take this job? And he said, let me ask you something. And I said, okay. He said, are you happy where you are? -Yeah. Are you making reasonable money? -Yeah. Do you get to cover almost everything that the quote-unquote big guys in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago cover? I said, yeah. He said, do they treat you well?- Yeah, most of the time. And he said, what’s your problem? And you know, that’s when it hit me along with the family stuff that the only thing that would’ve made me wanna move to Los Angeles to work for the times was ego was to say, Hey, I worked for the LA Times and that it didn’t mean that much to me. And so we decided to stay and what I thought back in my youth would be a three to five-year deal here. When I signed on an 88, I’m still here. They can’t get rid of me. And now I get to walk away of my own volition. So I guess it worked out!
Very interesting part of this interview to me. Paul Daughtery, he’s super talented. If you haven’t read his stuff, go check him out. Had opportunities to go to LA multiple times. And I think if you’re a professional, who’s on top of your game or you run a business or you have ambition and you grow up here in Cincinnati, there’s always gonna be this desire. Like, Hey, can I make it on the bigger stage? Can I go to New York? Can I go to Chicago? Can I go to LA and make it there? Can I be someone big and important? This is the interesting part of Cincinnati to me. It’s a big city, right? It’s one of the top 20-25 largest metros in America, but it’s also got a small-town feel. And so you have these big city amenities, you have the major sports teams, you know, it’s 2 million plus population, but it’s also kind of community oriented. And you’re never like two steps away from knowing kind of everyone in the city like that Kevin Bacon game.
And so two themes that Paul hits on here that I think are really interesting are ego and contentment. And what we find out here is the reason why he really wanted to not move to LA because as this kind of older, wiser journalist said to him, Hey, you’ve got everything you want there. Why are you moving? And the answer was, I want my ego to be puffed up. And I think this is such an interesting interview and it’s not like there’s no ego in Cincinnati whatsoever, but there is a part of the city that, because we get looked over a lot from national press and national media, even just watched the Bengals, like for those of you are Bengals fans and have followed their story. They rose to the Superbowl last year. And everyone’s just saying it was a fluke, right? It shouldn’t have happened. I and I guarantee you just because this is how it works in Cincinnati. When Joe burrow takes us back to the super bowl this year because our offensive line is actually gonna let him live and survive and have a pocket and tear gonna be running double routes. When we get back to the super bowl and win it, everybody’s just gonna crap on it again.
Because that’s just what happens here in Cincinnati is like, you don’t get a lot of credit because you’re not LA or Chicago, or New York. And so you kind of have to come to terms with that if you wanna live here. And I found that interesting in this interview, that’s what happened with Paul. He realized his ego was what was gonna take him to LA. And then he also realized that he could be content here, not only content but really enjoy it. And so that, I feel like it’s important. If you are thinking of moving here and you want to be, you know, can you be a big fish in a small pond kind of deal? Are you okay with a smaller town feel? Even though we have bigger city amenities for Dan Hoard the interviewer that reminded him of one other hall of fame, sports journalist here in the town hall of Famer Red’s broadcaster, Marty Brennaman.
Dan Horder:
Sound a little like our mutual friend, Marty Brennaman.
Paul Daughtery:
Yes. Yeah. I think Marty felt the same way. And he took far less money to hang around with the reds than he could have gone to Boston, for example, they wanted to hire him. I think Chicago, the Cubs at some point had a flirtation with Marty, but yeah, pretty much the same.
Find A Home In Cincinnati with Team Sztanyo
So this is a warning. If you think you’re moving here for three to five years, be careful. You might get sucked into Cincinnati for the long term and end up staying for the rest of your life. This city’s amazing. I love it here. If you are looking to move to Cincinnati area, gives us a call at team Sztanyo at 513.813.6293. Thanks so much.