Jaime Cardenas has been covering soccer as a Times sports intern. He apparently impressed enough to stay — and inspired Sports Editor Randy Harvey to put some writing into his memo announcing the news:

To: The Staff
From: Randy Harvey, Sports Editor

From Jaime Cardenas, the newest addition to our sports staff:

"The first edition of the Los Angeles Times I ever got was the August 18, 1998 issue. It's the one two days after Jim Murray died.

"I want to be a sports reporter.

"When Mr. Murray passed away, I was a senior in high school in Tijuana.

"I had heard on a sports radio station, from Jim Rome, I think, that the L.A. Times had put out this great sports section celebrating the life of 'the greatest sports reporter ever.'

"Well, wow, if I want to be a sports reporter then I think I should have that newspaper. I begged my father to cross the border into the U.S. and pick me up a copy of the L.A. Times that day.

"I want to be a sports reporter.

"I still own that newspaper--the front page and the sports section--and read it every six months or so. I get tips on how a good sports reporter should act, behave, gather information and write.

"I want to be a sports reporter."

Those are the first few paragraphs of Jaime's introduction letter when he applied earlier this year for a sports internship. He did an outstanding job for us, covering Chivas USA soccer, assisting in coverage of Mexico's national soccer team and reporting from the X Games. We were fortunate that we were able to offer him an opportunity to remain with us after his internship ends this month.

Jaime was born in San Diego and raised in Tijuana, where he attended kindergarten through high school. He attended college at Southwestern Community College and Cal State Fullerton, where he was an assistant news editor and staff writer for the Daily Titan. He covered soccer, basketball and ROTC and also wrote for the news, opinion and music and entertainment sections. For us, he will report to prep editor Bob Rohwer but also will continue covering Chivas USA soccer and international soccer and will assist in major league baseball and boxing coverage.

Jaime Cardenas is a sports reporter.