15 Terms Everyone in the sports writing Industry Should Know

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One of the reasons that many good writing about sports is nonfiction is that you can't contend with the inherent follow this link drama of this reality. Back in 1986, I sat with Roger Angell of The New Yorker and Peter Gammons from the Shea Stadium press box at the end of the World Series between the Mets and the Red Sox. I was 23, a cub reporter, paying careful attention not only to the games, but also to those two. Mr. Angell formed belles-lettres from ballplayers; his prose was a martini hauled across the page -- smooth and elegant, with juniper humor and distilled insights that created something you liked even more complicated in its own flavors. That October evening, it had been 68 years because the Red Sox last won the championship, during that time they'd become the indefatigable fatigables of the sport of baseball. Year after year they crept near victory, only to drop in style. As the bottom of the inning started, here they had been winning, 5 to 3, and the nearest yet, ahead 3 games to two. The press box was situated high over the area, requiring a visit to reach the degree. Throngs of all sportswriters were climbing to find that the Red Sox as they came indoors to celebrate the triumph. Mr. Angell and Mr. Gammons, nevertheless, did not move, so neither did . When the infamous ground ball rolled Bill Buckner's legs giving the game I had the feeling that we were the only three left up to see. It is as if they knew. Afterwards, when Mr. Angell told of the evening, he explained his graffiti-riven scorecard --"Wow!" -- before declaring"no shorthand could communicate the enormous, encompassing, supplicating sounds of that night, or the feeling of encroaching danger on the field." Much like Mr. Angell, most sportswriters are impassioned lovers, but of course writing about games necessitates distance. Mr. Holtzman wore sharp suits to the ballpark, and had eyebrows so thick they looked like a pair of nesting voles. (The recent unmasking of Joe Paterno makes his point concerning the"Godding up" of athletic figures.) Somewhere between the controversial style of Dick Young of The New York Daily News and multimillion-dollar contracts that were routine, matters swung the other way and sportswriters began to be perceived not as lovers but as antagonists from the athletes they cover. There is some truth to their complaints. Where it is okay to insult your own subjects, I can not think of different types of journalism. "It's just like a sex columnist who hates sex," is how a young N.F.L. coach I know believes about those covering his team.