Search Results for: sports

The Truth About Race, Religion, And The Honor Code At BYU

Longreads Pick

Over the past month, BYU has been held up as a symbol of all that is decent in college sports for its unsparing treatment of Brandon Davies, the African-American basketball player who violated the school’s honor code by reportedly having sex with his girlfriend. Davies was suspended shortly before the NCAA tournament, and a braying mainstream press lauded BYU for sticking to its principles. Sports Illustrated’s website even wondered if a values-driven, “non-hypocritical” BYU was “on the verge of becoming America’s team.” The reality isn’t so appealing.

Source: Deadspin
Published: Apr 15, 2011
Length: 18 minutes (4,658 words)

Gerald Marzorati: Five Longreads for Opening Day

Gerald Marzorati, a former editor of the New York Times Magazine, is an Assistant Managing Editor of the Times


“Early Innings,” by Roger Angell. (The New Yorker, Feb. 24, 1992) (sub. required)

America’s baseball belletrist here writes of how he came to love the game.

“The Silent Season of a Hero,” by Gay Talese. (Esquire, July 1966)

Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio? The author finds him in retirement, uneasily.

“The Streak of Streaks,” by Stephen Jay Gould. (The New York Review of Books, Aug. 18, 1988)

More DiMaggio, this from the renowned paleontologist and ponderer of evolution—contemplating, here, what it means to have a hot streak (i.e., to cheat death).

“Final Twist of the Drama,” by George Plimpton. (Sports Illustrated, April 22, 1974)

The boyishly witty inventor of field-level participatory journalism here is a careful observer—of everything surrounding Henry Aaron’s home-run that broke Babe Ruth’s lifetime record.

“Coach Fitz’s Management Theory,” by Michael Lewis. (The New York Times Magazine, March 28, 2004)

A piece I coaxed Michael to write—about his high-school baseball coach, and much, much more.

Princeton vs. UCLA: Reflections on a Historic Upset

Princeton vs. UCLA: Reflections on a Historic Upset

Princeton vs. UCLA: Reflections on a Historic Upset

Longreads Pick

I had a courtside seat for that game in Indianapolis, on the Princeton bench. I was a sophomore, small — too small, and slow — forward on that 1996 team. The only action I saw was the pregame layup lines. But countless times over the past 15 years, my former teammates and I have all had conversations, even with people we’ve just met, along these lines: “Oh yeah, you played basketball at Princeton? Were you in that team that beat UCLA?” “Yes.” “Man, I remember that game, I was at my frat house at Scranton going wild.” Or “I was at a sports bar in Baltimore,” or “I was in my den, screaming at the television.” People — and, believe me, not just Princeton or UCLA alums — know precisely where they were, what they were doing and what they were drinking (often alcohol) during that game.

Source: Time
Published: Mar 17, 2011
Length: 38 minutes (9,658 words)

motherjones:

Inside the “lavish,” “debauched” lifestyle of Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, the son of the dictator of Equatorial Guinea. Beyond the oil money, all-night parties, Playboy bunnies, and 15,000-square-foot Malibu mansion, there’s the larger question of whether Teodoro has used shell companies to funnel $100 million into the United States. Click here for deets and this week’s 4 other Longread story picks.

Programming note! Every week we team with the excellent Mother Jones to feature our Top 5 Longreads email. This week’s picks are from This Recording, Slate, Sports Illustrated, Foreign Policy and Minneapolis City Pages. Sign up to get the email every Friday.

'I'm Glad I Went to Prison'

‘I’m Glad I Went to Prison’

What Was He Thinking?

What Was He Thinking?

I Was Teenage Hockey Message Board Jailbait

Longreads Pick

If you Google hard enough, you can locate a thread deep within the Internet that was posted to the alt.sports.hockey.nhl.phila-flyers Usenet newsgroup on March 22, 2000. “Where oh where is Katie Baker??” reads the subject line. “What the hell happened to her?” says the post. The responses are mercifully cryptic. “Detention,” wrote one man. “Isn’t she trapped in Cambridge?” cracked another. “Harvard has a high school? :)” responded someone with the username Nastyflyersgirl. “Wow,” wrote one lady called Starr. “No one is safe with any secrets here. Like they say, the truth is bound to come out sooner or later.”

Source: Deadspin
Published: Jan 27, 2011
Length: 21 minutes (5,284 words)

The Worldwide Leader in Dong Shots

The Worldwide Leader in Dong Shots

The Case Against Lance Armstrong

The Case Against Lance Armstrong