An Interview with Gary Andrew Poole

“I don’t want to rely on conglomerates, like ESPN, for all of my sports information. I think the death of newspapers and the rise of monopolization in sports media doesn’t bode well for sports journalism.”

“There are a lot of talented writers out there and they are producing some good stuff, but the system is working against them. Everyone knows it. Journalists and readers are disturbed. Journalists want to do good work but they are being hamstrung.”

“Many newspaper leaders have decided to misuse their best writers: in many, but not all cases, they don’t allow them to do what they do best—report, put issues into context, and tell stories. Readers are smart and they realize this lapse in quality and seek out their information elsewhere.”

Gary Andrew Poole: Interviewed on January 15, 2009

Position: Journalist/Author

Born: Wheat Ridge, Colorado.

Education: Colorado State, B.A.; Columbia University, M.S.

Career: Writing professionally since 1986, published in a variety of publications, including The New York Times, TIME, GQ, USA Today, Forbes, and Wired.

Personal: Married, two kids.

Favorite restaurant (home): Taco Truck, Temescal Canyon Road, Los Angeles. “Workingman’s food. Great huevos rancheros and fish soups for a few dollars.”

Favorite restaurant (away): Pizzetta 211, San Francisco. “A sentimental favorite. I know the owner, and she named a pizza after my daughter. “

Favorite hotel: Three-way tie: Hacienda Cucin, Ecuador “reminds me of an Agatha Christie novel”; Number 16, London, South Kensington area; Mauna Lani, Hawaii, “relaxing and my kids love it”.

Author of: The Galloping Ghost: Red Grange, an American Football Legend (Houghton Mifflin): www.garyandrewpoole.com

Gary Andrew Poole, Columbia Journalism Review, January 6, 2009:

http://www.cjr.org/essay/back_to_the_future_1.php?page=all

In the 1920s, The New Yorker published a piece that declared sports a “trivial enterprise” involving “second-rate people and their second-rate dreams and emotions.” The magazine went on to concede, however, that “the quality of writing in the sports pages is, in the large, much superior—wittier, more emotional, more dramatic, and more accurate—to the quality of writing that flows through the news columns.” Indeed, many of the greatest writers in journalism—Grantland Rice, W. C. Heinz, Jim Murray, Red Smith, to name but a few—found their home on the sports pages. Sports are big business and they have big themes: physical and intellectual tests, joy and heartbreak, hope and perseverance, teamwork and individual transcendence. The games and characters are ripe for vivid storytelling, and philosophic discourse about human nature and our culture. They are also part of a multibillion-dollar industry in need of dogged watchdog journalism.

But since the mid-1990s, two forces have diminished classic sports writing. First, television coverage in general has expanded, making hype and the sensational aspects of sports dominant. ESPN became a cultural and media juggernaut, sending fans to SportsCenter for highlights and scores, rendering game recaps and box scores in the next day’s newspapers obsolete. Newspapers gradually began reducing the size of game stories, dashing the more literary ambitions of their writers. Many of the more stylish writers migrated toward higher-profile and better-paying radio and television gigs, and the faster news cycle created a sports world in which the best reporting started getting sliced into smaller stories. It used to be that a star writer like Red Smith would cover the games and put all of his reporting into a substantial game story or one of his columns. “Red Smith was my inspiration to get into sports writing,” says Buster Olney, a senior writer at ESPN The Magazine who spent six years at The New York Times. “You read his writing and said, ‘Wow!’ Today, in four-hundred words you can get the basic details of the game story, but you miss the details and the anecdotes. It’s interesting, and important, to know how the players and managers think, why they made certain decisions. That’s the cool stuff, and it’s getting lost.”

The Web, meanwhile, did to sports writing what it has done to journalism more broadly: carved up the audience and exacerbated the more-faster-better mindset that cable TV began. Anyone can go to the Web anytime to get scores, rapid-fire articles about games, and gobs of analysis and statistics. There are generalized sports sites like ESPN.com and CNNSI.com, hyper-focused team news blogs, sites run by the athletes themselves, and irreverent sports sites such as Deadspin.

All this dramatically changed the job of the sports beat writer and columnist, traditionally the bedrock of sports writing. Malcolm Moran, who is the Pennsylvania State University’s Knight Chair in Sports Journalism and Society, says 2003 marked a sea change in sports writing. In April of that year, autigers.com, an Auburn University fan site, was flooded with posts about sightings of Mike Price, the head football coach at archrival Alabama, at a strip club in Pensacola, Florida. The scandal became a national story, and Price was fired. “We passed a threshold,” says Moran, who spent his reporting career at USA Today, The New York Times, Newsday, and the Chicago Tribune. “The next nine-hundred and ninety-nine pieces of speculation on a fan site have to be checked out, and it could cost you your job if you miss one. It changed the business, and not for the better.”

In addition to covering the games and the teams, beat writers now must chase blog-based rumors—and blog themselves. It’s an untenable situation, and most reporters simply react to the daily torrent of news bites while the bigger stories and issues go wanting. Even columnists are producing more hackneyed items. The last Pulitzer for a sports column went to Jim Murray of the Los Angeles Times—in 1990. Mark Saxon, a beat writer for the Orange County Register, says today’s sports journalism is good for hardcore fans and fantasy league players looking for an edge, but the quality of the coverage and the overall storytelling have suffered.

These issues came to a head last April when Buzz Bissinger, the author of Friday Night Lights, confronted Will Leitch, then the editor of Deadspin (now with New York Magazine), on HBO’s Costas Now. Bissinger railed against blogs and taunted Leitch, brandishing a folder of vulgar blog posts and asking him if he had ever read the sports writer W. C. Heinz, who was Bissinger’s symbol for a tradition of greatness. “I think blogs are dedicated to cruelty; they’re dedicated to dishonesty; they’re dedicated to speed,” Bissinger said. After the show, Bissinger was ridiculed on the blogosphere and did an about-face, apologizing repeatedly and granting interviews to the blogs he had chastised.

I think Bissinger was on the right track but blaming the wrong medium. It is easy to criticize and stereotype bloggers, but most bloggers and their readers didn’t grow up devouring the latest Red Smith column with their morning coffee. Sports fans under thirty spent their formative years watching shows like ESPN’s Around the Horn, which features newspaper columnists shouting at each other like lunatics.

An interesting thing happened in the wake of the Bissinger-Leitch dustup: Deadspin and other blogs started interviewing older, celebrated sports writers, like Frank Deford. Check out the comments section on these long and fascinating Q&As—the young blog readers loved reading about these guys and seemed to enjoy their long-form narratives. In other words, readers of Deadspin appreciate great writing; it’s the newspapers that have given up on it, feeling as though they have to chase rumors and deliver a ceaseless stream of chicken-nugget news. In marketing parlance, sports sections have degraded their brand.

Like anything, this devolution of sports writing is complicated. People holding AARP cards tell me, “There are no more good sports writers.” That’s just not true. There are excellent writers out there: Buster Olney, Damon Hack, Gary Smith, John Feinstein, and Rick Reilly come immediately to mind, and there are others, some at smaller papers—Terry Pluto, a columnist for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, for example—working under the national radar. So far, the magazine industry hasn’t suffered the same kind of economic devastation that has befallen newspapers, and Sports Illustrated, ESPN The Magazine, Sporting News, and The New Yorker still, on occasion, publish put-down-your-iPhone-and-read-this articles. SI and ESPN are publishing some nice narrative work in the magazine, and on the Web, particularly in The Bonus and E-Ticket sections. Yahoo has hired some ex-newspaper stars and done some good investigative stories. In other words, all is not lost.

But here is a typical scenario that illustrates the problem for newspaper sports sections. Beat writers covering a baseball game see a player strain a hamstring. Immediately they are all on their BlackBerries posting an item about the injury and how the batting order was just changed. Something must be posted! Any writer who misses the tidbit will be called on it by his or her editor. But everyone has the same information; no one “scoops” anyone. So why not wait and weave that tidbit into the game story? The reporter would have the chance to go to the locker room and ask questions, talk to the manager about the change in strategy after the injury—to add context and nuance and narrative. These days, that sort of insight is too often lost. “If I were the editor,” says ESPN’s Buster Olney, who also blogs, “I would say, ‘Don’t worry about beating the seven other papers on the hamstring story; focus on developing your thousand-word game story. Remember the great writing you loved as a kid? Write it up like that.’”

Tim McGuire, a former editor and senior vice president of the Minneapolis Star Tribune who now teaches the business of journalism at Arizona State University, says newspaper management is showing a lack of leadership. “It’s a mission problem. The reporters are doing too much, and they’re confused about their mission,” he says. “We’re pouring the same news on people that they can get anywhere.” What’s needed, McGuire says, is for newspapers to play to their strengths. Make statistical information readily available on newspaper Web sites, of course, but it’s time for narrative storytelling and vividly written game stories to make a comeback—because journalists know how to weave tales, put events in context, and act as intermediaries to the firehose of information on the Web. Most bloggers don’t have that skill or, more important, that mission.

I spent the last few years working on a biography of Red Grange, a football player who played in the 1920s. In my research, I studied a century’s worth of sports writing, from W.C. Heinz and Red Smith to Hunter S. Thompson. As I read through yellowed newspapers, I encountered descriptive writing, clever word play, references to Shakespeare, the Bible, heroic couplets—and a wise eye toward human nature. I could see, smell, and hear these games. And when the stars played poorly, the writers didn’t soften the language leaving their Underwoods. They were not glorified flaks, as they are now often portrayed. Thompson, for instance, would study game film with NFL players to better understand their athletic choices.

Sports journalism has had its failings—homerism, winking at behavior that should have been scrutinized, and turning a blind eye to racial inequality, to name a few. The biggest story of modern sports is performance-enhancing drugs, a story which has been subject to some uneven coverage. While there were whisperings in the press, and Sports Illustrated bravely highlighted the issue in 2002, I wonder if Major League Baseball’s steroid scandal would have gotten past Grantland Rice, Westbrook Pegler, Heinz et al. My bet? Through their dogged reporting and descriptions of the players’ ridiculously bulked-up frames, the juicing would have been exposed early on.

The sports section is called the “toy department” by those who think its mission is more fun than consequential. But go to any major sporting event and you’ll see that the importance of sports to our culture is obvious; they are part of people’s dreams, of how they define themselves. The sports pages used to hold the honor as one of the best-written and best-reported sections in a newspaper. It’s important for sports, for newspapers, and for our society that they recapture that mantle.

Q. Isn’t journalism market-driven? And if so, isn’t the market getting what it wants from sports media?

A. Journalism – like any business – is market-driven, but just because McDonald’s sells a billion chicken McNuggets doesn’t mean it is the most worthwhile food on the planet. It is easy to write-off any industry as not able to make it in the marketplace, but let’s think about our society. We live in an information culture, and there needs to be a premium on education, knowledge, and reason. An ignorant society makes ignorant decisions. Daily journalism plays an important function in our society, and should serve a watchdog role.

In sports media, I enjoy ESPN and SI, and I read a lot of blogs—I like the kaleidoscope of opinions, information, and humor. But I also believe newspapers play a critical role in a well-informed society. I don’t want to rely on conglomerates, like ESPN, for all of my sports information. I think the death of newspapers and the rise of monopolization in sports media doesn’t bode well for sports journalism.

A large part of my essay actually addressed the issue of the market, i.e. readers. I believe the public wants newspapers to serve a watchdog role, give context and tell stories. Newspapers are deluding their strengths. The number of people expressing their frustrations with newspaper content indicates that newspaper managers have mismanaged their strategies and have had a failure of vision by underestimating readers.

Q. You suggest that the quality of storytelling in sports journalism has suffered. But isn’t quality subjective and personal? And if so, doesn’t your essay say more about you than about the state of sports media?

A. I am not suggesting it has suffered: it is suffering. A good indication is the Pulitzer Prize: the last one for sports commentary went to Jim Murray—in 1990. And there are other signs of demise: layoffs and a frustration with the profession have lead to a brain drain–many of the best storytellers are leaving the profession. For example, Washington Post Pulitzer finalist Tony Kornheiser has migrated toward higher-profile and better-paying television gigs, and I could list other talented stars who are writing less and talking more.

Anecdotally, I have had an overwhelmingly positive response to the CJR essay. Newspaper journalists, from writers at the San Jose Mercury News, the Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, the Associated Press, and many other papers, large and small, have sent me emails thanking me for writing the piece. They are sending it around to colleagues. Bloggers are tracking me down and writing letters of support; bloggers devour sports journalism and they want newspapers to do better. They all recognize the issues. There are a lot of talented writers out there and they are producing some good stuff, but the system is working against them. Everyone knows it. Journalists and readers are disturbed. Journalists want to do good work but they are being hamstrung.

My essay was a plea to editors and newspaper managers: let sports writers do what they do best.

Q. You seem to be saying that technology has bent art – within sports media – to its needs. But is that really a concern – hasn’t art always used technology to re-invent itself?

A. My essay was not intended to say that technology is bad, or blogs are bad, or instant information is bad. I like all three. Yes, technology does change art. New technologies have always changed writing, from Gutenberg’s printing press to the Web. I spent a lot of my career covering technology and I am definitely not Pollyannaish about it; I am not crying into my martini about the good ol’ days.

I was trying to make the rather logical argument that newspaper – online or print – sports editors are mis-allocating their best resources. If you were a football coach and you had the best throwing quarterback, the best receiver, and the best pass rushing line, and you decided to run the ball every play, you would get fired. Well, many newspaper leaders have decided to misuse their best writers: in many, but not all cases, they don’t allow them to do what they do best—report, put issues into context, and tell stories. Readers are smart and they realize this lapse in quality and seek out their information elsewhere.

Some people make the argument that the marketplace is speaking, and they don’t care if newspapers go out of business. I think if you’re a sports fan -or a citizen – you should care.

People need to consider the future. Bloggers tend to write off the news, but think about five years from now when newspaper staffs are greatly reduced. More than 15,000 journalists lost their jobs in 2008, and many papers are in trouble: the Rocky Mountain News and the Seattle P-I are the two latest papers on life support. There will be more layoffs and shutdowns this year. While I like the democratization of the media, I also think it is good to have so-called mainstream reporters reporting the news. It is important to have a professional who is steeped in ethics and basic practices of journalism covering the local sports team, and the local school board.

Q. Are you aware that Westbrook Pegler was a notorious anti-Semite?

Yes. I probably should have painted a fuller picture of Pegler, a writer I admire for his sports writing, and whom I deplore for his anti-Semitic views.

In the course of writing my biography of Red Grange, I studied Pegler’s writing because he was a prominent sports columnist in the 1920s. He was an incredibly gifted writer, and he was envied among the press corps for his biting wit and brilliantly composed articles. His sports writing was a counter-point to the so-called gee-whiz school of sports writing popularized by Grantland Rice. In 1933 he turned away from sports and started writing a nationally syndicated political column, which would rail against the New Deal – he felt FDR was too powerful – and labor unions. He won a Pulitzer for his journalism. In the 1950s he started going off the deep end, and, as you point out, he was a notorious anti-Semite. I think the John Birch Society might have kicked him out, if that tells you anything about how much he lost it. Of course, I don’t condone his anti-Semitism, but Pegler has to be part of the discussion when talking about sports writing greats because Pegler was a master of the form. I guess it is akin to Henry Ford in auto making history, Ty Cobb in baseball history, or Bobby Fischer in chess history–for better or worse they are significant figures and can’t be ignored.

Q. You cite Grantland Rice as someone likely to have cracked baseball’s steroid scandal. Yet, Ira Berkow, in his biography of Red Smith, wrote: “Rice was the most notable practitioner of the “Gee Whiz” school of sports journalism….Rice hardly ever attacked anyone and seemed to accept sports virtually without qualm or criticism. He once said that “when a sportswriter stops making heroes out of athletes, it’s time to get out of the business.” Why do you find Rice so admirable?

A. In the context of my article, I am citing Rice’s writing chops, which were also, by the way, praised by The New Yorker magazine. But I must disagree with the characterization of Rice, and other 1920s era writers, as suck-ups. The press box was as varied as it is today. I don’t think Rice would have admired and tolerated cheaters.

I read a lot of the sports journalism of the 1920s, and I came away admiring the writers. Yes, some of the writers in the so-called gee-whiz school piled on the hyperbole – a significant amount of it was tongue ‘n’ check, which seems to be lost by more earnest modern readers of the copy – and people tend to focus on Rice’s story leads, but if you read past the leads there was a lot of depth and excellent reporting in the articles and the story-telling was top-notch. For example, Rice had no trouble criticizing Red Grange—his era’s most popular and largest star of the gridiron—when he played poorly, and when Grange had a child out of wedlock, and was sued, the writers covered it.

I am not saying these guys were without flaws, but my specific point in the essay was that 1920s era writers were masters of description and fond of the absurd so they would have loved pointing out the ridiculous state of athletes’ chemically-enhanced physiques. They would have had a field day with Jose Canseco.

Q. You cite Red Smith as a sportswriting great. Yet, Smith, prior to Jackie Robinson’s arrival, “did not attack the color barrier in print”, according to Ira Berkow. When Connie Mack unleashed a racist tirade against Robinson and Branch Rickey in March 1946, and gave permission to publish it, Smith decided not to write it. Not until a year after Robinson integrated Major League Baseball did Smith devote a full column to blacks in baseball. Why do you find Smith so admirable?

A. Obviously not for his silence on the color barrier and the Robinson incident you described, but given that Red Smith won the Pulitzer – he was cited for “erudition, literary quality, vitality and freshness of viewpoint” -, Nobel Prize winner Ernest Hemingway called Smith “the most important force in American sportswriting,” and he was known as the “Shakespeare of the press box,” it is impossible to write an article about great sports writing and leave out Smith, a stylist of the first order.

Red Smith was a sports writing great. But I am glad you asked this question. It reminds me of Barak Obama’s profound speech about race during the election. He talked about the painful history of race in this country and its complexity, using the lens of his former church, “The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and, yes, the bitterness and biases that make up the black experience in America,” and he went onto talk about his own white grandmother who “helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed her by on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.”

Our racial history is filled with grief, pain, bravery and cowardice and newspapers have not always been aggressive enough in covering it, a point, I note in the essay. Newspapers have a lot to be proud of and a lot to be ashamed of. It is unfortunate that Smith didn’t attack the color barrier, as it is unfortunate that most writers, athletes, sports fans, and our society didn’t attack it. It is a national shame. When Peggy Noonan endorsed Obama for president she had an interesting line in her column: “A great moment: When the press was hitting hard on the pregnancy of Sarah Palin’s 17-year-old daughter, he did not respond with a politically shrewd ‘I have no comment,’ or ‘We shouldn’t judge.’ Instead he said, ‘My mother had me when she was 18,’ which shamed the press and others into silence. He showed grace when he didn’t have to.”

Jackie Robinson, a transformational man, did the same thing for the color barrier in baseball: through his grace he shined a light on small-mindedness. Sometimes it takes a brave person to expose our failings. It is a shame that Smith was not more of an advocate for racial justice because he would have carried a lot of influence. Journalists—and athletes–have a lot of responsibility and it is not always used wisely, even to this day.

Q. Congratulations on your new book, “The Galloping Ghost”. Why is Red Grange relevant today?

A. Thanks. His triumphs and struggles provide a pattern still followed, for better or worse, by today’s athletes. There has not been a lot written about Grange, who ESPN named the greatest ever college football player, and so I spent two years traveling across the country researching the book, reading lot of sports journalism but also digging through court records, oral histories, film clips, letters, etc.—the forensics of research—to tell the story of The Galloping Ghost.

Grange, who had his glory years in the 1920s, was the first significant college football star to turn pro, and to make a fortune – and lose it – playing professional football. As William Nack, a great sports writer in his own right and the editor of The Best American Sports Writing 2008, says: “Red Grange was the most important figure in the history of American football.” Grange partnered with the first sports agent who sold Grange into the movies, and other enterprises. He was a national star who rivaled Babe Ruth in popularity.

Sports play a significant role in our culture, and football has become our national game; I wanted to tell the story of football and explore its origins. If you draw a line in the mud of history and go back to the founder of our football culture, you will find Red Grange. He was our first sports commodity, and a significant figure—a transformational figure–in American sports history.

(SMG thanks Gary Andrew Poole for his cooperation)

An Interview with Joe Posnanski

“It was one of those columns I thought was a complete failure…I just felt so bad…When I finished I just broke down…In the morning I read it and thought…it couldn’t have been better. I don’t know if it was great but it was the best I have…it’s raw and it expresses everything that Buck meant to me and to this community. I guess in the end I didn’t fail – I did the best I could.”

“…I try hard not to get caught up in the cycle. I don’t listen to talk radio. I don’t watch ESPN or SportsCenter other than the event itself. I try to see things with a fresh eye.”

“…I started as an agate clerk and I would go on the wires and read…I decided I wanted to be a columnist. I would write pretend columns for nobody – practice columns. I must have written hundreds of practice columns when I should have been doing the hockey standings.”

“I’m probably more on the positive side – not necessarily soft. I tend to look at sports in a positive way. As a writer you develop a certain reputation and style and that is who you are… the label is in place – it doesn’t bother me.”

Joe Posnanski: Interviewed on February 22, 2007

Position: Columnist, Kansas City Star

Born: 1967, Cleveland

Education: North Carolina-Charlotte, 1989, English

Career: Charlotte Observer 1989-91; Augusta Chronicle 91-94; Cincinnati Post 94-96; KC Star 1996 –

Personal: married, two daughters

Favorite restaurant (home): Arthur Bryant’s, KC “a landmark and still the best barbecue in the world”

Favorite restaurant (road): Skyline Chili, Cincinnati “if I’m in Cincy I have to go to Skyline”

Favorite hotel: Marriott Marquis, New York

Joe Posnanski excerpted from “A KC legend dies; John Jordan ‘Buck’ O’Neil | 1911-2006”, Kansas City Star, October 7, 2006:

…The last time I saw him, he sat in a hospital bed, and he looked thin, his beautiful voice was a rasp. His memory was still sharp, and he grabbed my hand, and he whispered: “You are my friend.” He deteriorated from there. Two weeks later he was gone.

But even though it’s late at night and I can hardly see the keyboard because of the tears, I know Buck would not have wanted any of us to cry. So, instead, I will relive once more his greatest day. I heard him tell it a hundred times. It was Easter Sunday, 1943, Memphis, Tenn. The Monarchs were playing the Memphis Red Sox. First time up, Buck hit a double. Second time, he hit a single. Third time, he hit it over the right-field fence. Fourth time up, he hit the ball to left field, it bounced off the wall, and Buck rounded the bases. He could have had an inside-the-park home run, but he stopped at third.

“You know why?” he always asked.

“You wanted the cycle,” I always said.

That night, he was in his room when a friend called him down to meet some schoolteachers who were in the hotel. Buck went down, saw a pretty young woman, and walked right up to her and said, “My name is Buck O’Neil. What’s yours?” It was Ora. They would be married for 51 years.

“That was my best day,” he said. “I hit for the cycle and I met my Ora.”

“It was a good day,” I said.

“It’s been a good life,” he said

Q. Is it important to be in touch with your feelings when you write?

A. That’s the most important thing. A columnist’s job is to a strike an emotion in every column – if you haven’t you haven’t done your job. It can be anything – you can make people laugh, cry, -get them mad – something beyond the event you’re writing about.

Buck obviously was a different case for me. I was working on the book with him and I had written many columns on him for the paper. He was my friend and he was dying in the last few months we worked on the book – it was very difficult for me.

I remember the day he died. He died at 10 o’clock and they called me and said we need your column for 1-A. It would be the only thing running in the paper that day – they had already set up a special section for the Sunday paper.

We had bought a piano that day, by pure coincidence. I was tinkering with the piano when the phone rang. It rang three times and the third time I picked it up and they told me Buck had gone.

I had to sum up Buck’s life and I had not written a single word because I just couldn’t emotionally prepare for it. Now I had an hour to write it.

I just sat down and started writing. It was one of those columns I thought was a complete failure. I never like a column when I finish – I never feel good about it. At one point I was thinking, “What are you doing, you’re just typing”. They wanted 50 inches and I gave them 50 inches, which was a fluke because I just sent it in without measuring it. When I sent it I thought, “This is a failure.” I just felt so bad.

When I finished I just broke down. That’s the only time I’ve ever been that emotionally involved in a story. I don’t know if I could have written that in an hour unless I had been that emotionally involved and unless I cared about him.

In the morning I read it and thought it wouldn’t have mattered how many days I had – it couldn’t have been better. I don’t know if it was great but it was the best I have. It’s not necessarily beautifully written but it’s raw and it expresses everything that Buck meant to me and to this community. I guess in the end I didn’t fail – I did the best I could.

Q. You wrote this in another column: “His voice was always something close to music, wasn’t it? At the end when the cancer spread, Buck O’Neil lost that beautiful voice, and I think that hurt him more than the pain.”

Lovely phrase – how do you find those words when you write?

A. Good question. I guess I’ve read a lot. And I grew up in a house where both parents were born in the Soviet Union – I’m first-generation American. It was so important to them to use English words precisely. It wasn’t anything they practiced to help me write later on – they wanted me to be an accountant. As they were learning they were teaching me – it was so important to get the precise pronunciation and to use the correct word. They’re both big readers and they read to me growing up. I came to love words and the way they sound.

Buck is a guy – and I wrote this in the book – who spoke in sentences that broke out into little bits of phrase almost like verse. That’s the way he sounded to me. I heard it like a lyric or like a poem – that’s the way I wrote them in the book. That’s what I’m listening for. The phrase you mentioned, I just wrote that as it came to me. It was just how felt about Buck and his voice.

Q. What’s the name of your new book?

A. “Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O’Neil’s America”. I saw it in Borders today. It was a thrill seeing my book in a bookstore – quite an experience. I had a collection of columns published, but this was the first book I wrote from scratch.

Q. Did you enjoy writing a book?

A. I loved it. I spent a year with Buck O’Neil – it doesn’t get better than that. Writing was very different than writing the column. I thought it would be like writing a column but longer – it wasn’t like that at all. When I write a column my kids run in and out and my wife comes in and asks me questions. For the column that’s okay. With the book, that drove me insane. I had to leave the house to write it. It was fun to do a different kind of writing – I enjoyed it.

Q. You wrote recently, “ There is something else that drives me crazy, and it’s this: Everybody decides the story before the game even begins. And then, no matter what happens in the game, we won’t let go. Hey, I fall for this too. We go into a game, like Sunday’s Indianapolis-New England championship game, and obviously we have certain things set in our minds…And it sort of makes you wonder whether we’re even watching the games anymore. It makes you wonder if the pre-game hype has so overpowered what we’re seeing that nobody really pays attention.”

Are sportswriters influenced by hype?

A. We’re definitely influenced by hype. I don’t see a way around that. The hype is so overwhelming – it’s just around you all the time.

That was about the Colts-Pats game – you went into that game so barraged by the hype – the genius of Bill Belichick and Tom Brady is the greatest clutch quarterback ever and how Tony Dungy was too nice a guy to win it and Peyton Manning can’t win the big game. Those issues, while viable and true, had no bearing on the game – Belichick didn’t coach a great game and Dungy did, and Brady didn’t play well and Manning did. How do you write that the game had nothing to do with what we talked about? You don’t – you try to twist it into what people expect. It reminds me how pre-season polls affect how we watch a season, and affect how a team will be ranked in three or four months no matter how they play.

Q. You’re describing a sort of tyranny of hype – is it fair to say you don’t like it?

A. It’s so much a part of things I can’t say if I do or don’t. There are times we have to look around and say ‘What are we doing?’ Are we paying attention beyond the hype? Are we seeing the games? I don’t think it’s different than it ever was – sportswriters have always gone into games with some level of expectation. But now with 24 hours of radio, TV and the net we’re hit with a lot more. I do wish we could break out of it a bit.

Q. Are you suggesting the craft is suffering?

A. Yeah. Specific to that column – it was how the announcers handled it on TV. It’s not entirely about writing – it’s how we watch sports. Sure, the craft is suffering. There are a lot of subject lines and topics and issues that go on in sports and yet I’ll read 15 and 20 columns, including my own, that say the same thing. I think we need to work better at breaking out of this shell of expectation we all have about sports. Some writers are very good at bringing counter opinions but I do get the sense that a lot of us are saying the same thing.

I read an interesting Frank Deford column about John Amaechi and gay athletes. He said the reason athletes won’t come out is not because of lockerroom bias, which is the prevailing theory, but because of the fans. They’re the tough ones to overcome with that kind of announcement. His argument is that at no point has a Hollywood actor of any note announced he was gay during his period of success. His argument is that there are plenty of gay actors and yet none have come out because of the reaction they know they would get from America – and it’s that way in sports, too. It struck me that it was completely different than anything we had read. I wish we could do it more – to have the ability to break away from the news cycle and see things differently.

Q. Do you aspire to that?

A. Definitely. Aspire is a good word. I try hard not to get caught up in the cycle. I don’t listen to talk radio. I don’t watch ESPN or SportsCenter other than the event itself. I try to see things with a fresh eye. That’s a lesson I picked up doing talk radio a few years ago – I had a tragic six-week period as a talk radio host, which fans have never forgotten for my awfulness. I hated it – the reason I hated it is I was so caught up in the cycle – it was impossible to think of columns in a fresh way. You’re in there getting barraged with the same opinions over and over and arguing about things not worth arguing about. It really fogged my mind. It became hard to write my column in a fresh way and I quit. I started thinking ‘I have to come at this with a fresh eye and a fresh mind’.

Q. That’s revolutionary – not listening to talk radio or watching SportsCenter.

A. For me. I tell this to my friends in the business. I don’t have a good enough mind to compartmentalize the way other people can. They can listen all day and when the column goes they can shut it out and go onto the next thing. I hear radio voices in my head when I listen to talk radio. I have nothing against it. If people like it – great – I’m not looking down on it. For me as a columnist I can’t do it.

Q. You wrote a column about Frank Deford in which he told you, “I think there are probably more good sportswriters now than there ever were. I think, however, that sportswriters don’t have the same kinds of opportunities and choices … they are not allowed to go off into strange territory. You pretty much have to cover the tried and true.”

Do you agree with that?

A. I do agree to a great extent although the problem is generalizing with a statement like that. Columnists do get to go off into strange territories and newspapers encourage that – my paper does not limit people for the most part. But as a general rule you’ve got to write about T.O. or whatever the topic of the day is. There’s the sense that if you find the high school swimmer in your town that makes a great story it’s not viewed as something a lead columnist in the big cities would write. Frank was talking about a time when Sports Illustrated would put a track guy on the cover, or a swimmer, or the horse of the year even if he didn’t win the Kentucky Derby. It was willing to go off on a tangent and it doesn’t anymore – very few people do. If you find those stories they’re buried in back hidden behind the Tom Brady or Randy Moss story.

Other things are involved. We don’t get the access sportswriters used to get. There’s a much bigger division in the pro ranks between the writer and athlete in terms of exposure and fame and income. But there are elements we can control that Frank was talking about – we don’t take as many chances as we used to. We feel we have to hit the hot-button issue right now. I’m not sure we’re ever going back.

Q. What is driving that – economics?

A. Economics always has driven it. The feeling is that’s what people want. It gets back to culture. If the editor is a sports fan and turns on ESPN and gets hit with PTI and Around the Horn – and they’re all talking about one topic – today it’s Lovie Smith’s contract – that editor wants somebody to weigh in on Lovie’s contract in his paper, even if it’s the Miami Herald or The Star. It’s the big topic and we need to weigh in on it. Culture drives that to an extent. As an industry we’re still struggling for an identity in the time of the Internet and 24-hour everything. We’re still a static thing that shows up on the doorstep at 6 a.m. We want to be relevant and people feel we’re not unless we do the hot issue.

In the end we’re all trying to make the paper better and do our job as well as we can. I do sense there are people out there who want to tell different kinds of stories. But a lot of times we’re getting drowned by the big events and stories of the day.

Q. Where did you grow up?

A. Cleveland. We moved to Charlotte when I was in high school. I was reading Michael Weinreb’s book (“Kings of New York”) on the high school chess team in New York. Several Soviet-Russian immigrants were on the team. My father won the Cleveland Open in chess in the 70s. You grow up that way and you think everybody grew up with thick accents and liked soccer. It was interesting to read about other people who grew up that way.

My parents were born in the Soviet Union during the war. They moved to Poland and Israel and moved here in 1963.

Q. Who were your writing influences growing up?

A. Deford was the first. I had read Hal Leibovitz growing up in Cleveland. I read the Charlotte guys during high school. I had no idea you could become a sportswriter – it was so foreign to the way I grew up – I had no idea it was possible. I remember reading Deford’s collection – the story he wrote about the Louis-Conn fight. There’s one graf I can recite word for word. I put it down and said, “I want to be a sportswriter. I want to write like that.” At the Observer I started as an agate clerk and I would go on the wires and read Mitch Albom and Leigh Montville, (Mike) Lupica and Jim Murray. I decided I wanted to be a columnist. I would write pretend columns for nobody – practice columns. I must have written hundreds of practice columns when I should have been doing the hockey standings. That’s how it began.

There are so many good ones now. My reading has expanded – a small percentage of what I read now is sportswriting. There are so many good writers to learn from and steal from. It’s great – this is something I didn’t know I wanted to go into until I was 18 or 19. Ever since then I’m constantly amazed at how perfect it is for me.

Q. Who do you read?

A. I read a lot of people. I read people for different things. For funny columns I love Ray Ratto (SF Chronicle) and Gary Shelton (St. Petersburg Times). Martin Fennelly (Tampa Tribune). If I want strong opinions, to give me a different spin and get me thinking, Mike Vaccaro (NY Post), one of my best friends. Ian O’Connor (Bergen Record). Adrian Wojnarowski, who is doing the NBA for Yahoo.

If I want to read talented writing Bill Plaschke (LA Times) is as good as they come. S.L. Price (SI) and Steve Rushin, who is leaving SI. I really like Michael Rosenberg (Detroit Free Press) – I think he’s probably overshadowed by the power of Mitch (Albom), but he’s terrific.

Q. Are you a soft columnist?

A. I’m probably more on the positive side – not necessarily soft. I tend to look at sports in a positive way. As a writer you develop a certain reputation and style and that is who you are. With Jason (Whitlock) in KC and me in KC there’s very much this impression that Jason is the bad cop and I’m the good cop. That doesn’t necessarily meet reality – there are plenty of times I write a scathing column and Jason writes a heartwarming column.

But the label is in place – it doesn’t bother me. I would rather be known as a positive guy. Sports are supposed to be fun – there’s plenty of negativity already out there. I don’t go out of my way to be negative. I’ve probably written a dozen times a coach needs to be fired – I’ve fired plenty of people for a soft writer.

Q. Does the KC market define you?

A. Yes – it defines you in the sense that you are the voice in this town. I talk to Mike Vaccaro about this a lot – his column is often very powerful and yet because he’s writing in New York and seven or eight other columnists are writing there’s a lot of noise around. His column is not necessarily overshadowed but it’s not necessarily standing out.

If I write in the seventeenth paragraph something negative about a player or coach it can create a firestorm in town here. You’re not screaming up against a bunch of other people here. You think very hard about everything you write – it’s not going into a wind tunnel. That’s fine – I see that as a good thing. Most people would say KC is a softer market – it’s a Midwest town and it’s smaller. The general impression people coming here have is that it’s pretty good media market to come into. I’ve talked to numerous coaches who come here and they’re surprised how tough it is. Part of it is Jason, who has a strong voice. Part of it is the fans here want to win as much as fans in New York or Chicago.

Q. How have KC fans put up with what’s happened to the Royals?

A. Good question. I don’t know that they are putting up with it – the numbers have dropped significantly. It was this way in Cincinnati when I was there – the Reds were in first place when the strike happened and in many ways that baseball town has never come back, even with a new stadium. KC is a similar story. They had won 14 in a row leading into the strike. This town has never come back from the strike. Some of the anger is pointed toward Arrowhead Stadium, toward the Chiefs, who never can take the final step and get to the Super Bowl.

They’ve just stopped caring about the Royals, which is much worse. They’re tired of hearing things are turning around this year – there’s a new GM and a new direction and commitment. Until they win a few games I don’t think people will care as much as they did in the 70s and 80s.

Q. But how can the Royals compete given MLB economics?

A. I’ve been here 11 years – eight or nine years ago people were angry with baseball. The feeling was that MLB was set up so that the Royals didn’t have a chance to win – they were angry at Bud Selig and the players.

Since then small market teams have won in Oakland and Minneapolis and Florida. They’ve seen it happen while the Royals are banging their heads against the wall. It’s the Royals job to win within the system. It’s no fun to be mad at baseball. The Royals are culpable too. Yes, the deck is stacked and it’s tough, but people are paid good money to figure out how to win games. They’re paying millions to players, too.

Maybe they can’t compete with the Yankees or Red Sox but they’re not significantly below teams in their own division in terms of payroll. Their job is to beat the Twins and Indians. They’re renovating Kaufman Stadium, paying $250 million financed by a sales tax, and fans don’t really want to hear about baseball economics anymore.

Joe Posnanski excerpted from the KC Star, January 7, 2007:

They did step up. And this is where it gets embarrassing for Kansas City — once the Colts stepped up, the Chiefs had absolutely no idea what to do. No idea. They came into this game assuming that they would run over the Colts. When that didn’t happen, well, they still assumed they would run over the Colts. When it still didn’t happen, they shifted their thinking and starting hoping they would run over the Colts. And when that didn’t happen, they adjusted slightly and started praying they would run over the Colts.

And when that didn’t happen, the game was over.

“We acted like we were playing against a bunch of dumdums,” Johnson said.

Q. Did Larry Johnson really use the word “dumdum?

A. He did. I love that word. I was so happy when he used it. Otherwise it would have just sounded like him griping. “Dumdum” added a whole new comic element. I wish more people would use words like that.

(SMG thanks Joe Posnanski for his cooperation)

An Interview with Pete McEntegart

“I don’t have training as a comedy writer but I have trained myself a bit. Even when I was younger, before J school, I was writing Seinfeld scripts on my own…and I’ve dabbled with stand-up in the last few years. I’m not a professional like Bill Scheft. I’m not a comedy writer in sports – I’m more a sportswriter doing comedy.”

“I share an office with two other writers, but they’re not there all that often. I’m sure I could write from home if I wanted to…I like to go into the office – otherwise I might not shower and dress. Also, to see people, since I don’t really do reporting anymore. I just read a lot of things and try to think of funny things to say. I’m very much in my own head – which is isolating. So I like to go to the office.”

Pete McEntegart: Interviewed on April 18, 2008

Position: senior writer of 10 Spot blog, SI.com

Born: 1969, Carle Place, Long Island

Education: Williams, 1991, B.A. (history), Columbia, 1996 MJ

Career: Goldman Sachs 91-94; Journal Messenger (Manassas, Va.) 1996- 97; Daily Advertiser (Lafayette, La.) 97-99, Sports Illustrated 2000-2004, si.com 2004 –

Personal: single.

Favorite restaurant (home): Molly Pitcher’s Ale House, Upper East Side, Manhattan “my neighborhood tavern”

Favorite hotel: Four Seasons, Houston. ‘I was in the oil and gas group with Goldman – that’s where we stayed”

Favorite restaurant (road): “I don’t travel enough to have one – they don’t send me anywhere anymore, which is a point of contention. If si.com would send me to a few places I’d have a few. When I took the position I said I’d like to go to major events. They said yes and it did in the beginning but now much less. I do think there is a benefit to being on the scene for a big event if it’s part of the national conversation.”

Pete McEntegart’s 10 Spot on ‘How to Write a 10 Spot’, an original post for Sports Media Guide, April 23, 2008:

1. Arrive at office by 8:15 a.m. Eat bowl of Fiber One cereal. Brain must be regular.

2. Roll through rotation of Web sites, printing out top stories. Create neat pile for false sense of accomplishment.

3. By 9:30, kick myself for not coming up with innovative idea for morning post last night. How about when I wrote a spoof of CBS announcers describing Tyler Hansbrough getting out of bed? (“It seemed he just willed his feet onto the ground. He simply was not going to be denied.”) I liked that one. Read it again to waste more time.

4. With specter of 10:30 morning meeting looming, it’s now or never. Pick best (or only) idea I have and run with it. Top 10 lists are always a nice choice. Write, edit, bold the names, hit “publish” by 10:29.

5. At morning meeting, learn what actual sports journalists are doing while I’ve been concocting list of Eli Manning wedding highlights. (“1. Intimate ceremony held in gap of Michael Strahan’s teeth.”)

6. Start monitoring comments from morning post. Jump into any conversational thread I find amusing. Watch out for double-entendres run amok. Wish I’d thought of many of the commenters’ lines. Make note to steal in future.

7. Eat lunch at desk. Pick up morning story-pile and begin to write “Lunchtime Laughs,” a list of jokes in old-fashioned form (factual set-up off the sports news plus made-up punch line) that’s basically extinct except for late-show monologues and the 10 Spot. Wonder anew whether there’s good argument for extinction. Try to post by 1:30-1:45 p.m. because the natives get restless, commenting on my tardiness. Tell them off.

8. If it’s a Caption This day (twice a week), tear myself away from the comments section to search for a photo that lends itself to funny captions. Double-check that it doesn’t lend itself too easily to obscene ones. Post.

9. That night at home, select and post about a dozen favorites among the reader-submitted captions. Stress once again that it’s not a competition and there are no winners, just “happy participants.” Soothe the feelings of those who still insist they “lost.”

10. Hop in and out of comments among “night crew.” Say good night and ask them not to trash the place while I’m gone. Wake up and repeat.

Q. Are you a sportswriter or a comedy writer?

A. I was a sportswriter. I worked at newspapers and at the magazine for a while. I don’t have training as a comedy writer but I have trained myself a bit. Even when I was younger, before J school, I was writing Seinfeld scripts on my own. I had an interest in comedy and I’ve dabbled with stand-up in the last few years. I’m not a professional like Bill Scheft. I’m not a comedy writer in sports – I’m more a sportswriter doing comedy.

Q. Do sportswriters have to be wise guys?

A. Lots of writers I enjoy have that in their arsenal and can get some laughs – there are some funny guys writing sports. Gary Smith doesn’t need to play for laughs – he should just be Gary Smith. Sport lends itself to comedy – one of the things I like about sports is that traditionally it’s been a refuge from the real world.

Q. How hard was it to do a 10 Spot on Pope Benedict?

A. That was pretty easy. The pope is guaranteed humor – I noticed a lot of the late night shows getting a lot out of his visit. His visit to New York has been huge news for weeks. I went to Catholic school and was raised on Pope-ology. Obviously you have to be careful when making light of religious topics.

Q. What is it about the Pope that tickles people?

A. Good question. I don’t know that he’s inherently funny. It’s a common topic. Even non-Catholics are aware of the rituals and that he has a giant hat. There’s a lot of history there. If you’re going to write topical humor to a mass audience you need to know that a fair amount of people will get the punch lines, even if it’s a non-sports topic, like the Spitzer scandal.

For what I do, the Pope coming to Yankee Stadium offers a lot of possibilities. You’ve got one of the great religious leaders and you put him in the context of baseball – it’s sort of a natural formula for humor – juxtaposing things that are different. Contrast is the basis of a lot of humor – not that I know that much about comedy theory.

Q. Isn’t comedy instinctive?

A. Yes and no. I took a class for comedy writing and I read books about it. There are no strict formulas, but there certainly are techniques. Monologue jokes often have a factual set-up before the punch line.

Q. Do you watch Letterman for ideas?

A. I don’t’ stay up that late anymore. I go to Sports Business Daily every day for a transcript of Letterman’s and Leno’s monologues. They do a fair amount on sports, which is good – I get to see how someone else takes a crack at it. They do things that are hard for me to do because they can use a non-sports set-up and then make fun of the Knicks with an easy punch line. I can’t do that. It’s cheating to use a non-sports set-up in my world. But I will have a sports set-up and use Elliot Spitzer as the punch line, or whoever is in the news.

Q. Describe your job.

A. Now that it’s a blog it’s different than it used to be. I have more interaction with readers who are on all day commenting. It’s a very different dynamic – one that I like. There’s more instant feedback – I’m not just beating my head against a desk trying to craft a joke that I send out and don’t hear much back on it. Whereas now any riff I write people come right back at it and I can come back with comments in real time.

In general I’m supposed to riff on the lighter side of sports and on people that deserve to be mocked. Certainly the Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens types are manna to me. Our site has the news stories and people taking a more serious look at sports. Those things are important and have a place but 10 Spot is more for laughs.

Q. What is your workday like?

A. I used to file overnight when it was just 10 items per day and I posted once a day. For awhile I would write it overnight because sports happens at night and you want to reflect on everything that happened the night before. So I stayed up late but got up early to actually file it.

Since it’s become a blog I’ve gone to a regular Working Joe schedule. Monday through Friday I’m in the office at 8:15 and I try to get my first post up by 10:30, when there’s a meeting. Originally when we went to the blog format I thought I would stop the old-fashioned joke approach. But the audience rebelled and I decided I’m good at it and not a lot of other people do it. I started doing something at lunchtime called Lunchtime Laughs, which is up by 1:30. A few days a week we do a caption contest where we put up a picture and the readers write captions. Once a month we have a write-your-own-joke contest, where I give them set-ups from the news and let them write the punch lines.

As much as possible I try to get the readers to work so that I can coast on their coat tails.

Throughout the day I’m jumping in and out of comments while trying to write my next post. For material I read all the headlines and main stories of the day. I print out a bunch of stories as raw material and read through them and hope things click in my brain. It doesn’t always happen as timely as I would like – it’s catch as catch can. I sort of write out all the headlines and look them over and over until things occur to me. It’s not very scientific.

Q. Do you read other blogs?

A. People use ‘blog’ to mean so many things. I do read sites that are aggregators, like fark.com. Whether that’s a blog I don’t know. I just go to see every kind of whacky story they link to – that’s huge for me. Sports Business Daily is good. Even the minor stories, like a team having a promotion, can be funny. I need to see as much as I can.

I don’t read Deadspin anymore. I’m writing at the same time and I don’t want to see their riff on something before I do it. I look at The Big Lead in the morning – he does a bunch of links I’ll read. I don’t do too many bloggers per se – while I find them funny I just don’t have the time. I’m not going to read a 500-word riff on Kissing Suzy Kolber. I’m trying to come up with my own material.

Q. Who has time to read blogs?

A. Some people obviously are reading some of them. During the day while I’m writing I’m pretty much on the treadmill – I keep going to the main sites to see what is posted. From 8 to 12 I’m going all the time.

Q. Are you always on?

A. I work Monday to Friday basically. Now that it’s a blog I will jump in at other times. I didn’t expect this, but the readers are still there even when I’m not. I took a Friday off in February to visit my brother in California and they put up 1300 comments, talking to each other, wondering where I was. Somebody did a top 10 list of what I was doing in San Francisco. I’ll jump in sometimes on weekends. Our readership like most sports websites is mostly guys in offices. Business hours are our peak time – that’s when I’m at the controls. But I will jump in on some weekends and evenings.

Q. Do you gather material when you’re off?

A. To some extent. On weekends I try not to think about it. When it gets to Sunday I have to start thinking of how I am going to spin this or that. I’m not like some sportswriters who say the last thing they want to do when they’re off is watch sports. I still love sports – I watched the Masters and March Madness. In doing that I might see something I can make fun of on Monday. I don’t consider that work.

Q. Do you watch how many hits you get?

A. In the general sense, yes. There are times when I figure out how I can actually monitor it and then I get obsessed with checking in. Then they change the access and I go months without any idea. For awhile when I was on Fan Nation they had the number of views on top of each post and I looked at each one. Now it’s not and I’m just as happy. The hits are not really up to me. If they link me to a prominent post on the front page I get more hits regardless of what I write. It is what it is. If they put me on the front with photos f women in bikinis it gets a ton more hits.

Q. Does the number of comments indicate which posts are stronger?

A. Not really. At first they would be only so many comments. They didn’t have pagination in the comment section – you couldn’t jump from one page to the next. Once they changed that suddenly it was easier to post and read them all. Basically I have a loyal band of commenters. Some people are online all day posting, which is impressive unless you’re their employer. The first few pages will be on topic my post and they’ll add their own lines. If it’s a top 10 they’ll write 11, 12, and 13. The regulars know each other in a virtual sense. They might bring up their own topics or they might riff on posts from weeks ago. Ultimately the number of comments has to do with how interesting the conversation was on that post. It had less to do with the post itself. Commenting has a life of its own.

Q. Do you write from a couch in your office?

A. No. I share an office with two other writers, but they’re not there all that often. I’m sure I could write from home if I wanted to. Until I went to a blog I did half and half. I like to go into the office – otherwise I might not shower and dress. Also, to see people, since I don’t really do reporting anymore. I just read a lot of things and try to think of funny things to say. I’m very much in my own head – which is isolating. So I like to go to the office.

Beat writers are with their teams – they have sort of an office environment with other writers and athletes, and may not want to go to a regular office. This is it for me. If I just wrote from home every day – I’m single and live alone – I wouldn’t see anyone.

Q. Do bloggers feel isolated?

A. I would think they would. One reason I like the blog better is that even though I don’t really know these people I feel like I do because I deal with them so much. It’s nice to go back and forth. My job isn’t as isolating as it once was. Since I don’t cover events and do traditional reporting it’s nice to see humans.

Q. Is it journalism?

A. Well, I get paid. Probably not. It’s some sort of hybrid. It’s not what I learned at Columbia. It’s a living. Most days it’s a fairly entertaining way to make a living. When you come up with a funny joke it’s nice to get a few laughs. Then there’s the days when some poster decides to post something that crosses the line and you’re dealing with over-heated comments.

Q. Do you have interest in writing a traditional long form story?

A. If my goal job was to be a traditional columnist I think would play for laughs more often than not. Obviously there are some serious columns out there but that’s not what my bosses here want from me. Within the 10 Spot occasionally I will do some things that aren’t necessarily serious but might be a rant or reminiscence. I like to mix it up a bit.

Yes, I do have interest in doing other kinds of writing. But my experience is that it doesn’t fit that well in 10 Spot. Readers come there for laughs and conversation and a light tone – they don’t like it when I don’t do that. I guess I can look for things outside of the 10 Spot to do other sorts of writing. I’ve written magazine stories in the past. The 10 Spot is pretty much a full time job. I would be doing anything else on my time off. I’m trying to write a novel now – it’s a very different thing. I do occasionally write things for other parts of the site, but not often because 10 Spot wears me out.

Q. What’s your novel about?

A. It’s a sardonic thriller set on Wall Street.

Q. When will we see it?

A. I have to finish it and sell it. You don’t want to look like a chump and talk about it unless it happens.

Posted by Pete McEntegart, 10 Spot blog, si.com, April 15, 2008:

Pope Benedict XVI makes his first visit to the United States this week. One highlight of his trip will come Sunday when he celebrates mass for some 60,000 worshippers at Yankee Stadium. The Pontiff will also officiate a mass on Thursday at the Nationals’ new stadium, but since that isn’t happening in New York, it’s less important by definition. (OK, it’s really that Yankee Stadium lends itself to more wisecracks.)

Here’s what to look for when the Pope comes to the House That Ruth Built:

10. Crowd issues Bronx cheer when Pontiff admits love for Cardinals

9. Cheekily buries “Pope hat” in new stadium’s concrete

8. Absolves sin of trading away Jay Buhner

7. Hitches ride from bullpen to altar in Popemobile

6. Wiseacre removed after bellowing, “You’re no Benedict XV!”

5. Miraculously heals Carl Pavano

4. Delights crowd by multiplying hot dogs and buns

3. Draws wild cheers by declaring that it’s easier for Big Papi to go through the eye of a needle than for a Red Sock to enter into the kingdom of God

2. Communion wine jacked up to $8 a sip

1. Canonizes Derek Jeter– finally!

(SMG thanks Pete McEntegart for his cooperation)

An Interview with Jason McIntyre

“From 6 a.m. I hit the ground running – I go through the New York Times, LA Times, Miami Herald, USA Today, a lot of the big papers. I’ll sift through 50 to 100 e-mails from bloggers and readers, who send me stories from important papers or a neat story from Saskatchewan or a crazy story from Australia or a story about Mike Tyson doing something nutty in Cannes. E-mails drive the website and they continue throughout the day. Then I go to the entertainment sites to see what athlete hooked up with some celebrity last night. I peruse the political sites – I poke around the Internet basically – I know it can be an evil place but there’s just so much information. … I don’t want to give away my secret places – I’ll go to some of the more prominent college sports message boards – as much as people laugh at those sites there are nuggets to be learned. Then I’ll eat breakfast and prepare the posts. The next thing you know it’s 8 or 9 o’clock…”

Jason McIntyre: Interviewed on June 12, 2008

Position: co-creator, writer and editor, The Big Lead

Born: 1977, Queens, NY

Education: James Madison, 2000, BS

Career: The Herald News (NJ) 2000 -01, Bergen Record 2001-04, Star Magazine 04-05, US Weekly 05-07, The Big Lead 2006 –

Personal: married

Favorite restaurant (home): ”Curry in a Hurry”, New York; Woo Lae Oak, New York “great for dining with a large group of friends

Favorite restaurant (away): Madame Janette’s, Aruba

Favorite hotel: Grand Mayan Acapulco, “a hot tub on our deck”

Posted by The Big Lead, June 10, 2008, 9:57 a.m.:

In our frequent discussions with sports journalists, without question, they seem most embarrassed by Jay Mariotti of the Chicago Sun-Times. He’s viewed by many as a coward who takes joy in lobbing knee-jerk grenades
throughout Chicago, but refuses to face those he disparages in print. At least every other week we get an email about how Mariotti sits isolated from other journalists at major sporting events, and wears a perpetual scowl as he forms his incendiary columns. Some view him as a glorified blogger – a strictly opinion-based Negative Nancy who has the access to ask pointed questions, but never does because he’s allergic to locker rooms. He might as well opine from his sofa.

According to Teddy Greenstein of the rival Tribune
, writers at Mariotti’s paper – in particular, columnist Rick Telander – seem to be disgusted by Mariotti’s hack tactics. Back in 2003, Telander and Mariotti nearly went to blows in the Wrigley Field press box
, and last week, a similar incident played out in the offices of the Sun-Times “after [the paper’s] editors refused to run columns Telander filed for the Wednesday and Friday papers.” Telander was reacting to yet another idiotic Mariotti column, but was censored.

Why the paper’s editors continue to protect one of the biggest jokes in sports journalism is beyond us. Does anyone else think that maybe Around the Horn would become watchable if Mariotti were no longer on the show
? We’ve had many folks ask us to interview Mariotti, since it’s wrong for us to go after him without giving him a chance to respond. But he won’t do it. If a guy won’t face athletes, why do you think he’d face a big, bad, blogger?

Q. You wrote that you were amazed at the “venom” directed at your blog. Who and why?

A. I guess on the Internet it’s a lot easier to hate something and not like it and be mean than is to enjoy something or say it’s great. Buzz Bissinger – you saw his HBO rant – and a lot of people have echoed that and said the Internet is mean and nasty and vile. To some extent that’s true. A prominent member of the media said to me once – he had seen some of the heat blogs were taking – and he said ‘Jason, some of these journalists who hate blogs are just mad that you and other blogs are pissing on their hydrant – they don’t like somebody else coming into their territory’. I didn’t see it as that – I saw it as just offering our thoughts on sports – guys with opinions.

Let me ask you, when you dislike something do you normally go out and slam it or do you avoid it?

Q. Avoid.

A. Yeah. Jay Mariotti – every week he writes something mean and off the wall and knee-jerk and somebody will send it to me. If you know that, why bother to read the guy? Why get all worked up about Jay Mariotti or Scoop Jackson – why not ignore them?

Q. Emily Gould recently wrote in New York Times Sunday Magazine about her addiction to personal blogging. Why don’t you reveal much of yourself in your blog?

A. I’m not the story. I’m just a guy with a blog. I don’t think people care that much about me. There have been times when I reveal some things but the blog’s never been about me. I wanted to create a brand that could resonate – The Big Lead. I don’t want people thinking Jason McIntyre, so when somebody else takes over it will be a seamless transition. One reason I don’t use the word I is that people would think of an online journal – I don’t want it to read like a high school journal.

I have zero aspirations of that. Maybe you’ll see a couple of posts about my experiences in the celebrity world, or about the time Albert Pujols brushed me off.

Q. What happened?

A. I was with the Bergen Record. They threw me a bone and I went to a Mets game. I’m a young aggressive writer and I bumped into Pujols and Renteria in the bowels of the stadium – it was just me and those two guys, who were sitting there. I started to talk – they looked at me and at each other and pretended like I wasn’t there.

I covered the baseball All-Star Game. You ask Derek Jeter a question and he tunes you out like you don’t exist. Seeing that, I would almost rather be a blogger than put up with that every day.

Q. Why did you give up anonymity?

A. I had been writing the blog as a hobby for two years and I had turned down some media interviews – one with NPR – after the Colin Cowherd thing – and a bunch of middle-of-the-pack newspapers came after me. But they couldn’t mention my name, which was a deal breaker, and that kind of stunk. It came to the point where some people said being anonymous held back the website. I had quit my job and we were preparing to move out of the area. SI asked me and I said all right.

Q. Why were you anonymous in the first place?

A. I had a job – I was doing this as a hobby after hours with a friend and had gained a following. I had read stories about people getting canned for having a blog and I didn’t want to take a chance. I wasn’t making any money off of it – it was a fun after-hours thing, a way to unwind.

Q. Who is intern Bill and why do you need him?

A. He’s a guy who is a fan of the website and blogs and sports – one of these guys who sits at his desk at work and surfs the web and newspapers and obscure websites and must send me 20 links a day. I said ‘this guy is too good and too passionate to just be sending me links – let’s get him on as an intern’. I’m giving the fan a voice. A lot of people want to start a blog but figure ‘who’s going to read it?’. So I’m giving sports fans a chance to get their message out to a broader audience. Obviously some can write and some can’t and I have to edit them. But it’s an opportunity to let their voices be heard and it’s good to get a different perspective. Who wants to read 12 or 15 posts a day from one guy?

Q. How many posts do you write?

A. It varies. The most we’ve done in one day is 18 or 19. Neil Best at Newsday sets the blog crossbar pretty high with 25 or 30 posts on his record days. It depends on the news and it depends on my life. Do I have to take my wife to the airport? Do I have to take in the car for an oil change? These things cut into the amount of posts. I would say it runs from six to 12 to 15.

Q. Describe your typical workday?

A. I set the alarm for 5:58 a.m. and I wake up to the Howard Stern Show – which is sad but I have to be honest. That’s on in the background. From 6 a.m. I hit the ground running – I go through the New York Times, LA Times, Miami Herald, USA Today, a lot of the big papers. I’ll sift through 50 to 100 e-mails from bloggers and readers, who send me stories from important papers or a neat story from Saskatchewan or a crazy story from Australia or a story about Mike Tyson doing something nutty in Cannes. E-mails drive the website and they continue throughout the day.

Then I go to the entertainment sites to see what athlete hooked up with some celebrity last night. I peruse the political sites – I poke around the Internet basically – I know it can be an evil place but there’s just so much information. I’ll go the Mac Rumors site and veer off and do non-sports. I’ve been following real estate for a while. I don’t want to give away my secret places – I’ll go to some of the more prominent college sports message boards – as much as people laugh at those sites there are nuggets to be learned.

Then I’ll eat breakfast and prepare the posts. The next thing you know it’s 8 or 9 o’clock. Basically you are at your computer from 6 onward – you break for breakfast and go for a run – and most of the traffic picks up around 9 in the east and by 10 in most of the rest of the country. I’ve got on ‘Mike and Mike in the Morning’ – muted because those guys are awful but they have some headlines. They had Schilling taking shots at Kobe – I went to the Globe for that and typed up a post. After that show I watch some morning shows – you can’t watch sports all the time. If you consume sports that many hours a day you’ll kill yourself. I can’t stomach that – I need diversity. I need to get on my personal accounts, like Facebook, and maybe I’ll go out to lunch. The great thing is that you can post-date items – by 9 I might have items post-dated until 1 – it’s like being on autopilot for a few hours. I can run errands and go out to lunch. Then in the afternoon I’ll get a couple of posts ready and I try to sign off by 4 o’clock.

This week I happened to check an e-mail – it was about Tyler Hansbrough partying with a UNC cheerleader – so I instantly jumped back on and jammed the post in. One of the problems is that you never know when these things will come in – you’re constantly checking your e-mail. Every once in a while we want to bring the readers original stuff.

After dinner I hop on the computer and start to prepare the shells for posting the next day – that’s the formatting. That’s usually a good 45 minutes. Then I’ll turn on the NBA finals – if I don’t watch the game what can I say about the game the next day? We went away Memorial Day weekend and I missed three games. I said ‘I missed three games but from what I’ve read…’ – that’s how I had to phrase it.

I can’t be everywhere and I can’t be totally tied to the website – I can’t let it consume my life. I’m still going to go on vacations and have fun. I went to the Grand Canyon in February – my wife let me bring my computer. We got off the plane and in the airport I saw that Shaq got traded. You’re kidding me. At the hotel we were dressing to meet some people but I had to get on the computer and formulate some quick thoughts on the trade. That’s how on top of the website I am.

The toughest time for me was when I got married and we went on our honeymoon to Hawaii for two weeks. I obviously wasn’t allowed to bring a computer to that for two weeks, and I didn’t bring a phone either. Faced with that option I said I won’t watch sports. It should be noted that I made sure my wedding day did not coincide with the NFL draft.

A friend of mine got married in 2003 on the day Pedro and Zimmer got into that fight. There was some down time between the ceremony and reception and I went back to my room and saw it. What do you think everybody was talking about at the reception? I told my wife ‘let’s get our vacations out of the way now, or just wait until December when the NFL season is over’.

Q. Do you break news?

A. Depends on what you call news. Is that Tyler Hansbrough thing news? Is my interview with Tony Kornheiser news? We had an item about Hannah Storm’s new partner – is that technically news? In the world of sports media I guess you could qualify it as news.

Q. Why your interest in sports media as opposed to sports?

A. Take Mike Wilbon. He’s on PTI, NBA Live, and other stuff, and he’s more known than 50 percent of the players in the NFL. You can’t name a starter on the San Diego Chargers offensive line but you know Mike Wilbon – that’s the case with most sports fans. These guys have gone from being behind a byline to being on TV every day – every sports fan watches these shows and knows the writers – whether they want to or not they have become celebrities – when you see Mike Wilbon and J.A. Adande walking down the red carpet at the Super Bowl party. Rick Reilly is getting paid more than 98 percent of the players in MLS, and maybe more than 80 percent of the NHL players – he got a four year deal at $17 million – isn’t that more than the NBA minimum? It’s not just money but fame and notoriety, and not in a negative way.

Q. How big is your staff, including stringers and contributors?

A. I’m always trying to build to take the pressure off of them. There are great writers out there – the soccer guy who contributes is good – he’s going to get snatched up by a larger entity. I like the idea of new voices – ideally I’ll have four different voices on any given day. Anybody likes to think their voice is the greatest but people can take only so much from one guy. I don’t have an opinion on hockey – I can’t pretend to follow every team in every league. I’ve got a guy who writes hockey who is a free lancer for newspapers. I don’t know about the NFL but hopefully I’ll find someone. I’ve got a free lancer who breathes college football. Somebody is always pitching ideas – it helps to have different eyeballs everywhere to expand this site. One thing we try not to do is have items that are on the front page of SI and ESPN. That stuff is already out there. You try to go for obscure and random stories that people might not have seen.

Q. Is there a major league of sports blogs?

A. Probably not. If you look at size and traffic there’s probably some separation but that’s based on who’s been around the longest. You’re not going to jump in overnight and have 8 million readers.

Q. Do you read all the commenters?

A No. I would get nothing done if I read all the commenters. Some posts have 250 comments and I don’t read 10. If somebody is going in the comment section with something that is unruly somebody will e-mail me to check it out. People get hold of me if things get out of hand on the comments…we’ve tried to clean things up. People are going to curse – that’s fine – but we’re trying to do away with personal attacks or the racist and sexist stuff. Some people come on and try to start shit with other people – there’s no place for that – it doesn’t add value.

Q. Do you do your interviews by e-mail or phone?

A. Kornheiser was over the phone – he doesn’t do e-mail. I prefer e-mail.

I started doing it by e-mail because I was anonymous at the time and didn’t feel like I could call a major journalist like TJ Simer. Why would he take the time to talk to an anonymous blogger. I started out by e-mailing eight or ten questions.

People are more comfortable with e-mail because they know they won’t be misquoted. They can be far more eloquent explaining themselves in e-mail. Some people aren’t wordy but they might be wordsmiths on e-mail. I much prefer doing e-mail interviews. That was a sticking point with Richard Dietch (SI). He said no.

Q. How do you know if you’ve had a good day?

A. Good question. (long pause) Can we come back to this?

Q. What’s the latest on the blog wars – who is attacking who?

A. I try not to get caught up in that stuff. Which is weird, because I report on the media and that Jay Mariotti and Rick Telander hate each other, and Norman Chad and Tony Kornheiser had a beef. I feel like the folks in mainstream media would like that to happen – right now they feel it’s eight thousand bloggers against ESPN – but I don’t know that it’s necessarily like that. Certainly there are some people out there who don’t like my blog or don’t like me but I don’t know that there’s a blog war going on. Certainly there are bloggers who don’t like other bloggers – that’s just the nature of the beast.

Q. Why don’t blogs scrutinize other blogs the way they do mainstream media?

A. One reason is that a lot of bloggers are doing it as a hobby. Are you supposed to come after a guy blogging in his spare time as a hobby? A lot of the guys don’t have a ton of readership or writing experience. Are you going to hammer some guy who has 50 people coming to his website and destroy him – that’s kind of mean. There’s no intent to take anybody down. Some writers have the potential to have impact – they’re speaking to large audiences and sometimes people take umbrage and disagree with some of their stances. There’s no intent on my behalf to destroy anyone or be super mean to anybody

I get tons of e-mail every day with stuff being very harsh on athletes and people have said you gotta be careful what you write. If you link someone to something that is unconfirmed the blood is on your hands. I have to be cautious on what I read and link.

Q. You screen sources?

A. When we started we got crazy tips and ran with them because there were not a lot of people looking at us. As we’ve grown and earned respect we’ve had to clean up our act considerably.

Q. Posts you regret?

A. Yeah. Matt Leinart. It was off base and wrong. We took it down but it should have never gone up.

Q. Most mainstream sports media now have blogs? Are they co-opting the territory staked out by independent sports blogs?

A. Interesting topic. I recently talked to a newspaper that is doing a story about this exact topic. A Miami Herald writer (Armando Salguero) wrote a blog post on his Miami Herald site as if he were a blogger with no accountability – he used some choice language and the ombudsman wrote him up – you can ‘t do that and you can’t write like that. When people write for a blog the idea is that I can be free and loosey-goosey. Well, you can’t do that with a newspaper – yet. But there are plenty of good newspaper blogs, such as Dan Steinberg at the Washington Post, who get blogging now. It’s just an natural progression – eventually newspapers will hire bloggers or create their own on staff. I pitched one to my last paper in 2002 – a page 2 entertainment one-day-a-week thing. The newspaper shot it down and it became my blog.

Q. What’s the difference between Deadspin and Big Lead?

A One thing is that I started Big Lead and I also wear many hats since it’s mine and I’m not part of a larger company. I have to deal with everything, running it as a small business as opposed to being an employee, which is why I’m here from 6 to 5 every day. If something goes wrong with the server I call up and spend 30 minutes getting it fixed. I don’t have a marketing guy to reach out and lure advertisers. Luckily I have an understanding wife who is cool with me investing so much time in this.

I guess we veer more toward entertainment than they do, things like movies, stuff I think is fun that is not as serious and sportsy. They’ve been around much longer – Deadspin always will be the No. 1 sports blog. It’s in the Gawker family – the Gawker empire is phenomenal. I did a test sports blog for them in ‘02 or ‘03. I met with Nick Denton – he’s brilliant and he just gets it. They know what they want and they make it happen. I’m surprised there’s not more copycats.

Q. Any interest in replacing Will Leitch at Deadspin?

A. I don’t think they would put it to me.

Q. If they did?

A. I don’t think so. I’m having fun doing my little site here.

I’ve got an answer to how I know if I’ve had a good day.

Q. Go ahead.

A. I’ve had a good day If I’ve been fair to the people I’ve written about, be it athletes, journalists, coaches, other bloggers, whoever. If I’ve been fair and accurate I’ve had a good day.

Posted by The Big Lead, Sept. 20, 2007, 3:47 p.m.:

You’ll be seeing a lot more of Reggie Bush’s girlfriend, Kim Kardashian, this holiday season. Specifically, in the pages of Playboy
, according to Us Weekly. Mike Wilbon’s favorite piece of ass will be featured in 12 pages of magazine, making for a great stocking stuffer. As for Bush and Kardashian, a Chicago reader spotted Kardashian in the Windy City Friday, and according to our tipster’s dog’s, sister’s, boyfriend’s gerbil, Bush’s girlfriend jetted to Tampa to watch the Saints get hammered on Sunday. Perhaps she’ll be mugging for airtime in the Superdome this weekend?

(SMG thanks Jason McIntyre for his cooperation)

Posted: Wednesday March 12, 2008 5:32PM; Updated: Friday March 21, 2008 5:23PM

Jason McIntyre started The Big Lead in February 2006.

In the ever-evolving sports blogosphere, where truth and rumor-mongering collide daily and often on the same Web site, TheBigLead.com has found an unlikely ally: the mainstream sports writer. The site has gained traction among the sports media thanks to a near-daily dose of gossipy items about its practitioners and interviews
with some of the power hitters of sports journalism, all the while remaining anonymous to its readers and subjects.

Until now.

The person behind The Big Lead
is a 31-year-old former sportswriter who runs the Web site from his home in Brooklyn. He recently left his job as an assistant news editor at US Weekly and has been working full time on The Big Lead since January. That month, according to Google Analytics, TheBigLead.com had 2.07 million page views and 429,949 unique visitors. “At the blog’s best, it would strive to be The Colbert Report meets Drudge Report,” says Jason McIntyre, the co-creator and principal writer and editor of The Big Lead.

McIntyre decided to reveal his identity following a number of conversations with me. “It never really crossed my mind until now,” he says. “I had opportunities. NPR asked me to come on, and I’ve done some interviews anonymously.”

His decision to go public comes five weeks after the writers of another popular anonymous sports site — the entertaining and snarky FireJoeMorgan.com
— came out of the blogging closet to their readers. “The arguments against anonymity were overwhelming,” says Michael Schur, one of FJM’s founders and a writer and producer for NBC’s The Office.

“The arguments for, at the time we started the blog, were simple: We didn’t want people conflating our professional lives with our blogger lives. But once the site gained a substantial readership, and given its content, it became clear to us that it was more important to stand publicly behind what we write. The accused have a right to face their accusers, should they care to. The only reason we didn’t do it earlier was laziness.”

Should sites such as The Big Lead put a face or byline behind their opinions and reporting? It’s a question that will continue to percolate as more sports bloggers extend into reportage. “When you get into the business of gathering information and reporting news, I’d like to see someone accountable with a byline,” says Yahoo! Sports columnist Adrian Wojnarowski. “If it’s just a site or a blogger throwing out general sports opinions and jokes and whatever it is they do on their own private site, then who really cares? That said, if bloggers are gaining access as contributors to serious mainstream sports journalism sites, the rules should change. It’s no longer the free-for-all of posting that they had in cyberspace. They’re going to be a reflection on the sites they’re writing for. If they’re going to be reckless here, there are bigger consequences for everyone.”

Unlike the FJM crew, McIntyre has a background in sports journalism. He interned at the Greensboro News & Record after graduating from James Madison University in 2000 and then moved to New Jersey, where he held sportswriting jobs at the Herald News and Bergen Record. McIntyre freelanced for ESPN.com’s Page 3 and ESPN the Magazine and had a tryout for Gawker’s sports blog, the precursor to what is now Deadspin.com. He left the Bergen Record for Star magazine in 2004 and went to work at US Weekly in 2005 as a reporter. He has also freelanced for a number of papers, from The Boston Globe to Metro, a free daily newspaper published in New York, Boston and Philadelphia.

McIntyre updates the site 10 to 15 times a day, between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m., and usually answers upward of 75 e-mails daily. He has aggressively courted media members as sources. He says writers forward him stories — often their own — on a daily basis. “I think they e-mail us because we are fair,” he says. “We call it like we see it.”

Why would a major sports columnist agree to an interview with an anonymous sports blogger such as The Big Lead? The New York Post’s Mike Vaccaro said he spoke with the site because he thought it might be helpful for anyone who wanted to work for a New York tabloid. “I read, and had read, TBL occasionally, and it always struck me as relatively harmless at worst and kind of funny at best,” Vaccaro says. “After a few e-mail exchanges, I was fairly certain they were trustworthy, and they proved to be.”

Added Wojnarowski, who also agreed to an interview
: “I spend most of my days interviewing people for columns and stories, so I’ve always felt that the least I can do is honor the request of someone who asks that of me.”

Unlike traditional media outlets, The Big Lead has no written code of ethics. McIntyre says he and the site’s co-founder, David Lessa, a friend from college, have often debated adding one to the site. Does McIntyre consider himself a journalist? Is The Big Lead journalism? “I looked up the definition of journalism and it said something like the occupation of writing, reporting and editing,” he says. “So in the broader sense, in its traditional sense, I would say, yes, The Big Lead is journalism. We have some original reporting and other times we will just riff on a sporting event or a news story. But in the sense we don’t have anyone looking over our shoulders — we don’t have any editors and there is no one to answer to — that is not traditional journalism. Sports Illustrated has standards where you will have to vet a story with two or three sources. We don’t have that, and blogs don’t have that.”

BL was born quietly in February 2006 as a long e-mail chain between three college friends. It soon morphed into a blog with a core of 200 readers, mostly friends and family. McIntyre would post before and after work, and Lessa, a 31-year-old from Annandale, Va., who sells software to the government, would fill in during the day. (Lessa still handles the site’s technical side.) That August, McIntyre read a column from the syndicated columnist and ESPN poker commentator Norman Chad. “I had read him religiously in the Washington Post when I was growing up,” McIntyre says. “So I decided to e-mail him. I wrote, ‘Hey, we’re a blog. Nobody knows who we are, but can I send you some questions?’ He said sure. I was like, wow, that’s surprising. We sent him some questions, and he answered them.”

McIntyre and Lessa posted the interview
. The feedback was strong. Over the next three weeks they went hunting for other well-known sports media members. Bill Sheft
, then the humorist at Sports Illustrated, Los Angeles Times columnist T.J. Simers
, and Chris Jones
of Esquire all agreed to interviews. “At this point we realized the more we wrote about the media, the more the media would pay attention,” McIntyre says. “They liked reading about their colleagues and their peers.” Readers e-mailed suggestions for other sports journalists. One name stood out: Jason Whitlock. “Overwhelmingly, our readers wanted Whitlock,” McIntyre says. “He was writing for ESPN.com’s Page 2 and appeared on The Sports Reporters. But I thought he would be a long shot.”

Not so. The provocative columnist, a multimedia player in the sportswriting world, held nothing back in an interview posted on Sept. 22, 2006. Whitlock trashed his then ESPN colleagues
Scoop Jackson and Daily News columnist Mike Lupica, a regular on The Sports Reporters. The interview was picked up in USA Today and the New York Post, among others publications. ESPN quickly announced that Whitlock was persona non grata on its airwaves, saying his personal attacks went too far. Whitlock responded with a column critical of ESPN’s inability to tolerate criticism. (The network says Whitlock had quit his dot-com job with ESPN prior to his interview with The Big Lead.)

“Doing the interview was no big deal,” Whitlock says. “Norman Chad and T.J. Simers had already done interviews with the site. I never gave it much thought in terms of responding to their e-mails.” Whitlock says the site’s anonymity was not an issue for him. “I felt like it would be difficult to misquote or fabricate what was written in an e-mail,” he said. “I had a record of what was said and they had a record. Hard to screw that up.”

If the Whitlock interview caused a small ripple in the sports blogosphere, ESPN Radio host Colin Cowherd created a tsunami. Last April, while hosting his national radio show, Cowherd urged his listeners to flood the Web site, an act that is commonly known in the 2.0 world as a denial-of-service attack. The added traffic was too much for The Big Lead’s server, and the site was forced offline for a couple of days.

“At the time I didn’t know much about The Big Lead,” Cowherd says. “I remember at one point just laughing and saying, ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if we could just blow up a Web site?’ How did I know in four seconds that I would knock it down for a weekend?”

Cowherd’s act put The Big Lead on the map. ESPN’s ombudsman forcefully wrote that suspensions
should occur for Cowherd-like acts in the future. NPR, Slate, USA Today and a host of other publications discussed the attack. It made TBL a sympathetic figure in the sports blogosphere — which covered it like D-Day — especially among those with an anti-ESPN bias. “I’m sure he felt like Mike Tyson knocking out a tomato can, but it didn’t take that much to knock us offline,” McIntyre says.

Not so, says Cowherd. “I’ve been on the air for more than a decade in radio, and the only thing I’ve ever regretted in my life is The Big Lead thing,” he says. “My dad was a small-business owner, and I would never in a million years inhibit a small-business owner’s ability to operate. It was very off-the-cuff. … I regret it. I felt terrible about it.”

In a next-gen twist of irony, Cowherd says he hears from sports blogs more than ever these days. “I have had hundreds of bloggers e-mail me and say, ‘Please blow up our site!'” he says. “Literally, it is a running joke on the show.”

Asked if he targets ESPN because of Cowherd’s attack or because ESPN the Magazine did not offer him a job when he interviewed there a couple of years ago, McIntyre says, “We don’t intentionally target anyone. … We are sitting here objectively covering the sports media.”

The Big Lead generates a small amount of income from ads on the site; McIntyre’s wife also works full time. Like many Web sites that traffic partly in gossip, The Big Lead’s information is not always correct. It has shown questionable judgement on occasion by linking to items based on suspect information at best. McIntyre says his biggest regret was running what he termed an “insensitive” and “irresponsible” post regarding Cardinals quarterback Matt Leinart and fatherhood. He says he took it off the site after 45 minutes.

It’s unclear how going public will affect McIntyre. He is actively seeking work as a freelance writer and is now able to channel his energies full time into The Big Lead. The site’s interviews keep coming, including a Q&A last week
with New York Times reporter Karen Crouse. McIntyre says that he hears biweekly from sportswriters asking to be Q&A subjects. (Last year TBL approached me to do an interview; I politely declined.) “We’ll still do obscure stories and wonder aloud why USA Today gives a full-page feature to Doug Gottlieb,” he says, referring to the ESPN college basketball analyst. “We’re going to try to solve blind-item riddles in columns. Nothing is going to change.”

Or everything will change. There is now a face and a name behind the items. The problem with losing your anonymity, as the wise philosopher Marla Maples once noted, is that you can never go back. “I wish TBL would make his name known because ultimately, a site is only as credible as the credibility its readers ascribe to it, and over time I think it’ll be hard to sustain that,” Vaccaro said.

“And it’s not just so we can know whom to rip when something bad happens on TBL. I would suspect it’s a lot of work maintaining a site like that; you would think someone would want some kind of recognition for those labors. Wouldn’t you?”

EMOGRAPHICS

(source: Internal Survey Data)

Age

Under 18 4%

19-25 28%

26-34 45%

35-44 20%

45+ 3%

Gender

Male 90%

Female 10%

Education

High School Education 1%

College Education 84%

Post-Graduate Degree 15%

An Interview with Randall Mell

“The nature of the game is solitary – every round is a journey, but a solitary journey – more than any other sport…Golf is intensely focused on this one man or woman – the battle really isn’t against a cornerback or a pitcher – it’s against yourself – and against all your demons and doubts and fear and shame – all those internal obstacles. What’s appealing to me as a writer is to see and tell that.”

“The sport has a different culture than other sports – it’s not as combative or adversarial. It’s a smaller world – there aren’t as many beat reporters they have daily contact with. It’s a more intimate surrounding.

Golf writers get criticized because maybe they’re not as hard or as combative or adversarial as other writers. There may be some truth to that…”

“Some people in the newsroom can’t get enough of Tiger and some are sick of him… Tiger is a magnificent player with a magnificent swing. But as a personality he is just dull and boring and not interesting at all. Rarely does he have anything to say in a news conference that is worth quoting.”

Randall Mell: Interviewed on November 3, 2006

Position: golf and college football reporter, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Born: Madison, Wis., 1958

Education: Wisconsin-Eau Claire, journalism, 1981

Career: Marinette Eagle-Star 1981, Lake Geneva Regional News 82-85, South Florida Sun Sentinel 85 –

Personal: married, three children

Favorite restaurant (home): 15^th Street Fisheries, Ft. Lauderdale “you can dress informally but they treat you like you’re wearing a tux – overlooks the Inter-Coastal – great food decent prices” –

Favorite restaurant (road): Crab Catcher, La Jolla, Ca. “located atop a cliff – spectacular view – great crab”

Favorite hotel: Marriott Sawgrass, Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. “serene setting overlooking some great TPC holes”

Randall Mell excerpted from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, August 17, 2006:

MEDINAH, ILL. – They call it Sergio Garcia’s tree around here.

The towering red oak under which Garcia hit that remarkable recovery shot in pursuit of Tiger Woods in the final round of the 1999 PGA Championship at Medinah’s No. 3 Course has changed a lot.

Garcia noticed that when he couldn’t resist the urge to return to the foot of the tree in a practice round Tuesday for the 88th PGA Championship.

Countless members and guests over the past seven years haven’t been able to resist the urge to try the shot themselves, and they’ve scarred the base of the tree in bids to duplicate Garcia’s magic.

“They’ve had to overseed that little spot because everybody’s been hitting from it,” Garcia said.

At 19, Garcia was a shot behind Woods in the final round when he pushed his tee shot behind that oak tree. In a precarious spot, inches behind the tree and 189 yards from the hole, he took a wild slash, closing his eyes for fear the ball would ricochet back at him. His shot ran up onto the green, stopping 35 feet from the hole.

Q. Sergio’s tree – that’s beautiful. Does golf lend itself to better writing than other sports?

A. People in the business think of golf as a writer’s sport. Part of that is just the beautiful setting the game is played in – picturesque settings like Augusta National and Pebble Beach. It’s not limited to a 100-yard grid or between baselines. It’s a sport played against God’s great creations – historic backdrops – with ghosts like Jones and Nelson and Snead. There’s historic significance and it helps to have certain writing skills to bring that to life – to paint some pictures. Fred Turner, my former sports editor, would say, “Take me there as a reader.” He was a great editor because he was the quintessential reader.

That’s really the challenge. Just weaving the settings, histories, personalities and drama into a good tight meaningful story. The nature of the game is solitary – every round is a journey, but a solitary journey – more than any other sport. You have a kicker out there to kick a game-winning field goal but he has the snapper and holder. Golf is intensely focused on this one man or woman – the battle really isn’t against a cornerback or a pitcher – it’s against yourself – and against all your demons and doubts and fear and shame – all those internal obstacles. What’s appealing to me as a writer is to see and tell that.

Q. Is golf the best beat?

A. You have writers who would kill for it, and writers who can’t understand why anybody would want to write it – they think it’s just so boring. I have a great job. I get to write about golf and college football – a nice combination – they’re so different. My time covering Miami was one of the most fascinating runs in college football. There were great personalities – Jimmy Johnson, Michael Irvin, Cortez Kennedy – and lots of controversies – an NCAA investigation, a murder – everything you could possibly cover was on that beat. But it did wear me out. I had the Coral Gables Police Department on speed dial. I called the Police Chief by his first name.

So golf was almost a perfect reward for me. I got it in ’97 – my first Masters was Tiger’s runaway 12-shot victory. I came on the beat and the game completely changed with Tiger aboard. Covering golf I’ve only had to call the police over one incident.

Q. What’s your game plan when you cover a major?

A. First are the relevant themes – the story lines or issues that have to be addressed. What makes it more interesting to me is finding something nobody else has – which is hard to do at the majors. I was covering the U.S. Open at Shinnecock and there was a guy from California who had been in jail and was an alcoholic but had gotten his life back together and qualified. I was one of two writers who wrote about him – he was a classic U.S. Open ‘everyman’ story. It truly is an open tournament – you can qualify if you’ve got the game. That to me is a bonus story that makes it a better week.

Q. Are you a golfer?

A. Yes. I do play but not very good. The game fascinates me because you are battling yourself the whole way. You can hit a bad shot before you take the club back if your alignment is off. To me the best stories are trying to understand behavior and human nature. What shapes people and inspires them, what corrupts them or trips them up, and what saves or redeems people. We’re all flawed. That’s what makes us human and more interesting. Golf is all about overcoming your flaws. Hogan said something, “It’s not a game about hitting good shots – it’s about managing bad shots.” That’s why golf appeals to me. There are those life-type lessons that relate beyond the game.

Q. Do you need to play golf to cover it?

A. I don’t think you have to. It helps, but you don’t have to. Good writers can cover anything. The really good stories aren’t about why somebody used a five-iron instead of a six-iron. It’s those other things I said. How is somebody overcoming his flaws? What has shaped him to be a champion or prevented him from being a champion?

Q. Are golfers better interviews because of the nature of the game?

A. Not necessarily. It depends on the person. The sport has a different culture than other sports – it’s not as combative or adversarial. It’s a smaller world – there aren’t as many beat reporters they have daily contact with. It’s a more intimate surrounding. Golf writers get criticized because maybe they’re not as hard or as combative or adversarial as other writers. There may be some truth to that on a small scale. But you have writers like John Hawkins (Golf World), Len Shapiro (Washington Post), Ed Sherman (Chicago Tribune), Jim McCabe (Boston Globe) and Doug Ferguson (Associated Press) who ask tough questions and would thrive in any sport. Yet it clearly isn’t as combative and you can understand why other writers think that. The nature of the game is just different. There’s this notion that golf is a gentleman’s game and you have to police yourself and it’s more honorable. I think that is true – it does shape the culture of the sport. But whenever a lot of money is at stake and people compete intensely there’s always a dark side of human nature at work, and some corruption.

Q. Do golf writers have a watchdog function?

A. Yes. Definitely. I wrote a story at Doral last year, at the Ford championship. Ford, the sponsor, was trying to get the top players back to Doral – it had lost some of its luster – so it started a Monday corporate outing. They invited Sergio, Vijay Singh, Retief Goosen, and Padraig Harrington – and they were all paid six-figure sums. It didn’t technically violate PGA Tour rules, but it went into a gray area – it was very much a backdoor appearance fee – and they’re not supposed to have appearance fees. The other players were upset about it and the Tour changed the rule because of my story – now the Tour reviews all corporate outings held by sponsors. You don’t have the corruption you might have in other sports but there still are issues that need to be watched.

Q. How much of the beat revolves around Tiger?

A. That’s an interesting aspect. Some people in the newsroom can’t get enough of Tiger and some are sick of him. I see that in my e-mails all the time – why are you writing about him again? Everything revolves around Tiger – this week there was a controversy because he pulled out of the Tour Championship, and Phil Mickelson already had pulled out.

Tiger is a magnificent player with a magnificent swing. But as a personality he is just dull and boring and not interesting at all. Rarely does he have anything to say in a news conference that is worth quoting. He does that purposefully – he’s very smart. He’s managing himself as a player and a corporate entity, too. He markets himself – that’s part of who he is – but it makes it kind of boring to cover him as a personality. Yet he ends up giving you so much copy as a dominant player. As he gets toward the end of his career I’ll be curious to see if he opens up and becomes a leader of opinion. Jack Nicklaus is one of the great interviews in the sport now – he’s so opinionated you can get eight or nine stories out of one interview. With Tiger you struggle to get a quote. Maybe he opened up a little more this year – I shouldn’t be as harsh. He’s had strong opinions about drug testing and shortening the season, but overall he’s still guarded.

Q. Do you cover local golfers?

A. The hardest part is covering local golf – we almost need another reporter. I don’t do enough of it. I try to go to the locals. We have Morgan Pressel from Boca Raton – she dominates my coverage on the local stuff. I get most of my complaints about not covering the locals – “Why didn’t you write about my son?” – but it’s difficult for me get to. That’s a reality.

Q. Do media get to play the great courses?

A. At some events. Augusta has the famous lottery – they pick 24 people out of 300 or 400. I got picked my first year, which enraged our columnist, Mike Mayo, who had been there 10 years and never was picked. He just glared at me.

Q. What was it like?

A. Spectacular, fun and intimidating. I never played on fairways that were mowed so tightly. I skulled shots and hit some heavy.

Q. Your score?

A. 108. You had to ask. The funny thing I remember was my caddy – you have to hire a caddy. I asked him his name and he said “Nineteen.” I asked how he got that name, and he said, “My mama had 19 kids and she just ran out of names.”

You need a caddy there. Everyone talks about the greens – how fast they are – putting is an optical illusion. I had an 8-foot putt and he told me it was a 3-foot break. I’m thinking it was a little break. Sure enough he was right – my ball veered away.

Course knowledge is so important. Playing the course gives you an appreciation of just how hard it is. But that doesn’t stop us from writing on deadline that someone choked.

Q. Did playing the course help you cover the Masters?

A. One of my qualities as a writer is my empathy – it works for and against me. I think of myself as an empathetic person. I tend to sympathize with people’s struggles and I tend to relate to it. So playing that course did help me.

Q. Is there a connection between golf and writing?

A. We don’t have a caddy. Although you could call a good copy editor a caddy.

Q. How did you get to Ft. Lauderdale?

A. I was at the Lake Geneva Regional News. The biggest thing I covered there was the state basketball tournament. I had to figure out how to get noticed so I came up with a resume that was radically different. I made it look like the old Inside Sports Magazine, which at the time had all the great writers. I used that type and titled it “Inside Randall Mell” and designed it like the magazine front. The second page looked like the Table of Contents and inside I laid out my clips to look like the magazine. I sent it out to 20 or 30 papers. One guy in Kankakee sent it back to me and said, “You’re an idiot – you’ll never make it.” Craig Stanke was down here – he said he just laughed but he had to see what kind of character would do this. He said I made him read it and he could see I had potential. It got me noticed so it served its purpose.

I started in the Sun-Sentinel’s west bureau – at the time they used it as a training ground for young reporters. I wrote shuffleboard stories, senior golf, and then they would send me to do sidebars on the Dolphins or University of Florida games. It was almost like an internship. The funny thing about that was that I went through old issues and Gene Wojciechowski had stories in there and Bill Plaschke wrote for it. I was inspired that those guys started there, too.

Q. Your assignments before golf?

A. I was in the bureau for a year and a half. Fred Turner liked what I was doing and he decided I would be the next University of Miami football writer. This was 1987 – the height of the Hurricanes phenomenon – after the Fiesta Bowl and the beginning of the renegade Bad Boys. It was daunting to be thrown into that – I had never had a beat before. Greg Cote was the Miami Herald’s reporter and he was in his 4^th or 5^th year covering the team. I learned more my first two years getting my ass waxed than I learned in four years of J-School or the previous five years in the business. Cote was very good – he discovered a Miami journalism student by the name of Dan LeBatard – Dan became Greg’s personal assistant and would fill in on Greg’s days off. He knew all the football players and he was talented even at that young age.

Those two were a formidable combination. I shouldn’t say this but I still have footprints on my butt from them. But I learned so much. I can say there are Herald beat writers who have my footprints on their butts because of the lessons I learned. I had a strong command and strong sources and learned from my early mistakes and did well there. I won an investigative reporting award in 1993 for a story on UM players Bennie Blades, Brian Blades, Michael Irvin and others receiving thousands of dollars in secret cash payments from agent Mel Levine while playing in the late 80s. In 1995 I won an APSE investigative reporting award for a story I co-wrote with Dave Hyde on the drug-testing failures at UM that led to Warren Sapp playing in the Orange Bowl despite failing four drug tests.

I learned from competing early and failing early – it made me a better reporter. Thank God I had an editor, Fred Turner, who stuck with me because the first two years were painful.

Q. I’m going to read one of your college football leads, from the Sun-Sentinel, September 15, 2006:

Kafka’s the quarterback.

That’s Mike, not Franz, but the famed novelist might have been moved by the depressing turn Northwestern’s football program has taken.

The Wildcats joined the growing ranks of Division I-A teams that have been stunned by I-AA underdogs this year.

Northwestern quarterback Mike Kafka and his teammates know the existential angst the famed Czech writer once so skillfully explored.

The Wildcats’ 34-17 loss to New Hampshire came with NU fans there to see their first home game since coach Randy Walker’s death from a heart attack last summer. There was moment of silence in memory of Walker before kickoff, and his family members took part in the coin flip.

The rest of the game was Kafkaesque in its disappointment.

How do you come up with leads like that?

A. I wish I knew because then I could figure out how to do it more often. The fun of writing is when you surprise yourself like that and it just comes.

Anything that makes the story more fun – if you can grab someone’s attention immediately – it just helps. There’s so much out there with the Internet and blogs and message board. You have to catch readers early because they read the headlines and the lead and they move on.

(SMG thanks Randall Mell for his cooperation)

The first place for investigative reporting in the Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE) annual national contest was for 1995. I co-wrote with Dave Hyde. I was the University of Miami beat writer, he was our columnist. The story detailed the drug-testing failures at UM that led to Warren Sapp playing in the Orange Bowl despite failing four drug tests at Miami.

The first place for investigating reporting in the Florida Sportswriters Contest was for 1993. The story was about how former UM players Bennie Blades, Brian Blades, Michael Irvin and others received thousands of dollars in secret cash payments from agent Mel Levine while playing for the Hurricanes in the late ’80s. Bennie said he received between $30,000 and $40,000 from a student runner who worked for Levine.

One of my qualities as writer is my empathy – works for and against me – I thin kof mysaelf as empathetic person – tend to sympathize with peropls struggles and I tend to relate to it – so playing that course did help me

Concneetionc betweent he game and writing?

We don’t have a caddy although you could call a good copy e3ditor a caddy.

Randall Mell excerpted from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, September 15, 2006:

“Kafka’s the quarterback.

That’s Mike, not Franz, but the famed novelist might have been moved by the depressing turn Northwestern’s football program has taken.

The Wildcats joined the growing ranks of Division I-A teams that have been stunned by I-AA underdogs this year.

Northwestern quarterback Mike Kafka and his teammates know the existential angst the famed Czech writer once so skillfully explored.

The Wildcats’ 34-17 loss to New Hampshire came with NU fans there to see their first home game since coach Randy Walker’s death from a heart attack last summer. There was moment of silence in memory of Walker before kickoff, and his family members took part in the coin flip.

The rest of the game was Kafkaesque in its disappointment.”

How did you come up with that?

Do you need to play it to cover it?

I don’t t hink you have to. It helps. But you don’t have to. There are good writers hwho can cover anytying. The realy good stories arounet about why a 5 iroin isntinead of 6. its other things I said. Whats a guy overcoimgin what he got. What has shaped hinm to be a hcmaoion or prevented him from being achampion.

Does the game make golfers better interviews?

Not necessarily. Depoendson the person. Sprot has diferenct culture than other spots. Not as combative or adversarial. Smaller world – areent as many beat wrproters they have daily contact with. More intimate surrounding. Golf writers get criticized because maybe therye nota s ahrd onwriters or as comb ative or adeversarial – may be some truth to that but not sw scale – you have john Hawkins, len Shapiro, ed Sherman, jim mccabe, guys who ask tough qutonns and wouls tghrive in any sport – doug ferguson – yet it clearly isn’t as combative – you can uderstand wh other writers think that – nature o f game is jusat different – notion that golf is gnentleman’s game – you have ot police yourself its more honorable – I think that is true – it does shape cutlreu of sprot – but wherever lot of money at satake and people com itnenslty – always dark sid eof human nature at work and some corruption –

Watchdog function in golf?

Yes. Defitniely. I wote a story at doral last year, ford champonship, ford the sponsor was trying to get the top players back to doral – it had lost some of its luster – started a modnay corporate outing invited Sergio, veejay, reteif, padraig Harrington, they all were paid six figure sums – but it didn’t technically violate pga tour rules- but wneet into gray area very much a backdoor appearance fee – not surprised ot have appearnac efees – but this served as one – other players were upset aout it – tour changed ruels ecausea of story – now tour reviews all corp outings held by sponsors –

But you don’t have corruption you might have in other sprots – still issues that need to be watched

Drug stesting?

Tiger has psoeken up about that – what he says hasimpact –

How myuch of beat revoleves around tiger?

Intterstsing aspect of it. Epopele cant get n3eough tiger in new sroom and people who are sick of tieger. I see that I nmy e-mails all the time. Why r eyou writing aobu thim again. Everything now revoels around tigert , tour champoisnhip this week controversy tiger backed out, phil had backed out –

Tiger is magnficient player – majestic swing – but as personatlity he is just dull and boring and not interesting at all – rarely does he have natying to say in news conf that is worth quting – he doesthat purposefully – very smart – he’s managing himself as a player and corp entity too – he markets himself – partowho he is – but it makes it kind of boring ot covcer him as personalty – he ends up giving you so much copy as domiant player – I thin kasha gets odler toward end ofcareer I’;l be curous to saee if he opens up and beomces leader of opinion – jack nicklaus is one of great interview in sport now – so opnionated – you cangget 8 9 stories out of interview – tiger you satruggle to get aq uote – maybe he oepened up a ltitle morethis year – he is getin gbetter I shouldn’t be as harsh – he had stsr opinon about drug testing changing shroterning the saeason – but overall he’s guard

How much for local gofflers?

Hardest part is covering local golf. Almost hneed antoher repoerter. I don’t do enough of it. I try to go to locals. We have morgan pressl – form boac raton – she dominates my coverage on local satuff. I et most complaints aobut that why didn’t you cover mys on – difficult – a reality

Three kids. Satepson 20, 7 and 9.

Married.

Bron, Madison, 1958.

Favorite restaurant home: 15^th Street Fisaheries, Ft. Lauderdale “you can dress informally but you get elegant treaament overlooking inter-coastal great food decent prices – they treat you like yourre wearing at tux”

Favorite restaurant road: crab catcher, la joya, at top of cliff, spec view, great crabs

Favorite hotel: Marriott sawgrass. Sererne setting overlooking great holes TPC.

Media days playing the course?

Some events. Guaust has famous lottery, I got picked the firstyear. 24 people out of 300 or 400. enraged columnist he had been there 10 years and never picked, mike mayo, he just glared at me.

What was it like?

Spectacular fun an dintimdating. Never played on fairways that were m owed so tightly. I skulled hosts and hit shots heavy. Kind of intimdating to play. 108. you had to ask. Funny becausae caddy – you hire caddie s- I said whatsyou name – he said 19 – how you dget that- my mama had 19 kids and she just ran out of name

You need a caddy there – everyone talks about greesn – how fast – optical lilusion I had 8 foot put he tells me thre foot break – I[m thinking gltitle break – sure enough he was right – ball veer saway – course knowledge so oimportant

Gives you appreicaiton of just how hard it is – doenst stop us on deadline from writing that someone chokes

ARCIA’S TREE TAKES A BEATING

By Randall Mell Staff Writer

1257 words

17 August 2006

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Broward Metro

8C

English

Copyright 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel. All Rights Reserved.

MEDINAH, ILL.

They call it Sergio Garcia’s tree around here.

The towering red oak under which Garcia hit that remarkable recovery shot in pursuit of Tiger Woods in the final round of the 1999 PGA Championship at Medinah’s No. 3 Course has changed a lot.

Garcia noticed that when he couldn’t resist the urge to return to the foot of the tree in a practice round Tuesday for the 88th PGA Championship.

Countless members and guests over the past seven years haven’t been able to resist the urge to try the shot themselves, and they’ve scarred the base of the tree in bids to duplicate Garcia’s magic.

“They’ve had to overseed that little spot because everybody’s been hitting from it,” Garcia said.

At 19, Garcia was a shot behind Woods in the final round when he pushed his tee shot behind that oak tree. In a precarious spot inches behind the tree and 189 yards from the hole, he took a wild slash, closing his eyes for fear the ball would ricochet back at him. His shot ran up onto the green, stopping 35 feet from the hole.

Unable to see the ball on the elevated green, Garcia bolted up the fairway like a boy leaving school, doing a scissors kick to see where the shot landed. He just missed making birdie.

METAMORPHOSIS I-AA SCHOOLS ARE CUTTING I-A FOES DOWN TO SIZE. WHAT IN THE NAME OF KAFKA IS GOING ON?

By Staff Writer Randall Mell Information from other beat writers, wire services and other news organizations was used in compiling these reports.

1615 words

15 September 2006

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

.

Kafka’s the quarterback.

That’s Mike, not Franz, but the famed novelist might have been moved by the depressing turn Northwestern’s football program has taken.

The Wildcats joined the growing ranks of Division I-A teams that have been stunned by I-AA underdogs this year.

Northwestern quarterback Mike Kafka and his teammates know the existential angst the famed Czech writer once so skillfully explored.

The Wildcats’ 34-17 loss to New Hampshire came with NU fans there to see their first home game since coach Randy Walker’s death from a heart attack last summer. There was moment of silence in memory of Walker before kickoff, and his family members took part in the coin flip.

The rest of the game was Kafkaesque in its disappointment.

An Interview with Dave Krieger

“Unbelievably I saw Tim Kurkjian last night on ESPN arguing that he would vote for Mark McGwire for the Hall of Fame because there are not enough facts available to prove he had done steroids. This is coming from a person who didn’t want an investigation.”

“If you take the position that not enough facts are available, after you opposed an investigation, clearly you are not acting as a journalist. Maybe you’ve gone over to the other side – you’re acting as a promoter.”

“I view myself as a letter writer to my readers, who can’t go where I can go. I’m in here and this is what I see and hear and can figure out.”

“Fans want what the team wants – positive publicity – all the great stories you’re not seeing, all the wonderful human beings you’re not recognizing – and they want you to write about it…if you did it as a columnist you would suck and probably lose your column. Beat guys could get away with it because a lot of beat writers at the highest levels are homers.”

Dave Krieger: Interviewed on November 28, 2006

Position: Columnist, Rocky Mountain News

Born: 1954, New Haven, Connecticut

Education: Columbia, Amherst

Career: Claremont NH Eagle-Times, Burlington Free Press, Press Secretary for Sen. Patrick Leahy 1977-78; Cincinnati Enquirer 78-81, Rocky Mountain News 81 –

Personal: divorced, one son

Favorite restaurant (home): Sabor Latino, Denver “neighborhood Mexican-Caribbean-South American joint”

Favorite restaurant (away): Greens, SF “a veggie place – unbelievable what they do and I’m not a vegetarian”

Favorite hotel: Hotel Chelsea, NY, “former home to Dylan Thomas, Arthur Miller and other writers – on the National Register of Historic Places – the clerk once asked me if I was a writer and I said yeah and he said we have writers here. I said I know because I saw the plaques. He said, “We still have some who are alive.”

Dave Krieger excerpted from the Rocky Mountain News, April 11, 2006:

Baseball’s steroid crisis has spilled over into the sports media in much the way the Iraq crisis spilled over into the news media, or at least onto Judith Miller’s desk.

In its wake, there’s been an uncommon amount of navel-gazing about the state of “sports journalism.”

Let me do what I can to clear this up:

Sports journalism is an oxymoron.

You might already be aware of this, but the outcome of a sporting event has precious little effect on anything, assuming there’s no riot. If we judged it by the usual journalistic standard – significance – we would run it in the back with the horoscope.

However, fans love sports and they want to read about their favorite teams. We satisfy this demand in the role of entertainment reporters.

We operate in a hazy neutral zone between journalism and promotion…

Q. Why is sports journalism an oxymoron?

A. I should say first that the use of that statement was a device at the top of the column to get a laugh. Clearly it was an exaggeration – sports journalism is not an oxymoron.

I was annoyed at the time. I had just seen Tim Kurkjian (ESPN), who is a former sportswriter and I assume he still calls himself a journalist, arguing on TV that there should be no investigation into the steroid mess. He said, “What’s the point – if you found out what would you do with it?”

My jaw dropped – I cannot imagine a journalist who would not want to know. Unbelievably I saw Tim Kurkjian last night on ESPN arguing that he would vote for Mark McGwire for the Hall of Fame because there are not enough facts available to prove he had done steroids. This is coming from a person who didn’t want an investigation.

Q. You find Kurkjian’s position ironic?

A. More than ironic. It is what an apologist or a p.r. person for Major League Baseball would do – block the investigation and then say there are no facts to prove anything. It’s what government p.r. people would do when they’re covering something up.

I came up as a news reporter. It’s inconceivable to me that a journalist wouldn’t want to know before passing judgment. I’m not picking on Kurkjian – I don’t know him – and I understand he was a fine baseball writer. I’ve run into a lot of baseball writers with that view. They’re so invested in that view that whether or not they’re acting as a journalist is an open question.

If you take the position that not enough facts are available, after you opposed an investigation, clearly you are not acting as a journalist. Maybe you’ve gone over to the other side – you’re acting as a promoter.

Q. Does sports journalism tend to be promotional?

A. Yes. It’s very different than being a city side reporter – it’s more akin to entertainment, rock, and movies. From a traditional journalism standpoint in which one judges the value of news based on its significance to society at large – who wins these games couldn’t matter less. Yes, the ancillary economic factors are important – who wins doesn’t matter. It’s entertainment and we give it more space and attention than it should get because people are so into it. We’re serving a market function but it’s not a traditional function of journalism. It’s the same thing as people writing endlessly about Jennifer Aniston – it’s nonsense from a news point of view.

When you get guys approaching sports from a hard news point of view that’s revolutionary. It’s not coincidental that the two (SF) Chronicle reporters (Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada) were not sports beat guys. It takes an outsider’s perspective. If you talk to the beat guys you’ll find they’re much closer to the teams they cover than to their newsrooms. As an NBA writer I was never in my newsroom but I was around the coaches and players constantly. You have a tendency to identify more with your sport than with your paper.

Q. How do you approach it?

A. I understand it’s entertainment. I’m writing a column today about the Broncos that has very little journalistic value but huge entertainment value – the Broncos get huge attention in this marketplace. If I see myself that way – as an entertainer – then what I write doesn’t have to have significance. That’s fine – that’s what I’m being paid to produce because there’s a market for it. But when big issues like steroids come in, then we have trouble finding our footing because we’re in a different role than the traditional journalist.

Q. You wrote a column recently about a Colorado solider stationed in Iraq finding comfort in watching the Broncos game on TV. Wasn’t that a case where sport was significant in a broader sense?

A. It is a consolation to me that sports has a role greater than the purely self-indulgent entertainment that most of us get out of it. You get those heart-warming stories about soldiers overseas or sick kids in the U.S. to whom sports means a great deal – people for whom everything else is pretty bleak and for whom it’s great to have something exciting and fun to focus attention on. Sport has that role in the real world.

In that case it’s news – you are acting as a journalist. You’re writing about how sport affects fans in the real world – not just for fans looking to escape – but for people who need it. The more of those stories we do the more in touch we will be with our basic roles.

I don’t have an objection to sports being escapist, and I don’t dispute that most of our work is done in that escapist realm. But as journalists it would be nice if we touched base with reality just often enough so that when a hard news story came along we recognized it. So that when a steroid story comes along we don’t view it as an attack on our turf. A lot of sportswriters objected to a steroids investigation as though outsiders were coming in and messing up their sport. We have to keep in mind that we are the outsiders – or are supposed to be.

Q. What do you write most often?

A. I’ve been here 25 years – I’m the local guy. Our other columnist – Bernie Lincicome – came in 2000 and he gives us more of a national perspective. I tend to focus on local teams – I do a ton of Broncos columns because they’re the state religion here. Later on I’ll focus on Avs hockey and Nuggets basketball. I do as much baseball as I can but with the Rockies it’s not easy to do. Occasionally I’ll do the national stuff.

Q. Which recent Broncos column got the most public reaction?

A. Plummer-Cutler columns are all the rage here – we have a quarterback controversy. It’s a classic sports controversy that doesn’t matter to anybody but football fans. The quarterback of the Broncos is probably the leading public figure in Colorado – more than the governor or mayor. I wrote a column a week ago today in which I said – predicted might be too strong a word – that if Plummer didn’t play well in Kansas City he would be replaced by Cutler. It was an educated guess and I laid out my reasons. That was last Tuesday. On Thursday NFL Network breaks a story attributed to sources that Cutler will replace Plummer. NFL.com wrote it and claimed they broke it. Then ESPN’s Chris Mortensen said he broke it. Every news outlet outside of Al Jazeera claimed to have broken it.

Q. What did you make of the breast beating?

A. It was a modern statement about our business. It’s more important for each outlet to claim they had it first than it was to deliver the information. I’ve never seen a story broken that many times. Finally the Broncos had a press conference, with the usual media cluster fuck, and announced it yesterday.

Q. Do outlets benefit from being first?

A. No. I don’t think anybody cares. It’s all inside baseball and one-upmanship among ourselves. It’s a feather in our cap as a reporter to break a story – everybody wants credit for that whether or not they actually broke it. My column did not claim to be based on sources. Once the NFL Network did it everybody after that had the story in front of them and just had to confirm it – that’s not the same thing as breaking it. It makes us look bad in the eyes of viewers. I don’t think anybody cares who broke it – they just want to know what the information is.

Q. As a columnist do you do much reporting?

A. Quite a bit in my column, in contrast to Bernie, who is more of a craftsman. He’s a great writer – and since Bill Lyons retired – maybe the best in our business. He tends to take the big picture.

I was a beat reporter for years. I tend to get more quotes in my columns and pursue people more. I approach it analytically – why is this happening – and I try to find someone to explain. I view myself as a letter writer to my readers, who can’t go where I can go. I’m in here and this is what I see and hear and can figure out.

Q. Is access an advantage?

A. Less and less. When I covered the Nuggets in the late 80s they flew on commercial flights and stayed in hotels that didn’t charge $400. I was around them all the time – sitting in airports and coffee shops. Doug Moe would hold court in coffee shops – the media and hangers on would come down and sit for hours and hours. All of that is gone now. The teams are on charters and they stay in places we can’t afford. I sat next to Dikembe Mutombo when he was a rookie – we were on a 747 and he didn’t get one of the eight first-class seats – and this 7-1 guy was assigned a middle seat in coach. I was next to him – his knees were almost in his mouth – and he was good-natured about it. There’s nothing like that to get to know somebody. Now I can go in a lockerroom after a game all season long and never develop that kind of rapport.

The reality is that access means less and less. They moved us off the floor this year – all over the country. They really don’t care anymore. I asked an NBA official, “Don’t you want us to communicate the sights and sounds?” He said, “We can do that ourselves now.” Access is limited and formulaic. There’s so much on TV – there will come a point where we won’t have any more access than the fans. The business model of NBA TV and nba.com and NFL TV and nfl.com is to eliminate the middle man – we are the middle man – and to provide access directly to fans.

Q. Is traditional print media going the way of the blacksmith?

A. I think that’s right. NBA TV came in last fall to cover the Nuggets training camp – it was going live on-air from camp. Nuggets practices have been closed to reporters for nine years – if I went to practice as a reporter I would sit outside the door until 15 minutes remained and they would let us in. If I stayed home and watched on NBA TV I could watch the whole thing – fans had more access than reporters – that’s the way it’s going. We will eventually be in the role of a blogger. We’ll do analysis and commentary but in terms of information we won’t have more.

Q. Who will get credentialed in the future?

A. Great question. It will be up to them – already they are credentialing themselves. Mlb.com is in every pressbox, mlb.com writers are covering every team for the mlb.com website. They’re covering themselves. It seems clear to me that over the last 10 or 15 years it dawned on them that they need us less and less. The owner of the basketball and hockey teams in Denver – Stan Kronke – also has started his own TV sports network which carries the games of both teams. As you can imagine, the coverage is pretty positive. That’s where you have to go to watch the games – announced by announcers his company approves. How long they’ll tolerate outside media – that is critical and not only positive – is not clear to me.

Q. Don’t teams owe the public more? Aren’t teams quasi-public entitites?

A. Probably, but that’s a qualitative judgment. Does one require another? Do tax breaks for arenas or donation of land or a public subsidy mean you will do this and this – is anything written down? No. It’s really up to the organization. Some teams are better about it than others. (Nuggets and Avs owner) Stan Kroenke doesn’t talk to the press – he doesn’t feel he has to.

I’ve made that argument – that the teams are quasi-public institutions – that this is not like owning a Wal-Mart shopping center. People care and want to know. My arguments have been unpersuasive to date.

Q. Do fans – like voters – get what they deserve?

A. Most fans just care about the team – they would choose the owner over the media. We’re not in a strong position in regard to fans – most fans want a fan magazine instead of a traditional journalism. They want as much information as possible about the players they cheer for. The more positive it is the more they like it. If it comes down the way it’s looking like – with the middle man being forced out – I don’t think we’ll have a lot of allies protesting on our behalf.

Q. What do the hard-core fans want?

A. Fans want what the team wants – positive publicity – all the great stories you’re not seeing, all the wonderful human beings you’re not recognizing – and they want you to write about it.

My job is not to be a fan magazine – but they want more fan magazine stuff. They do not want the people they admire and cheer for and love to be criticized. They don’t want criticism – they don’t much care if it’s well-founded or not. If the team is really bad the fans will turn on them because they want change – that’s when they’ll read what’s wrong with them.

When I criticized University of Colorado for its sex-recruiting scandal I never got hate mail like that. Let’s face it – the program is not Nebraska or Oklahoma – and yet there’s a core there that absolutely takes its personally if you criticize the team.

Q. If you wrote uncritically how boring would your job be?

A. You’d be a bad beat writer and if you did it as a columnist you would suck and probably lose your column. Beat guys could get away with it because a lot of beat writers at the highest levels are homers. I’m not going to generalize and say all beat writers are homers – a lot of them maintain independence and develop respect from both sides. Some editors believe beat reporters should be switched off after a certain amount of time – that’s a tough one for me because certain people who have been on the beat forever are legendary – and wouldn’t have been if they hadn’t stayed on it.

Tracy Ringolsby (Rocky Mountain News) just went into the baseball Hall of Fame based on 30 years plus of terrific baseball coverage. If he had been transferred to football after seven years he wouldn’t have had the opportunity. I’m not with that, but if I was a sports editor I would watch out for that phenomenon. The culture of the team has a tendency to overwhelm the culture of journalism you initially brought to the beat – I would be watchful for that if I was an editor.

Q. How often do you write?

A. Four a week. That’s a bit of a stretch but most columnists have to. We look up to columnists who write only three times a week. Some write two – that would be wonderful – you would have more time to research and interview.

Q. Your newspaper background?

A. I came to the News as a City Hall reporter in 1981 and I moved over to sports in 84. I covered the Broncos in 84-85, special projects in 86-87, and the Nuggets from 88 to 2000. I started the column in 2000.

Q. Why did you leave news?

After I covered the mayoral race in 83 I had run out of things to do – there was no place to go on news side.

Funny thing. Mike Littwin came here a sports columnist hoping to get back to news, which he had done at the Baltimore Sun. He had grown up in sports and gotten tired of it – he wanted to write more significant things. My journey was the opposite – I started in news and got frustrated with that. I got bored – sitting through meetings was harder than sitting through ball games. I was also thinking, “What difference does any of this make?” – which is what sportswriters think. I came over to sports knowing it was fantasyland and that was okay with me. I am able to compartmentalize – once I’m at a ballgame it doesn’t matter if its meaningless – I can still enjoy the game.

Q. Did your news reporting skills transfer?

A. I felt they did – but I’m not sure the people I covered felt that way. They felt I was too hard and too aggressive. Half the coaches in American believe it’s your obligation to support the team – particularly college coaches. It’s a completely different mindset if you bring a hard news attitude. I’ve had very difficult relationships in this business with people I’ve covered. People who grow up as sportswriters tend to be more friendly than I was. If you bring a traditional city-side adversarial “I’ve got questions” attitude you’re going to alienate people. I certainly did.

Q. Who?

A. Dan Issel – the coach and GM of the Nuggets. Our relationship was not great. What happens on competitive beats – at that time the Post and the News were owned by separate companies and were very competitive – is that one side will become the confidante of the coach and the other side will be the opposite. The Denver Post was on Issel’s side – he would share information with them – and because I had chosen an adversarial stance I was on the outside. I had to get information from agents and G.M.s around the league.

There’s a great advantage being on the outside – you can write anything you know. The guys on the inside can’t because they get their information from the inside. I prefer that guerilla role.

We more than held our own. We kicked ass on trade stories – the team would never want that out but if I could get it from other G.M.s or agents and we could run it. Stuff within the organization we would get our ass kicked because we were the last people they would tell. On balance we held our own.

Q. Who do you read?

A. Bill Lyon (Philadelphia Inquirer) is retired but still writing – he was the most under-rated writer of our time – close to a poet. TJ Simers (LA Times) is very funny. Ray Ratto (SF Chronicle). Both guys in Kansas City (Jason Whitlock and Joe Posnanski) are terrific. Rick Morrissey (Chicago Tribune). Richard Justice (Houston Chronicle). Shaun Powell (Newsday). Mike Bianchi (Orlando). The whole Washington Post crew: Tom Boswell, Mike Wilbon, Sally Jenkins, Mike Wise. Years ago when I worked on the Hill I loved to read Dave Kindred and Ken Denlinger.

Q. What New Media do you read?

A. I read Deadspin. Occasionally I look at blogs by local bloggers – like the bulletin boards for the college teams – but generally they’re so partisan I don’t find them helpful – they tend you toward writing things that ardent fans like, which is not your job.

(SMG thanks Dave Krieger for his cooperation)

Sure. Home is 303-458-7288. Cell is 303-619-4283. You’ll probably have to leave a message. Let me know when it would be convenient for me to get back to you and I will.

Krieger: It’s not our job to help cover up scandals

April 11, 2006

Baseball’s steroid crisis has spilled over into the sports media in much the way the Iraq crisis spilled over into the news media, or at least onto Judith Miller’s desk.

In its wake, there’s been an uncommon amount of navel-gazing about the state of “sports journalism.”

Let me do what I can to clear this up:

Sports journalism is an oxymoron.

You might already be aware of this, but the outcome of a sporting event has precious little effect on anything, assuming there’s no riot. If we judged it by the usual journalistic standard – significance – we would run it in the back with the horoscope.

However, fans love sports and they want to read about their favorite teams. We satisfy this demand in the role of entertainment reporters.

We operate in a hazy neutral zone between journalism and promotion, and it’s not just us. Do you notice the change in tone on 60 Minutes when the subject switches to sports?

Suddenly, Ed Bradley is fawning over Tiger Woods. Michelle Wie is charming Steve Kroft.

If this is how TV’s most distinguished news program covers sports, what do you expect out of the wretches who do it every day?

Nevertheless, there’s been a lot of concern about “sports journalism” lately, most of it in relation to steroids. (Not that we’re on them. No one’s saying that.)

This is a pretty adept PR job by Major League Baseball, which has managed to make the question, “If the press didn’t know, how were we supposed to know?” Too bad Enron didn’t think of that.

In fact, two reporters from the San Francisco Chronicle forced baseball to act, but critics point out these were not sportswriters but news-side guys.

As Mark Jurkowitz of The Phoenix in Boston wrote last week, sports have become a big seller for newspapers and other media, which are looking for sales drivers in a big way.

According to Jurkowitz, Buster Olney, formerly of The New York Times and now of ESPN, wrote this in The Times 10 days ago: “I had a role in baseball’s institutional failure during what will be forever known as the Steroid Era.”

This self-flagellation is more evidence of baseball’s extraordinary influence over the people who cover it. Players, trainers and “nutritional gurus” were making the case throughout baseball’s Steroid Era that you could bulk up the way Mark McGwire did, the way Sammy Sosa did, the way Barry Bonds did, by a combination of protein shakes, South American herbs and serious weightlifting.

Sportswriters, as you may have observed, do not tend to be weightlifters. By and large, we bought it. Now, Turk Wendell says no one can put on 30 pounds of muscle in a single off-season without pharmaceutical assistance. In all honesty, most of us had no idea if you could or not.

So call us naive, but that is not the same as sharing the blame with baseball for baseball’s internal dysfunction. Jose Canseco wrote in his book Juiced that he taught team trainers to administer steroids. Those are club employees. That’s baseball’s problem.

But some media types went above and beyond the role of oblivious spectator. Some actively argued against an investigation of the Steroid Era, a probe baseball launched only after the two Chronicle reporters published their book. One prominent example was Tim Kurkjian, also of ESPN.

Kurkjian argued there was no point to an investigation. This is a television analyst and former sportswriter who does not want to know.

Nor was he alone. Any number of commentators fretted at how difficult such an investigation would be. How could it ever succeed? How broad should it be? What could possibly come of it? Better to let it drop.

The underlying rationale, of course, is it would be better for baseball to let it drop. A commentator who takes this position has crossed the line from journalist to baseball guy. A journalist always wants to know as much as possible. He certainly doesn’t throw up his hands in despair before an investigation even starts.

Perhaps it is worth mentioning here that ESPN is in business with baseball to present and promote its games. It has built a stable of experts – some of them former journalists – to support this enterprise with studio shows, analysis and the like.

But “analysis” to a business partner is not the same as “analysis” to an outsider. A business partner wants to know as much as possible about tonight’s starters but would rather avoid the unpleasantness of the steroid scandal. It is no coincidence that ESPN also airs Bonds’ reality show, Bonds on Bonds, over which Bonds has editorial control.

It’s not our job in the sports media to run baseball, and it’s a good thing because the evidence suggests we wouldn’t do it much better than baseball does.

It’s also not our job to help baseball cover up its scandals. Even if there’s just a small slice of journalism left in what we do, it should be enough to tell us that.

rts

Broncos games serve as a link to home

Dave Krieger, Rocky Mountain News

939 words

17 October 2006

Rocky Mountain News

FINAL

2C

English

© 2006 Denver Publishing Company, Rocky Mountain News. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights reserved.

So you think Broncos games are a nice break for you?

Imagine for a moment you’re Senior Airman James Demoney of the Air Force in your second deployment to the Middle East.

By Middle East, I do not mean Ohio.

“Big picture: We are responsible for ensuring our C-130s are mission ready in order to ferry troops and supplies in/out of Iraq,” Demoney wrote to me recently by e-mail.

“We also have a lot of aero-medical evac that comes in and out of here, along with human remains missions, but I shall opt not to get into detail about that at all. I’m sure you understand.”

Whatever you think about the mission in Iraq, the American servicemen and women in the desert are doing what their country asked in circumstances most of us cannot imagine. Sports on television serve the same function they serve for us, times 10.

Demoney, who was born in Aurora, is an avid Broncos and Avs fan, which is how our correspondence got started.

“Football for us is more or less time for us to take our minds off the mission for a while and have a piece of home for a little bit,” he explained.

“I know that when I watch football, it’s all I think about, aside from being at home with a beer or 10 while I watch. It’s fun to sit with a group of people who you’ve seen around base but don’t really know and just talk smack back and forth and watch a game.

“No one gets violent or anything like they would at a sports bar. It’s all good fun. Though it seems every time I go to the recreation center (the “Flex”) to watch the Broncos, it’s always just Bronco fans. I’ve made friends with this guy from Pope AFB, N.C., who is always up there watching the games. I don’t even know his name, but we always watch the games together. He’s from Wyoming, though. I do know that.”

Apparently, the Broncos fan experience is universal no matter where you are. Demoney offered this account of the Sunday night game in New England a couple of weeks back:

“I work from 5 p.m. to 5 a.m., which is 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Eastern time. The game came on here at the scheduled kickoff time, but I missed the first four minutes because I was training the new guy and the TV was on the wrong channel.

“I don’t remember the first half much, except I do remember thinking to myself how good Denver’s run defense looked, and immediately after I thought that (Laurence) Maroney had a good run. At least, I think it was a run. I saw him running.

“I am finding it hard to have confidence in Plummer after watching the first two games and after watching him throw a couple of passes into double and triple coverage and have a couple of passes go right through the hands of New England defenders. In the first half, I thought for sure this was another ‘bad Jake’ game, but that pass to Walker on third-and-1 into the end zone was PERFECT – great throw, awesome catch, fantasy football points.”

From 7,000 miles away, Demoney’s wish list sounds like my mail from Arvada:

“I would like to see Tatum keep getting 20 carries or more, would like to see Javon keep getting the balls when it counts, and would definitely like to see Shanny let Jake open it up more.”

Last week, Demoney was back in front of the TV for the Monday night game against the Ravens.

“For me, the biggest highlight of the game was Tater Bell carrying Ray Lewis on his back across the first-down line. I cannot stand Ray Lewis. And, of course, the icing on the cake, that was the TD pass. Jake still makes me angry, though.”

I’m no military expert, so I’ll let Demoney describe what he does the rest of the time.

“Our unit (386th Air Expeditionary Wing) is the most tasked C- 130 unit in the AOR (area of responsibility). We generate more sorties (missions) out of here than any other C-130 unit in the AOR, which includes the C-130 unit in Qatar (Guard and Reserve) and the C- 130 unit in Balad, Iraq (active duty from Little Rock, Ark.).

“Our mission motto here, so to speak, is, ‘Boots on the ground.’ The base attached to this one where the Army and Marines are is one of two staging areas for them going up country (to Iraq), so we are constantly flying Army and Marines personnel in and out of this base, as well as their support equipment. Hence, the motto.”

Airman Demoney turned 22 last month. He lives in Abilene, Texas, with his wife, Nicole, who is expecting their first child in January. He hopes to be home by then.

He was headed for Qatar during the weekend, so I don’t know if he caught the Raiders game. Before he left, I asked him to name the hardest and best things about being where he is.

“Hardest part – being away from my wife and being away from everything that is familiar to me,” he wrote.

“Best part – taking pride in what I do, taking pride in being here and contributing to something greater than myself.”

kriegerd@RockyMountainNews.com COLUMN

kriegerd@RockyMountainNews.com

MORE KRIEGER COLUMNS »

Copyright 2006, Rocky Mountain News. All Rights Reserved.

ports

Giving thanks for things great and small

Dave Krieger, Rocky Mountain News

920 words

23 November 2006

Rocky Mountain News

FINAL

2C

English

© 2006 Denver Publishing Company, Rocky Mountain News. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights reserved.

So many things to be thankful for and so little space. As always, The Dude’s thanks follow mine in a cynical ploy to attract a younger audience. I will also be inserting the expression “I’m down” at random intervals. If any of The Dude’s thanks puzzle you, keep in mind he is playing fantasy football this year.

Without further Adu (who is the same age as The Dude and has only 11 more career MLS goals) . . .

I am thankful for Terrell Owens’ new children’s book, Little T Learns To Share. A heartwarming tale just in time for Christmas.

Also available on TerrellOwens.com – an adjustable locker room towel.

I am thankful for the global NFL, which keeps moving Broncos games from day to night so Broncomaniacs in Shanghai can watch them over breakfast.

I am thankful for Bob Knight, who is about to become the winningest coach in college basketball history and whose little slap of a player last week was totally overblown by the mainstream media. He chokes guys harder than that.

I am thankful for Barry Bonds, who is about to become baseball’s career home run champion, possibly as a designated hitter for the A’s.

Coincidentally, Oakland pharmacies report they are out of human growth hormone until further notice.

I am thankful for former NFL lineman Kevin Gogan, who made an instructional video on how to deliver a cheap shot without getting caught to help out players like Tennessee’s Albert Haynesworth and Oakland’s Tyler Brayton, who were a little too obvious. Gogan recommends three soft-tissue targets: the groin, solar plexus and throat.

“Hard to talk and breathe when your Adam’s apple is coming out of your ear,” he points out.

Hey, this is football. A delightful stocking stuffer.

I am thankful for Larry Coyer, even if he has a few things to correctify.

I am thankful for Nick Ferguson and sorry to see him out for the season. The Broncos locker room has no more engaging personality. And when he pipes his iPod through the sound system, it’s 1970 all over again.

I am thankful for the University of Colorado, Colorado State University and the Air Force Academy for reminding us that bad college football does not keep the sun from shining 300 days a year.

I am thankful for collegiate athletic teams that make you proud, like the CU ski and cross country teams, both national champs this year. Of the school’s 23 national championships, 22 are in these quintessentially Colorado sports. Unfortunately, these are not the teams that get noticed.

I am thankful for the Tribune Company, which ordered spending cuts at the Los Angeles Times while guaranteeing Alfonso Soriano $136 million to play center field for the Cubs. I’m down. At least they have their priorities straight.

I am thankful for Heidi Fleiss, who denied she hired Mike Tyson to be a gigolo at Heidi’s Stud Farm, a brothel for women she plans in Nevada. I assume this means the position is still open.

I am thankful for the Rockies, winner of the fourth annual Tommy Sheppard Media Relations Award, a metaphorical statue I will present metaphorically to owner Charlie Monfort when he pays off on our annual bet next month. These guys are the most popular punching bag in town, but they haven’t pulled a Silent Stanley yet. If you have a question for Charlie, send it to me at the e-mail address below.

No promises, but I’m down.

I am thankful for Andre Miller, the Nuggets guard who offered fitness tips to elementary school students this week. Tip No. 24: Don’t show up fat to training camp.

I am thankful for David Stern, who wants to punish players for swaying during the national anthem and Mark Cuban for being Mark Cuban. In a related story, Donald Rumsfeld and Saddam Hussein have expressed interest in the job, should Stern retire.

I am thankful for Al Davis, whose meager legal judgment against Oakland in one of his many imaginative lawsuits was overturned by an appellate court. In between bites of Cream of Wheat, Davis vowed to make Pete Rozelle pay.

I am thankful for the Nuggets, who sold the wretches’ floor seats to high rollers this year but thoughtfully put us much closer to the concessions.

I am thankful for Jose Theodore, who is the next Patrick Roy in the sense that Brad May is the next Claude Lemieux.

And now, thanks from The Dude, 17:

“I’m thankful for Chad Johnson’s late but explosive emergence into his role as the best receiver in the NFL.

“I’m thankful for the NFL Network. Whenever I turn ’em on, it’s always something interesting.

“I’m thankful for the Cubs getting Alfonso Soriano. I’m definitely down with that.

“I’m thankful that Allen Iverson is still throwing himself around like a rag doll, playing his heart out. His team’s not as good as it should be, but it’s getting better.

“I’m thankful for Frank Gore. He’s just a beast. He’s the foundation of the new Niners. They might just win the division this year.”

I asked if he needed to sit down.

“They’re 5-5 and Seattle’s 6-4,” he said. “It could happen.”

I’m down.

kriegerd@RockyMountainNews.com COLUMN

Q. What’s between Ringolsby and Michael Lewis (author of “Moneyball”)?

A. Tracy didn’t think much of his book. They have a feud going – Tracy’s viewpoint is legitimate – they both have their right to an opinion. A lot of veteran baseball writers look at Michael Lewis as someone who understood what Billy Beane was doing but didn’t know much about the game other than that – Lewis is not a baseball specialist. He immersed himself in the A’s and Beane and took Beane’s word for how revolutionary his approach was. The baseball writers thought it went overboard, and that Lewis over-simplified and over-dramatized.

I’m sort of in-between. I can see the arguments on both sides. I thought it was a useful contribution to the conversation but I can see where the baseball writers thought it was overblown.

An Interview with Tim Layden (Part 1)

“This story I was emotionally immersed. I felt the story. It was acting upon me. It was such an emotional time you couldn’t help but feel it…My emotionalism carried me through – somehow I got in my car and got to the office. I couldn’t screw up. I just couldn’t let myself screw it up. I sat down to write at 7 p.m. and finished at 10.”

“I’ve been doing this 31 years if you count college and what it always comes down to is if the people or the subjects of the story are engaged in what you’re doing. If you’re not doing an investigative or adversarial story, if the people connect with you – whether it’s a profile or an enterprise piece that involves something broader – then you have a chance to do something good and enjoy it.”

“To do your job, whether it’s a technical story or a profile, if you are a good listener and a diligent student I think you can do the job. You’re a bridge between the subject and reader. I’ve told athletes and coaches, ‘I’m the translator here, you say what you have to, but I have to explain and go one step further. I have to explain to people who know less than I do’. “

Tim Layden: Interviewed on July 16, 2007

Position: senior writer, general assignment, Sports Illustrated

Born: 1956, Whitehall, NY

Education: Williams, 1978, English

Career: Schenectady Gazette 1978-86, Albany Times Union 86-88, Newsday 88-94, Sports Illustrated 94 –

Personal: married (Janet), two children (Kristin, Kevin)

Favorite restaurant (home): Harvest Cafe, Simsbury, Ct. “Fresh, innovative lunches. My wife and I have been going since

we moved to CT in 1995. Friendly, unpretentious, relaxing”

Favorite restaurant (road): Sapporo, Louisville, Ky, ‘sushi – go through at debry with mark beech, writer/repoerter at SI – we love to gather people for sushi in Louisivile – noeses turne dup at us – grat spot”

Favorite hotel: “I hate all of them – being in hotel means you’re on road and away from family – every time I check in I just want to get my work done and get home”

Tim Layden excerpted from Sports Illustrated, July 24, 2007:

Reggie Bush had never been drilled like this in his life. In high school and college he had always been the best athlete on the field, too fast and too elusive to leave himself open to a clean shot. But here, in an NFC divisional playoff game against the Philadelphia Eagles, his initiation came suddenly. A swing pass floated into the right flat, a flash of green helmet and white jersey, and now Bush was on his hands and knees on the turf of the Louisiana Superdome, crawling in his black New Orleans Saints uniform like a small child, sent back to his infancy after getting blown up by Eagles cornerback Sheldon Brown. The play resonated throughout the league: Watching it on TV a thousand miles away in Chicago, Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher rose in appreciation. “Those are the ones you dream about,” he’d say later. The New Orleans crowd, frenzied only seconds before, fell silent.

…Bush rose quickly to his hands and knees, then to one knee and then to a standing position. And then back down to all fours, pawing at the ground. “I popped right up,” says Bush, smiling at the memory. “Then I was like, Ooooo, I can’t breathe, my wind is gone. I better get back down. I never felt anything like that before.” Bush sat out one play before returning to the game.

Q. What is your Big Hits story about?

The whole culture of big hits, starting from square one – how does a big hit occur? I talked to guys involved in them last year. Jeremy Shockey was laid out. How did it happen to him, what does it feel like – generally and specifically – and how did it affect him psychologically? Was he ever knocked out? I take it to the realm of equipment they wear, which isn’t much, although the average fan doesn’t know that.

By and large guys were happy to sit down and talk about it. They warmed up to it, I think, because I wasn’t asking how they would beat the Bengals this week, or what it was like to grow up in grandma’s trailer. Sportswriting 101 – you can do better with a subject if you take them where they haven’t been. If you ask Reggie Bush what the pressure of being a No. 1 pick is like his eyes are likely to glaze. Probably half the guys who received big hits were willing to talk about it, and he was one of them. He jumped right into the topic. You could tell it was something he hadn’t been asked before.

One of the things I tried to ask players was if they thought fans understand the level of violence in the game. NFL is the most popular game in America, but the majority watch at home on TV. They’re attracted to the hitting and violence, but they don’t understand it to a significant degree. We asked players, “Explain what they’re missing.” A lot had to think about how to put it into words. Most of these guys are tormented in their own little world. Except for the superstars, their jobs are on the line every week and month. They’re as insecure as the next guy. Delivering hits is all part of what they go through. It’s a fascinating culture.

I was assigned a story last September – the NFL editor, Mark Mravic, thought it would be interesting to do a story on the Cover 2 defense. He was in a conference call with the reporters, and we all tended to mention profiles, which can be the richest and easiest story. Let’s be honest, you need access to one guy and then you paint the edges. Mark said ‘let’s do the Cover 2, we hear it every week and no one knows what it is’. There was silence on the phone. After 15 seconds I said ‘okay, put me down for that one’. I pecked away at it for three months – it was long and complicated. But I got a tremendous response, in letters and e-mails, and from peers and players telling me it was tremendous. A book agent called and suggested expanding it into a book on other defenses and offenses. It just blindsided me.

As journalists sometimes we miss what readers want to read. Usually you want to do a story that makes readers cry or gets turned into a movie or a miniseries – a Gary Smith type of piece. That causes you to miss a more obvious thing that serves the reader well. A month later I did a Super Bowl preview with Manning and Urlacher, about what each of them sees on the field. Urlacher gave me a long chunk of time, about what he sees 30 seconds before the snap, 15 seconds, 10 seconds, and five seconds. That story got another huge response. I guess there’s a message there somewhere.

Q. How much technical expertise do you need to cover football?

A. To do your job, whether it’s a technical story or a profile, if you are a good listener and a diligent student I think you can do the job. You’re a bridge between the subject and reader. I’ve told athletes and coaches, ‘I’m the translator here, you say what you have to, but I have to explain and go one step further. I have to explain to people who know less than I do’.

I don’t know that football is the most complex game but it’s presented that way. We can’t understand most of what’s going on, but we can try to explain most of what’s going on to readers, at least on a certain level. I sat in a lockerroom with a Ravens player who spent 45 minutes explaining one play to me. Obviously that’s too much – I can’t go that far with it. You don’t need too much technical expertise, but you do need a willingness to listen and learn.

For the Cover 2 story I got on the phone with Pete Carroll, who was its architect way back. I would say this and he would say ‘no, you’re getting close but there’s more to it than that’. I would say ‘Give me more’.

Q. What are your favorite stories to write?

A. Hard question. A story can present itself and turn out to be lousy. Other occasions you dread a story you’ve been given to do and it turns out to be good. I’ve been doing this 31 years if you count college and what it always comes down to is if the people or the subjects of the story are engaged in what you’re doing. If you’re not doing an investigative or adversarial story, if the people connect with you – whether it’s a profile or an enterprise piece that involves something broader – then you have a chance to do something good and enjoy it. Investigations – you’re always going to be fighting uphill.

So much of what you get with the big-time sports, NFL, MLB or NBA, is rote. The athletes, coaches and front offices are so programmed by watching ESPN, they’re so familiar with what media interviews are supposed to sound like that they only say those things. Whenever they can get a step beyond that, to answering questions thoughtfully, you can have a story that works.

A year ago, the first fall I was on the NFL fulltime for SI, one of my early stories was on Rex Grossman before he became a poster boy for disaster. I went out to dinner with him and went to his family’s condo in Chicago after he played well. I’m not saying he was insightful because insight doesn’t come naturally to him, but throughout the interview he was telling stories in response to my questions. I got honest answers and narrative from a human being saying what he felt. With big-time athletes that was kind of rare.

Q. The Grossman story – why did it happen?

A. In that case, it was another mechanical function of our profession – I caught him at the right time. He had been a big star in college, came in as a high draft pick and was injured and dropped off the radar. Then he did well again and was news. I got to him just as it was happening. He wasn’t talked out or jaded and things were going well. It was a confluence of things where he was willing to tell stories and talk about himself and be loose about it. He even gave me the cell phone numbers of his wife and dad. A month later that story couldn’t have been done – he hit the skids. He began to mistrust the media and felt we had an agenda and the window closed. With a guy like him it closes for good. With a lot of athletes it does. They develop a media persona, which is different from the way a human being would be conversant if you were talking while having lunch together. A media persona talks in vanilla speak.

ESPN is a good example. If you look at a typical week of SportsCenters and the best pieces ESPN does, say by Tom Rinaldi or Chris Connolly, those are three to four minute pieces usually with athletes who are under or next to or off the radar, who haven’t been talked to death. When they do a Reggie Bush or a Matt Leinart or a Barry Bonds it has to be tricked up, with music and quick sound bites. It’s almost a music video because the substance provided by the athlete is minimal. We do the same thing in print journalism. You trick it up, interview around the person and hope to get substance from some other source.

There’s just so much media now. The average pro athletes feels like he has a microphone in his face 18 hours a day.

Part of it is timing and part of it is being who you are. The larger media outlets can still take a crack at the big names. Scott Price (SI) did a terrific piece on Tony La Russa. Maybe the timing was right in the sense that there was news – new things to look at – La Russa’s DUI in the spring and a player who died shortly after that. In a way that was almost a timing thing, too. My point was that athletes who are overexposed can open up with the right media, SI or ESPN or the New York Times. Sometimes you get a guy who has talked too much to talk a bit more.

Q. What was your favorite story?

A. People ask that all the time. I didn’t used to have an answer but now I do. It was the Joe Andruzzi story after 9/11. SI put out an issue that was devoted to the events of the week that followed 9/11 – it was one of the magazine’s finest moments. My story was about a guy in sports but it went way beyond sports. Joe’s brother Jimmy had made it out of the south tower seconds before it collapsed. He walked into the house and told me that story. That’s something a sportswriter gets to do maybe three times in a career – a story with that kind of national gravitas. I got so much response on this story.

The politics of 9/11 have changed so much since then but at the time no politics were involved. That was a story on a journalistic level. The athlete and family let me into their home and the story had meaning and value and power.

Q. How did it come about?

A. 9/11 was on a Tuesday. I got the call on Thursday – an editor said this would be a good story. As a reporter you think, ‘how do I make this happen? Who do I call first? Will all these people talk to me?’ You’re being told to do something and you’re not sure it can be done. I called his agent and it went back and forth, no, no, maybe, and then late Saturday afternoon the agent called and said the Andruzzis will talk to you tomorrow on Staten Island. Selfishly, that’s where I wanted it to be.

I drove down the Jersey turnpike, where you could still see the smoldering smoke from the towers and I drove by the site of the attacks. And then I drove to Staten Island where the Staten Island Advance had page after page of head shots of dead firemen and police. Joe’s mom knew all these men who had been killed.

So many stories we do are mechanical. You’re not so much concerned about getting a great story as with getting a story. It’s a series of gets – you’re not engaging with people as much as checking off a list. This story I was emotionally immersed. I felt the story. It was acting upon me. It was such an emotional time you couldn’t help but feel it. Then to be in their house – your cynicism and professional mechanics go out the window.

Then I drove in to Manhattan to the magazine’s offices. My emotionalism carried me through – somehow I got in my car and got to the office. I couldn’t screw up. I just couldn’t let myself screw it up. I sat down to write at 7 p.m. and finished at 10.

Tim Layden, excerpted from Sports Illustrated, September 24, 2001:

On the day after the disaster, Joe sleepwalked through meetings and practice in preparation for a game at Carolina that he hoped would not take place. “I was there, but not really there,” he says. When the NFL announced the next day that its games were canceled, Joe drove to Staten Island. Late last Friday afternoon he was sitting in the living room of his parents’ modest split-level house when Jimmy walked through the door and stopped at the entrance to the room. He raised his right hand and held his thumb and index finger less than an inch apart, wordlessly demonstrating the margin of his survival as his lip trembled and his eyes watered. Both men began to cry, and they embraced in the center of the room, sobbing for longer than either could ever remember.

….At the core of this immeasurable disaster, the missing firefighters were at once heroes and victims, symbols of bravery and tragedy. It will be years before their ranks fully recover the experience and skill that was lost. Two days after the towers fell, Jimmy joined the thousands of firemen and other volunteers searching through the rubble for survivors and bodies. Standing atop a pile of twisted steel and compacted concrete, he felt another rumble, similar to what he had felt 48 hours earlier. He ran from the pile in terror and promised not to return soon.

His brothers Billy and Marc have done multiple shifts on what rescue and recovery workers have come to call “the mountain,” their name for the pile of rubble that had been the tallest buildings in the city. “I hate to say that it’s hard to appreciate what it’s like down there,” said Billy on Sunday, “but television does not do justice to how terrible it is.”

The previous evening he had held a fellow firefighter’s ankles as the man reached deep into the wreckage and scooped intestines out of a detached torso for DNA identification. In another place he picked up a single tooth. “By the end of my shift down there, I smelled like death,” he said, and then he too began to cry.

On a cool, crystal-clear Sunday morning, Joe went with Jimmy to the Engine 5 station house, a three-story building that is one of the oldest firehouses in the city. He found tough men, scarred but battling for their sanity. “There were guys there who said they’d been crying for three days and it was time to stop,” Joe said later. They were also worried about Jimmy, who had taken things harder than most. “They said he’s not back yet,” said Joe. “They said he needs more time. I hope it helps him to talk about it.”

Joe sat on the steps of his mom and dad’s home. A soft breeze ruffled the American flag on the front of the house. Inside, the table was set for dinner. Soon Joe would return to Massachusetts to begin preparing for this Sunday’s game against the New York Jets in Foxboro. Football business. “Regular game week,” said Joe.

Normalcy beckons, but reaching it will take longest for those survivors who were closest to the flame.

(SMG thanks Tim Layden for his cooperation)

An Interview with Tim Layden (Part 2)

“I was reading my own clips – a lot of them had long opening anecdotes. Now I wonder if I needed those. A lot of my profiles involved long intros with detail about the time and place and person. I think it’s good to check that and see if it feels right. The short answer is that sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. But if you’re under time pressure, sitting on a 6000-word story with five days to write it, that’s a different kind of pressure. Sometimes you just have to write what you have to get started.”

“If you hit everything you get linked to and let that cascade it’s just too much if you try and read everything. I can’t imagine being a national columnist and trying to be on top of every piece of news every day. It would just wear me out.”

“Nobody at SI has addressed the tug-of-war between the website and the magazine. Institutionally, as a group what do we do about this? If we write a story for the web at midweek, because that’s the growth part of the organization, but then it becomes a part of the story on the weekend, nobody has told us what to do. Or what exactly do you do for the web if you think your story will hold for three days?”

Tim Layden: Interviewed on July 16, 2007

Position: senior writer, general assignment, Sports Illustrated

Born: 1956, Whitehall, NY

Education: Williams, 1978, English

Career: Schenectady Gazette 1978-86, Albany Times Union 86-88, Newsday 88-94, Sports Illustrated 94 –

Personal: married (Janet), two children (Kristin, Kevin)

Favorite restaurant (home): Harvest Cafe, Simsbury, Ct. “Fresh, innovative lunches. My wife and I have been going since

we moved to CT in 1995. Friendly, unpretentious, relaxing”

Favorite restaurant (road): Sapporo, Louisville, Ky, ‘sushi – go through at debry with mark beech, writer/repoerter at SI – we love to gather people for sushi in Louisivile – noeses turne dup at us – grat spot”

Favorite hotel: “I hate all of them – being in hotel means you’re on road and away from family – every time I check in I just want to get my work done and get home”

Tim Layden excerpted from Sports Illustrated, November 9, 1998:

Mother and son lived alone in a tiny three-room apartment at Fifth and Robidoux in the northwest Missouri city of St. Joseph. They had moved there from Salina, Kans., in 1945, after Marionetta Snyder divorced her husband, Tom, a traveling salesman. The son, Bill, was six years old at the time of the move. For the next 12 years he slept on a Murphy bed in the living room next to his mother, who slept on a rollaway cot.

Bill learned to swim at the YMCA pool six blocks away, and he played five sports at Lafayette High. His mother worked tirelessly. She would leave the apartment before Bill awakened and walk to the Townsend and Wall department store, where she was a sales clerk and buyer. Often she wouldn’t return until after Bill went to sleep at night. She never owned a car, never even got a driver’s license. She just worked. “We didn’t have much, but she provided me with all that she could. She literally gave up her life for me,” says Bill. Marionetta died in 1996 at age 78. “She taught me that what the Lord gives you is time,” he says, “and 24 hours a day is all you get.”

This workday ends at midnight, when Bill Snyder, 59, walks down the narrow carpeted hallway from his office into the foyer of the Vanier Football Complex at Kansas State, where he has been coach for 10 seasons. His only concession to the lateness of the hour is a slight loosening of his yellow necktie, which complements his gray wool suit. He pushes open a glass door and walks into the cool prairie night, pausing to lock the building because he’s the last to leave. His dark green Cadillac sits at the curb. “You could drive by the complex after leaving a party at 2 o’clock in the morning, and his car would be there,” says Kansas City Chiefs wideout Kevin Lockett, who played for Snyder from 1993 to ’96.

…He’s home now. The suit jacket is laid neatly across the cooking island in the kitchen of his house in an upscale development three minutes from the stadium. In six hours he will be back in the office, chasing perfection again. Snyder is at the top of his profession and in the race for a national title. Yet, like any perfectionist, he despises finite goals. “If we’re fortunate enough to win a national championship, I don’t believe it would be a culminating experience,” he says. “There’s no finality in any of this for me, other than death.”

Is he happy? “I’m not unhappy,” he says.

Soon the only sound in the kitchen is the rhythmic clacking of dress shoes on the hardwood floor, followed by the opening of a refrigerator door and the whisper of cool air flowing into the room.

Q. How important is the opening anecdote?

A. I had this argument sitting in an airport in Italy with Michael Farber – I love to talk the craft of writing with him. He lectured me on his opinion that the anecdote is over-used and passé. All of us lean on it when it’s not meaningful. I don’t know how to start a story so I’m going to run off four grafs with description, clouds and cars and when I’m done I’ll start the story. He said ‘sometimes a story just starts. Write a declarative sentence and just go. If you’ve got great access and scenes you can get to that eventually’. I said ‘sometimes an anecdote can set up what a story is’.

Over the years at SI people have used the opening anecdote as a way of showing off. Look at me, I’m in Michael Jordan’s living room and I’m going to make you read about it for 500 words so you know I’m there.

I was reading my own clips – a lot of them had long opening anecdotes. Now I wonder if I needed those. A lot of my profiles involved long intros with detail about the time and place and person. I think it’s good to check that and see if it feels right. The short answer is that sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. But if you’re under time pressure, sitting on a 6000-word story with five days to write it, that’s a different kind of pressure. Sometimes you just have to write what you have to get started.

I once wrote a piece on Bill Snyder, the football coach at Kansas State. Snyder was a strange inaccessible guy, a megalomaniac who ran an obsessive program and took K-State from nothing to being a contender. The only time he talked to media was on Wednesdays from 12 to 1. I went there three straight Wednesdays from Connecticut. One time I asked if I could follow him home and shake hands in his driveway. He asked why. I said ‘that’s who you are and it will help me better’. He said sure. I followed him at midnight to his house – he got a cold dinner out of the refrigerator and sat down and ate.

The anecdote at the beginning was a story he told about his mother raising him in a small apartment and sleeping on a cot, which I could recreate. Then I used his best quotes – the ones that best summarized the story I was about to tell, which is a common device good writers and bad writers use. I used the scene where I followed him to his house as the kicker.

In a way I felt I was tricking the reader because I only spent three minutes at his house that night, and I asked to go. But I didn’t create the circumstances of him going home late and getting the cold plate of food and picking at it. By following him I was able to bring closure to the story in an accurate and representative way that validated the way the story started.

When you use those anecdotes you always wonder if they work or not, if they enhance the piece of just show that you can write. Nobody bats a thousand on it. We all need a way to make a story move along and connect good material. That’s one of the hardest things to figure out.

Q. How much travel is involved in your job?

A. About 100 days a year, though it fluctuates. In Olympic years it goes up. In the last 20 years my low is 75 days and my high would be 200, but I haven’t been near 200 in a few years. You make concessions. Baseball guys don’t have control over their travel. I don’t cut corners on material – I cut corners on comfort. I’ll take the 6 a.m. flight out and the 7 p.m. flight home. It’s exhausting. But it enables you to stay home and watch your son play hockey or your daughter row in a race. As a result you’re kind of tired all the time.

Q. Is it hard on your health?

A. I’m pretty healthy. I exercise diligently. I was a runner for a long time and now I’m a biker. I don’t drink much and I don’t smoke. It does affect sleep. You get a few more colds. For stories connected to events SI has morning deadlines on Sunday and Monday and you have to stay up and file in the morning at least 15 times a year.

It’s something you accept. If you have discipline and speed you don’t have to stay up all night. When I first came to SI to cover college football I would get to my hotel room by 8 and be done by midnight. I had that newspaper edge, but I lost it over time and got slower. Long features are different. You file those on Thursday on your own time.

There’s a great emphasis today on being a specialist. I never enjoyed staying on the same thing, or talking to the same G.M. every day. I’m thankful SI lets me do different things. Even when I covered college football I did the Winter Olympics and when Bill Nack left in 2001 I got into horse racing, which is a great storytelling beat.

Q. Where do you find information?

A. Depends on the topic I’m researching. I’ll go to a whole new realm of websites if I’m not working on a particular story. With some restraint I’ll go to the New York Times, USA Today, ESPN, and SI.com and shut it down after that – because you can eat up a day reading. If you hit everything you get linked to and let that cascade it’s just too much if you try and read everything. I can’t imagine being a national columnist and trying to be on top of every piece of news every day. It would just wear me out.

NBC Sports links to us so I go there. I try to go to Deadspin and thebiglead.com., which is similar but not quite as snarky. It’s pretty clever for what it is – an alternative universe sports website. And there are many more than that now.

Q. Do you worry about breaking news?

A. I don’t. If I can break news that’s great, but nobody at SI expects me to. The news I break might be about somebody doing something fresh and different. It won’t be about an offer sheet – Peter King and Mike Silver will get those stories – they have 40 years between them on the NFL. Nobody expects me to get that stuff. Covering a Triple Crown horse race or the Olympics I will break news here and there but not of the earthshaking variety. I don’t like to get beat on things.

It’s tricky at SI. With the website you’re trying to hold your own but you’re also trying to develop weekly stories. Even though it may seem antiquated you have to have a story four days after the race – it still has to have pictures and fresh information. Which is hard to do in this day and age. It’s hard to do that and to write daily news every day. My weekly stories now contain information I’ve already written on the web.

It’s always been difficult, even for (Dan) Jenkins 25 years ago when he sat down on a Sunday night. A lot of what he wrote wouldn’t have appeared anywhere else, but now there’s a lot more media.

During the last Olympics I spent 22 days in Italy and wrote 21 stories for the web. I also wrote three weekly pieces, which I filed on each of three Sundays. In many cases the subject matter of my magazine stories would overlap the subject matter of my web stories.

I broke a couple of stories. One was a long piece on a skier’s family that hadn’t gone public, Julia Mancuso, an up-and-coming skier, whose father’s name was Ciro. He had been an epic marijuana dealer in the 70s and 80s and had spent a number of years in prison. Julia had been a little girl when the ATF and FBI arrested him – he had got very rich doing it – but he had never talked about it and no one had drawn a connection between his pot dealing and her skiing – his money had enabled her career. I talked with him and wrote a long piece and they put it on the website on Thursday. Nine days later she won a gold medal at the end of the Games, and I’m still the only one who had talked with this guy. I talked it over with Craig Neff, our editor, about how to do this for the magazine. I got some access to her and some more information, and I worked in the father angle as one of the hurdles she had overcome – the old adversity angle – and I used about 500 words that had appeared on the website 10 days earlier.

Q. How do you balance the needs of the magazine and website?

A. Nobody at SI has addressed the tug-of-war between the website and the magazine. Institutionally, as a group what do we do about this? If we write a story for the web at midweek, because that’s the growth part of the organization, but then it becomes a part of the story on the weekend, nobody has told us what to do. Or what exactly do you do for the web if you think your story will hold for three days?

It’s an unspoken battle – how much to give to the web. Every writer makes the decision on his or her own. There’s been talk of creating a position as a liaison to help make that decision.

Four days before the Kentucky Derby in 2004 I got some details on the lives of the owners of Smarty Jones, who almost won the Triple Crown. They had met through Alcoholics Anonymous and there were some other things about their life together that would make an interesting story. It would have made a nice web story for sure. I called the managing editor of the web and said I’ve got a good back story on Smarty Jones – I didn’t know he was going to win the Derby of course – but I said it would make a great magazine story next week or a great web story now and I can bang it out in an hour and a half. He said ‘do what you think is best’, which wasn’t a real answer. So I sat on it. And it held for the magazine.

No place in the American sports journalism landscape puts out 80 to 120 pages of solid stuff every week like SI. Even if there are parts of SI you don’t like there are usually darn good quality stories you don’t get anywhere else. Is it viewed as ponderous and slow – probably – maybe even within its own building. But there’s nobody at the web demanding that they get everything first. They tell us ‘everything you give us is a bonus’.

The pressure is all self-driven. I don’t have to write 20 web stories at the Olympics – I just do. It’s probably better for my survival in the business and it’s fun.

The tug-of-war between the web and the magazine is still subtle. The credo is still that the magazine comes first. There would be no website without the magazine. Or it would be a lesser entity. The brand name of SI still carries a lot of weight. Circulation is still 3.1 million, and it made $125 million last year. It’s still a powerful force regardless of where it is in history, even if it’s closer to its end than beginning. It’s still a force to be reckoned with.

(SMG thanks Tim Layden for his cooperation)

An Interview with Adam Lazarus

Adam Lazarus: Interviewed on September 20, 2011

Position: Author, Featured Columnist for Bleacher Report

Born: 1982, Cleveland

Education: Kenyon College, 2004 BA in English; Carnegie Mellon, 2006, Masters in Professional Writing

Career: “After finishing my first book, Chasing Greatness
, I freelanced for Atlanta Journal Constitution in 2009 then moved on to Bleacher Report in 2010.”

Personal: “Husband to my lovely wife Sarah and father to our boxer Hannah.”

Favorite restaurant (home): Greenwoods, Roswell, GA. “They specialize in Southern cooking so it was a different type of food than I wasn’t used to when we moved here in 2009. But my wife and in-laws have been going there for years and when they took me I realized what they were always raving about. It’s delicious: I love their meatloaf. Best of all, the portions are ridiculously huge.”

Favorite restaurant (away): Abay, Pittsburgh, PA. “Abay is an Ethiopian restaurant in Shadyside that my wife and I went to for many of our early dates, so there is naturally a sentimental place in my heart for it. I am usually very picky about any food that doesn’t come via the Drive-Thru, but Abay has so many different flavors and such a unique feel that I love it. Plus you are actually encouraged to eat everything with your hands so that was an added bonus.”

Favorite hotel: Renaissance Waverly, Atlanta, GA. “I don’t stay in many hotels, but since my wife and I were married at the Waverly and all of our family and friends shared the day with us there, it’s my favorite.”

Author of: Super Bowl Monday: The New York Giants, The Buffalo Bills, and Super Bowl XXV, (2011): Chasing Greatness: Johnny Miller, Arnold Palmer, and the Miracle at Oakmont, (2010).

Q. Why “Super Bowl Monday
” – what drew you to the subject?

A. Super Bowl Monday: That was arguably the greatest Super Bowl ever played—closest final score, four lead-changes, came down to the last second—but the cloud of the first Persian Gulf War hanging over the game made it such a poignant moment for Americans as well as the soldiers and sailors carrying out Operation Desert Storm.

And considering how many NFL legends were competing that day in front of the “Silver Anniversary team”—an All-Time Super Bowl lineup featuring Joe Montana, Jerry Rice, Mean Joe Greene, Mike Singletary, etc was voted on by the fans and honored on the field before the game—it was a great way to celebrate 25 years of the Super Bowl.

I also wanted to retell the story of that entire Super Bowl. Most casual fans remember Scott Norwood’s “Wide Right,” but to boil that game and those to teams down to the outcome of a single play really does neither one justice. It belittles the Giants victory to think that Norwood’s miss “gave them” the game, it ruins the Bills magical season to paint him solely as responsible for the loss, and it diminishes an incredible contest that was so hard fought and so competitive from the first play to the last. But more than anything it’s an unfair burden for Norwood and the Bills franchise to carry. Perhaps the noblest moment in the book isn’t the Giants win or Thurman Thomas’ fourth quarter touchdown: it’s how Norwood and his teammates responded to the missed kick immediately after the game.

Q. How did you research it?

A. I did interviews with the game’s stars and key personnel like Bill Parcells, Bill Belichick, Jim Kelly, Marv Levy, Bruce Smith, Jeff Hostetler, and many more, but I also relied heavily on newspaper archives from that era. I read hundreds of New York Times, Newsday, Buffalo News, Los Angeles Times, Sports Illustrated, etc. articles. That was a great way to pinpoint specifics that occasionally fade over the years: two decades is a long time.

In some cases, the 1991 version of Jeff Hostetler or Bruce Smith had a better perspective on something than the 2010 version. By using their quotes from that time period instead of today, I was able to tell the story of a play or a game more thoroughly. I also collected tons of resources from the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the NFL Films offices. Both of those trips to Canton and Mt. Laurel unearthed great treasures that I would not have found in the newspapers or even with interviews.

Q. What is the narrative structure you chose and why?

A. I wanted to do a great deal of background work on the game’s key people (Hostetler, Kelly, Ottis Anderson, Parcells, etc) so there are many places where I pull back and include biography. That means the book isn’t completely chronological from page 1 to page 300. But I thought this was the best way to build up the characters so that by the time the reader does get to Super Bowl XXV in the middle chapters, they know what got the players there and how – ironically – many of their paths had crossed before.

Along the same lines, there are some places where I do “Super Bowl Flashbacks.” Not only was that the 25^th anniversary Super Bowl and many of the game’s past heroes were honored, but in the Giants-Bills game, there are three very unique moments of Super Bowl déjà vu and I point those out at key moments in the book. The best example is Scott Norwood’s kick at the end of Super Bowl XXV paralleling Jim O’Brien’s kick at the end of Super Bowl V. Obviously those two field goal attempts had different outcomes, but they made for a nice juxtaposition. The other two “flashbacks” are much more subtle but no less intriguing and I did more than simply point out the parallel. In the case of the O’Brien/Norwood parallel, I went back and spoke to O’Brien and some of his teammates in Super Bowl V to recreate the moment and how that one kick changed his life.

Q. Biggest challenge on a reporting/writing level?

A. Collecting the interviews with the key people was challenging and in some cases a long struggle. But it was certainly worth it in terms of adding “behind the scenes” material. Bill Parcells was probably the best example of this. I chased after him for a long time but when I finally spoke with him, he shared so much detail that it really made the book richer. As important as the newspaper research was—collecting quotes from the moment or specific details that have been lost in memory over time—the only way I learned what Parcells or Jeff Hostetler or Darryl Talley was thinking that day was by talking directly with them.

Q. Biggest challenge on a personal level?

A. The Gulf War and Operation Desert Storm is one of the key elements of the book and where the book’s title is derived from: to the soldiers and sailors watching the game in the Gulf, it was already Monday morning, not Sunday night when the Bills and Giants kicked off. So I wanted to tell that part of the story. Not only because of the patriotism on display that day in Tampa – Whitney Houston’s national anthem – but because there were a few players with family members serving and there was a great deal of uneasiness in the nation at that time.

So I chose to give a timeline of the war and told a few stories about soldiers and sailors watching the game – there’s a great picture in the book of a handful of soldiers watching the television, one with a machine gun strapped across his back – and included their feelings about whether or not the game should be played and what it meant to them.

But I struggled with not going too far down that road. For one, this is intended to be a sports book and Jim Kelly, Jeff Hostetler, Thurman Thomas, etc, are the book’s stars. Furthermore, I didn’t want to trivialize the situation and suggest that the Super Bowl was some sort of cure-all for the painful time that so many American were going through—for some it was not a “welcomed distraction”.

And finally I am not a military historian nor am I a veteran so I didn’t want to write a “War Book” when I don’t have that type of expertise. Finding the right balance was difficult, but I believe I achieved it.

Q. How do you envision your career going forward?

A. My agent just sold my next book—another 1980s/1990s NFL story—to Da Capo and it will come out in September 2012, so that’s the next step. I’d ultimately like to get to the point where I can churn out a new sports biography or narrative every few years, while also writing thoughtful in-depth profiles on today’s sporting landscape. I tend to think of myself more as a sports – true – storyteller rather than a reporter or columnist or writer. There’s always drama and intrigue and suspense in the sports world and I try to go out and find it.

Q. Tell us about your work with Bleacher Report and its role in your career.

A. Bleacher Report is a wonderful platform and not just because it helps develop new writers, something that the more conventional outlets don’t really do. Mostly, it has really helped me hone more opinions on the world or sports. Sometimes it’s great to “report” on events or issues in the NFL or Major League Baseball, but to actually voice an opinion about what your seeing was something I didn’t have many opportunities to do prior to Bleacher Report. People who have been watching sports all their lives, like the people at Bleacher Report, are not only entitled to opinions about what they see, but they are justified in expressing them: they/we know a lot about the games and usually offer unique and enlightened views.

Q. Why do mainstream sports media dump on Bleacher Report and why shouldn’t it?

A. Well, I think there is much less criticism now than there used to be–Bleacher Report has been great at adapting and improving constantly. And the best example of that is that they no longer have an “open door policy.” Not just anyone can write for Bleacher Report anymore and that’s helped really increase the quality across the board. But I think part of the criticism was the fact that Bleacher Report writers don’t have the same level of access as mainstream outlets so the viewpoint was seen as a bit distant and therefore less valued. In some cases I understood that, but just because you aren’t in the press box or the locker room doesn’t mean your viewpoint is worthless. I think Bleacher Report’s main goal is to speak more as a voice for the fans (hence the name) and that can be achieved by watching the games on TV or keeping in line with the newspapers/internet/TV.

Q. How does your Bleacher Report work dovetail with your authorship of books, if at all?

A. You know to be honest, they don’t really dove tail at all, and that’s a good thing in my opinion. When I’m writing for Bleacher Report it’s almost always about today’s NFL. My books–this Super Bowl XXV one and my next one, which centers on the 49ers dynasty–are about the past. I love both today’s NFL and the “historical” NFL equally so I get to work in both on a weekly basis. And my books are always about storytelling and building up a story, developing the characters–even though they are non-fiction that’s essential.

Bleacher Report is a different type of style, more about informing the reader about what’s going on in the sports world and offering commentary on that.

(SMG thanks Adam Lazarus for his cooperation)

An Interview with Bob Ley

“We do OTL because we fill an important part of the ESPN equation – which is asking people to take their brains out for a walk. We do it in a way that respects people – it’s not a top 10 list or a highlights show – those things are entertaining but this is different. We do substance…”

“We have frank and animated debates internally about who to bring on. That guy’s a big name but that guy’s a better speaker. What captivates an audience? I’m a firm believer that in 20 seconds you either establish credibility with an audience or you don’t.”

“There are perceived issues, different philosophies between ESPN’s entertainment side and journalism side, and between the business side and journalism side. But there is a Berlin Wall that is not coming down. Business interests do not dictate our news operation. Which is not to say the news side is not aware that our network has business partners.”

“You want to make sure you know your material and know where you want to go to get this done. Fatigue can be more of a question, particularly on Sunday morning when I’m up at 4 a.m., and I’ve got SportsCenter and Outside the Lines. The twin orbs of my brain are swirling in opposite directions at the same time.”

Bob Ley: Interviewed on December 18, 2006

Position: host, Outside the Lines; anchor, SportsCenter, ESPN

Born: 1955, Perth Amboy, NJ

Education: Seton Hall, 1976, communications

Career: WOR Radio, NY, 1976; Suburban Cablevision, East Orange, NJ, 77-79; New York Cosmos p.a. announcer 1979; ESPN 79 –

Personal: married, (Barbara), two daughters

Favorite restaurant (home): Landing Zone, Harwinton, Ct. “a little hole in the wall near the airstrip – noveau American eclectic cuisine – biker guys sitting at the bar – 212s sitting at tables”

Favorite restaurant (away): Tuscany, Bridgeport, Ct. “white lace Italian – if you have an outstanding warrant sit with your back to the door”

Favorite hotel: Mandarin Oriental, NYC “stayed there for ESPN’s 25^th anniversary– plasma HD in the rooms – you gotta love it”

Q. You are known for being an artful interviewer – is there an art to asking a tough question?

A. ESPN brought in a guy – John Sawatsky – who was hired to do nothing but teach people how to conduct interviews and ask questions. I was in the first group – a four-day 40-hour seminar. Go to the NPR website – they did a story on “All Things Considered” about him.

I learned a number of things. The problem is learning the classic precepts and applying them on live TV. Most one-on-one interviews are not longer than four minutes – you want to follow up but not slow the show down. It requires adaptation. Even sideline reporters – the art is in asking a direct question to provoke a good answer – you’ve got to move right into it. You’ve got to ask it in a neutral sense in such a way that it moves the answer in the right direction. “Why did you warn him about going into the paint?” Why and how are the easy questions that hopefully can provoke an illuminating answer. The problem is that the world has become such a media-schooled place. People coming on (air) have been prepped – everybody has their force field on.

Q. You interviewed the elder President Bush a year after Katrina – one account said you asked him if his son deserved blame for the aftermath?

A. The Bush 41 question I recall was, “For leaders of the country, at all levels, what is the great lesson of Katrina?”

I’ve spent a lot of time with 41 in the past and with 43 and I know that 41 does not like to talk about 43 for a variety of reasons. There had been $100 million appropriated for Katrina relief and I was down there and didn’t see a lot of it at work – where the hell is that money going? If you read Doug Brinkley’s book – for a historian it’s full of anger but it’s factual too and you can weed out the opinion and fact. The book kills (New Orleans mayor Ray) Nagin and (Louisiana Governor Kathleen) Blanco doesn’t come out well, nor does (Homeland Security Secretary) Michael Chertoff.

Q. Sawatsky talks about asking “open-ended” rather than “close-ended” questions – and asking questions to elicit information rather than to prove a point – and persisting when necessary.

A. John is a tremendously intelligent man, a gifted reporter in his own right, and he’s raised the bar on interviewing no doubt. (His point about) persisting is interesting – because the demands and realities of live TV – and not just time, but the concerns of losing an audience in a 500 channel world – make that a calculated risk in any format except (Tim) Russert’s or Charlie Rose’s.

Q. Any memorably tough interviews?

A. I do recall interviewing David Stern live during the 2001 All-Star break, when the issues of NBA players disrespecting the game/image were paramount – those were the pre-Lebron and Carmelo days. Our piece included Nate McMillan, then coach of Seattle, basically calling out young players, as well as a veteran player. Stern was, to borrow from Queen Victoria, not amused – and I’ve known David for years. I’d like to think there is a good reservoir of mutual respect there. And as he criticized the report I simply asked him, “Commissioner, what specifically is inaccurate about that report?”

Q. Why does ESPN do Outside the Lines?

A. Do you mean why does it still, or why does it do it? That’s a question many people feel the need to ask. I know why originally – there was nothing like it since Sports Beat had moved on. It started in 1990 as an episodic hourly show, then it became a monthly through the 90s and then in April 200 it became a weekly show to the not inconsiderable amount of skepticism internally about its chance of survival. It became a nightly in May 2003 and a daily show in July 2006.

We do OTL because we fill an important part of the ESPN equation – which is asking people to take their brains out for a walk. We do it in a way that respects people – it’s not a top 10 list or a highlights show – those things are entertaining but this is different. We do substance – good journalism – we find good stories and macro issues and present them well because nobody is going to watch if we don’t. In the hyper-competitive environment of 500 channels you better give somebody a compelling reason not to hit the clicker, which is part of the male chromosome and I think our network has more high-testosterone males watching than anybody else. So it’s a challenge to hold those viewers. We’ve figured out a proven form to present a good story and hold our audience.

Q. Does ESPN do OTL to satisfy a journalistic obligation?

A. Inherent in that question is an inference – and I’m not saying you are, but one might say there is a lot of that going on elsewhere, and I would not necessarily agree with anybody who would say that.

I remember when we were building this place and we were the young Engine That Could and everybody loved us – we were the network everybody gravitated to because we were the new kids on the block. Now we get to the top of the mountain – we are acquired by Disney – and we’re not so much a network as a brand. We’re an international entertainment brand and we have more viewers around the world than domestically. So now that you’re on top what’s the natural American inclination – you take shots at the guy on top – it’s a chic thing to do.

Inherent in that question is a criticism that we don’t do journalism, and that’s simply not the case. Yesterday morning on ESPN News (correspondent) Chris Sheridan was being interviewed on the Knicks fight and he gave a tidbit about (Knicks coach) Isaiah (Thomas) talking to ‘Melo (Carmelo Anthony) before the foul – saying ‘I wouldn’t go into the paint – it’s not a good idea’. That’s now the focus of the league investigation and we had it yesterday morning.

There’s a pretty good body of journalism being done on the network. Some of the longer-form features being produced are evocative and telling. SportsCenter, in its 60 or 90 minutes, does a good job of encapsulating and highlighting the news and our anchors do their jobs extremely well.

That said, there is an obligation on all the shows here, and incumbent upon us, to deliver a number. Ted Koppel said this in the Times about ABC, “It’s not a public interest corporation – it’s publicly owned.” Nightline had to turn a profit. His biggest rating was a show with Tammy Faye and Jim Bakker, which generated the coin to allow him to go to Israel to do a town meeting – that’s the tradeoff.

Outside the Lines as a corporate entity must carry its own weight. Incumbent on us is doing shows that appeal to people – it’s no different than the New York Times watching its circulation numbers.

Q. Do you worry about OTL ratings?

A. Do we sit in the corner and whimper and ring our hands – no. Are we cognizant of the need to present an appealing show – yes. How do we tell the story of Marvin Harrison? How do we get inside this enigmatic spectacular somewhat reclusive Hall of Fame quality receiver? Maybe it’s not necessary to do that show a day before the Bengals play the Colts on Monday night, but if it’s a good story we’re going to mention that. We are accused of being over-promotional – and I take the fifth on that – but that’s what keeps us going.

The very success of the whole network allows OTL to continue and be a showcase. Sunday morning at 9:30 is the Rodeo Drive of network time slots, and I don’t want to say that too loud because there’s not a lot of competition for what we do. It’s Sports Reporters and us, and if we do our job well we’ve got 300 million Americans all to ourselves.

The afternoon show, by comparison, is at a hyper-competitive time.

Q. Are OTL ratings adequate?

A. Absolutely. Between SportsCenter and Sports Reporters on Sunday morning it more than holds its own. Weekdays it’s not nearly as large a number, but more often than not it raises the ratings of the show that precedes it.

This is not charity. We’re not some Ford Foundation show on PBS.

Q. What was the highest rated OTL show?

A. I believe it was on the Yankee-Red Sox rivalry – it happened to be on the day that Don Zimmer got into it with Pedro – that was a huge number for obvious reasons.

We’ve done shows on thorny topics like race – race is the great elephant in the living room, especially in sports. We’ve done some thoughtful shows on race that have done very well, and that’s encouraging. There’s a body of thought that while American’s demographic is changing white Americans still predominate and white Americans don’t want to have this uncomfortable conversation about race. But our shows have done well because sport presents a unique opportunity to have this conversation that resonates to other parts of America.

LZ Granderson wrote a piece for Page 2, about the HBO show ‘The Wire’ being a huge hit among black athletes – because it unstintingly presents a certain slice of black life in honest and human terms. The point is that when you work in sports you’ve got to understand the concept of diversity in your soul – and that applies to when you are thinking about stories who to talk to and how to make develop a story cognizant of this. We’ve got a term – ‘Rolladex suspects – meaning round up the usual suspects. Sometimes you have to say, wait a second, how can we do better?

There’s a constant dynamic on TV – we have frank and animated debates internally about who to bring on. That guys a big name but that guy’s a better speaker. What captivates an audience? I’m a firm believer that in 20 seconds you either establish credibility with an audience or you don’t. Either you know what you’re saying or you don’t. Putting together a good panel is a chemistry class – it takes a lot of behind-the-scenes thought. Live shows are even more difficult because you can’t edit. When you sit somebody down in front of a camera, with lights in his face, and ask him questions – it doesn’t come naturally to a lot of people. It’s an acquired skill.

Q. Granderson’s piece also was about homosexuality – about when a gay male athlete in a team sport will come out.

A. We have done a number of shows over the years on gay athletes, as far back as when we were only a monthly show. I’d estimate at least five shows, between a monthly, and some Sunday and daily/nightly shows. The great question has been – when will a male team athlete come out in the pros? And the reporting seems to be stuck there. I did a story with a young high school kid in a small Pennsylvania town who was basically run out of town for coming out. Wrenching.

Q. How large is the OTL staff?

A. That’s tough – I’m not sure I can conjure up a number. There’s a core group of about 15 and some rotate in and out. We also have freelance reporters and producers and we also utilize the resources of SportsCenter and they use our material. In some instances we take their features and repurpose it for our needs. And of course our research department is top of the line – they’ll research any number of concepts or fact-check something usually in 20 minutes.

Q. George Solomon, the ESPN ombudsman, has criticized the news operation in several general areas – that it overplays and over-covers sensational stories and that interviews need to be sharper and with tougher questions. Are those fair?

A. George was hired to do his column and I don’t disagree with a lot of things he says. But we do so much as a network and speak to so many different people in so many way – anybody who sits there as a parent or consumer and agrees with everything they see – you’d have to be on Kool-Aid. I don’t run the place – a lot of smart people do, some of whom are my friends, and they’re all very open about what we do. We hired George to do that column – I had him on my show to discuss the Bobby Knight ‘chin’ thing. Everybody is very open to dialogue on why we do certain things and why we should do some things differently – it’s a collaborative process.

Not that it’s a democracy nor should it be – it’s a business. In terms of dialogue the top guys listened to complaints about the ‘Bonds on Bonds’ show – which I was totally against. It all came out during a talent symposium in March at Bradley Airport. We had an honest, open and frank dialogue about the propriety of doing this – they didn’t shrink from it – they asked questions and considered all the viewpoints. It wasn’t like ‘We’re doing it this way and screw you.’ And ultimately they responded to our concerns.

Q. Is there tension between the entertainment and journalism sides at ESPN?

Sometimes questions arise. There are perceived issues, different philosophies between ESPN’s entertainment side and journalism side, and between the business side and journalism side. But there is a Berlin Wall that is not coming down. Business interests do not dictate our news operation. Which is not to say the news side is not aware that our network has business partners. We did a story developed by espn.com about NFL research into concussions – it was Peter Keating’s story. If you read it you know it raises serious questions about the NFL policy, but there was never a suggestion that we don’t do the story. We do vital business with the NFL. You let folks know it’s coming out on Sunday – if they want to let their folks know it’s their business. We just don’t want a colleague blind-sided at 10 a.m. Sunday morning. I’m not saying folks internally are always happy that the guys at OTL have done a particular story, but there’s never a suggestion it’s not something we should be doing.

Please understand that on a regular basis, at story conferences and management meetings, the boys upstairs are constantly updated on stories in development from all areas of the company – for reasons of editorial content, insuring an economy of labor, etc., – and in that mix is the education of all to any particularly sensitive story. So I can’t specifically say for sure how Peter’s story was brought to the attention of upper management – my boss is Vince Doria – but it was probably in the normal course of business. No badge of courage need be presented to anyone here.

Q. Didn’t the NFL exert pressure to cancel the “Playmakers” series?

A. It took a fair amount of stones to put that on to begin with. My understanding is that there were indications the NFL wasn’t happy about it before it went on, and even so it went on and lasted a full year. I don’t know if this is true, but I’ve read it in other media, that the company was approached by other entities to sell the rights of Playmakers – we could have made a lot of money and believe me we’re about making money – and we chose not to. You can take the contrarian view that ESPN folded like a bunch of lackeys, but it took something to put that on. By the way Tank Johnson, what’s fact and what’s fiction?

Q. ESPN’s impact on the sports culture is said to be negative – is that fair?

A. It started with the highlight phenomenon – and this goes back ten years now – the wallpapering of highlights contributed to the “me first – look at me” attitude. Maybe ten or twelve years ago there might have been some validity on that issue, but I can tell you first hand a lot of thought goes on about what goes on the air. We are the 800-pound sports gorilla that defines the daily discourse on sports, and I said this to Chris (Berman) on our 25^th special – with being a leader goes a great amount of responsibility. It is one we take seriously. I can speak for myself and the people I work with on a daily basis – we do take it seriously. I think parenthood helps you understand, and answering e-mails and phone calls helps you understand just how much responsibility we have.

The flip side is they give us a great forum. Sometimes we have to remind ourselves these are the jobs we wanted all of our lives. It gives us a podium.

You can positively affect things – if somebody doesn’t run out a ground ball and you report it – sometimes the facts alone are damning. I’m very happy we were the first to report this Isaiah thing. If somebody sent somebody out to commit a hard foul on one of the best players in the game that should be reported.

To assume our impact is always negative is somewhat unfair.

Q. Are you a sportscaster or a broadcaster?

A. I guess I’m a broadcaster. A sportscaster would be the Red Blazer in the white world of sports.

Q. Pardon?

A. That’s from the old Cheech and Chong song, “Basketball Jones.” A song on which, by the way, George Harrison and Carly Simon played in the band, and Michelle Phillips was a backup singer.

Q. Ever experience stage fright?

A. No, but you’re always on edge. You’re always driven by a fear of failure. One of the funniest things that happened to me was when we were doing a town meeting on ‘sportsmanship’ at Disney World, in 1997, before a live audience. We spent a couple hundred thousand dollars on this and put in a lot of work. With two minutes to air, I’m standing on my mark, my boss, Howard Katz, calls me over. He says, “Bob, don’t bleep it up.” I said, “Thanks Howard, I’ll try not to.” That was his way of loosening me up.

Stage fright is a Ralph Kramden thing. You want to make sure you know your material and know where you want to go to get this done. Fatigue can be more of a question, particularly on Sunday morning when I’m up at 4 a.m., and I’ve got SportsCenter and Outside the Lines. The twin orbs of my brain are swirling in opposite directions at the same time. Sometimes I’ll introduce a live piece on the SportsCenter set, and then turn to my computer and work on the 9:30 show. Even on the afternoon show I can be juggling two shows, or taking care of e-mails during a commercial.

Q. Who do you read?

A. Peggy Noonan – I wish I could write like her. Tom Friedman – though I don’t always agree with him, but he is a master of synthesizing the complex to the conversational. John LeCarre – he can construct such marvelous plots. I’m reading Dave Kindred’s “Sound and Fury” – we had Dave on for the anniversary of John Lennon’s death – he gave us the behind-the-scenes story of how Monday Night Football reported it. James Lee Burke – the novelist – who is painfully poetic.

Q. Who do you read in sports?

A. We get a daily clipping service. I don’t have a favorite columnist – I’m always driven to read out of necessity. The usual suspects – (Mike) Lupica (NY Daily News), Mike Penner (LA Times) – whether he writes a column or a story you know you’re getting good stuff. One of the troubles with the afternoon show is by the time I open the Wall Street Journal or USA Today it’s 8 p.m.

My day starts at 6. I open e-mail and click on live links and by the time you come up for air it’s dinner. I’m up at 6 to check the night note and see if the world has exploded. There’s a meeting at 8 and 10 a.m. and we’re on the air at 3:30. I come home and I’m working on the next day’s show. There’s always a piece to polish or something an associate producer has prepared. Right now I’m off for two weeks and my PDA is buzzing away and I’m fighting the Pavlovian urge to check it. I really don’t have a sense of an off day because of the need to stay current.

Q. On-air personalities you admire?

A. Bob Costas – I always enjoy him. I watched his Sportsman of the Year show – he’s always thoughtful. The world has changed – I used to watch the Voice of God at 6:30 – Cronkite or Brokaw or Jennings. We’re in a new media age – it’s interesting to watch Katie (Couric) try to establish herself. I like to watch my good friend Robin Roberts on Good Morning America.

Q. How did you get to ESPN?

A. I sent a tape after I got a call out of the blue from Scotty Connal – the original No. 2 guy in our company, with Chet Simmons. I’m not sure of Scotty’s exact title but he was a prince, and an icon in the industry. He offered me a job and at the same time I had an offer from New Jersey Public TV. I had 18 hours to choose. It was a tough call – like one of those countdown clocks to the NFL draft we put on. I was 24 when I had the offer from ESPN, and I took it.

Q. Good decision?

A. I think it worked out okay.

Q. Ever consider working elsewhere?

A. I’ve had a number of feelers over the year. The most serious was 10 years ago when CNN SI was beginning operations, and my contract was coming up at ESPN. We had very substantial conversations, but – like my choice between job openings in 1979 – I think I opted correctly.

(SMG thanks Bob Ley for his cooperation)

Q.The Atlanta Journal-Constitution criticized an OTL show about Braves first baseman Adam LaRoche using medication for ADD. The paper said OTL failed to point out that LaRoche’s improved hitting coincided with becoming a regular in the Braves lineup, and that it failed to point out that other major leaguers are using the medication. Your reaction?

A. The AJC’s reaction was rather surprising. My recollection is that we did mention other major leaguers using ADD drugs. I do recall we were startled at the volume of the criticism, and that the central issue of the LaRoche show was this: he was using a drug otherwise banned by baseball. We contrasted that, in our presentation, with the OTL exclusive earlier in the summer in which retired major leaguer David Segui said he used HgH with a doctor’s prescription, late in his career – and Segui ascribed incredble recuperative qualities to the drug.