Who’s your columnist/blogger/Tweeter #9
Your comment must be posted by 30 minutes before the Tuesday April 6 class.
You must include the URL of the column or blog item so that others can read it, too.
Your comment must be posted by 30 minutes before the Tuesday April 6 class.
You must include the URL of the column or blog item so that others can read it, too.
March 31st, 2010 at 9:34 pm
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/100330
This week Bill Simmons did a diary of WrestleMania XXVI.
Simmons was a wrestling fan when he was younger, but has since fallen off the bandwagon. Simmons uses humor to get his points across about certain wrestlers or announcers.
April 1st, 2010 at 6:31 pm
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writers/grant_wahl/04/01/wahl.mlsdps/index.html
This week Grant Wahl writes about changes to Major League Soccer’s salary cap rules. Now, teams have the option of having up to three designated players, whose salaries are exempt from the salary cap.
Wahl uses analytical skill in his rundown of the 13 designated players in league history. He also analyzed the potential impact the rule change will have, including the possibility of Thierry Henry playing for Red Bull New York.
April 3rd, 2010 at 10:56 am
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/01/AR2010040103267.html?sid=ST2010040203175
I was really impressed with the structure of Jenkins’ latest column, “For Tiger Woods, it’s a (big) rush to redemption as the Masters nears.”
After grilling Tiger for his insincerity and seemingly fake image of a “new” Tiger, Jenkins goes into a Tiger-statement-followed-by-a-Jenkins-rebuttal-of-how-his-statement-was-full-of-you-know-what structure. It flows easily to any reader, and at least from my perspective, it gets you revved up to being really disappointed with Tiger, just like Jenkins clearly is.
There’s one statement I have to comment on from Jenkin’s latest column, however…
“It’s not good for business if fans decide Woods’s ‘legendary focus’ is just compulsion, his ‘competitive fire’ is just epic selfishness, and his ‘quest for history’ is just insatiability.”
While I agree with Jenkins, I have to ask this question: What’s so WRONG with Tiger, AS AN ATHLETE, if his admirable mental strength on the golf course is based on him being an inherently selfish, compulsive person?
Sure, it wouldn’t be good for his image as a role model. But then again, if the guy is a darn good golf player, do we really need to focus on anything other than how he plays golf?
I would highly recommend that anyone who has ANY interest in Tiger read this column.
April 4th, 2010 at 11:26 am
http://goal.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/02/dream-realized-now-its-time-to-wake-up/
This week Yael Averbuch took over the blog again. I’ve already written about her in our previous blogs but she is on Sky Blue F.C (Professional Women’s Soccer team) and just helped lead them to a championship title.
She writes about watching the practices of the 1999 Women’s World Cup team and how amazing it is that the same women she watched then, are the ones that are subbing in for her now. Although she hates coming out of games, she takes it as an honor that these legends go in for her. She also writes about how to balance your life as an athlete or someone who just strives to be excellent in everything they do.
Her paragraphs are extremely lengthy, and some could probably be split into separate ones. However, journalism is not her profession, and her blogs are so interesting because they are speaking from personal experience. Also, she always writes about something I can completely relate to, so I actually look forward to reading her blogs more than Jack Bell’s. Maybe if he worked on her writing style a little it would be a dangerous duo.
Kimmy you would love it so check it out!
April 5th, 2010 at 4:00 pm
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2010/04/selig_says_nats_are_on_the_rig.html#comments
This week, Dan Steinberg a MASN interview with MLB commissioner Bud Selig at Nationals Park during the Phillies vs Nats game.
Selig said that the Nats are on the track for success in the future. Selig also stated that he is happy to have baseball is the nations capital and gives credit to Ted Lerner for his short term accomplishments for the team.
This interview ironically occurred when the Phillies build a 4-1 lead and the crowd was mostly Phillies fans.
April 5th, 2010 at 7:57 pm
http://sports.espn.go.com/chicago/mlb/columns/story?columnist=wojciechowski_gene&id=5048080
This week, Gene Wojciechowski wrote about the possibilities of the Chicago Cubs and Chicago White Sox performing well enough this season to make the MLB Playoffs.
Wojciechowski lists five reasons for each team, noting records and stats from last year, as well as star players and players who are expected to perform well.
I really liked how Wojciechowski finished both of his lists with “the unknowns,” which essentially lists things that both teams will have to do in order to make the playoffs when the season is over.
April 5th, 2010 at 11:00 pm
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-plaschke-tiger-woods-20100406,0,7613773.column
This week Bill Plaschke wrote about Tiger woods press conference where Tiger talked about his sex addiction and his workings with a doctor who has been accused of giving performance enhancing drugs.
In Plaschke’s usual style the paragraph lengths are very short with frequent quotes scattered throughout the story. This style adds to the enjoyment of the piece and also, punctuates his main points quite nicely.
April 5th, 2010 at 11:01 pm
In the posting above Woods should be capitalized in the first sentence.
April 6th, 2010 at 12:04 am
http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/articles/2010/04/05/echoes_of_2004_title_year_as_red_sox_bow_in/
This week Dan Shaugnessy wrote about opening day of baseball Sox vs. Yankees. The major thing I noticed in his article was his use of describing the event of opening night.
Of course, everyone knew that the Red Sox upset the yankees in a huge comeback. Yet Shaugnessy discussed who sang the National Anthem, who threw out the first pitch, who was at the game, and all the exciting happenings of opening night at Fenway.
He then went on to discuss the highlights of the game and how the Sox were able to take the win.
April 6th, 2010 at 12:28 am
http://www.skysports.com/opinion/story/0,25212,12038_6063292,00.html
Martin Tyler’s starting stat this week is on how history is not on Manchester United’s side as they go up against Bayern Munich as they have only beaten them once in 8 matchups. That once was in the 99′ Champions League Finals.
He also goes on to point out which players play the least amount of minutes on average before they score.
Other interesting facts he goes into are who scores the most goals against the top teams, what would the standings look like if the season started in December and who has won the FA Cup with two different teams.
April 6th, 2010 at 12:40 am
http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=5049570
This week, Rick Reilly writes about how the NCAA men’s basketball tournament shouldn’t be expanded to 96 teams and rather be kept the same with 64 teams entering the tournament.
Reilly argues that expanding something to encompass more doesn’t always make it better. Reilly uses his witty style or writing by giving examples of expansion that weren’t good such as: Germany, Star Wars, Octomom and Hydrogen.
I agree with Reilly in that expand the tournament to include more teams would make it so that team not deserving of a birth would be playing with teams that deserves the right to play in the tournament. March is already madding enough, we don’t want to cross over into March Insanity.
April 6th, 2010 at 1:01 am
http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/2010/04/05/opening-day/
This week Joe Posnanski wrote about opening days at athletic arenas, and his memories about his first opening day as a boy. He talked about how he would put so much thought into those opening days and that even though the baseball season last 162 games the most important was the first game because, in his mind, it determined the rest of the season. To this day, Joe still feels that one of the most important games to a baseball club is the opening day game.
I like Joe’s writing style because it is almost all personal information. He tells stories that make you feel like you where there and feel what he was feeling. He connects with his readers on a personal level, which is not something that you get from every sports journalist out there.
April 6th, 2010 at 1:07 am
http://www.boston.com/sports/colleges/mens_basketball/articles/2010/04/04/blue_devils_play_a_tune_on_mountaineers/
Bob Ryan had a couple new posts this week. I chose this one because it is a perfect example of what a PM lead should be. Usually, because is is so experienced and good at what he does, Ryan can get away with not sticking to a cookie cutter PM story. Most of his story’s are features on players or coaches.
Here, he writes about the Duke Blue Devils performance over West Virginia. He starts out with a great opening sentence about Duke possibly winning the National Championship. In his third paragraph, he has the who, what, when, and where along with the score. The sixt paragraph, cookie cutter style, has his first quote.
This column was interesting because it is different from how Ryan usually writes his columns. I still enjoyed it, though, because he still added his humor and character in the story (even thought I dislike Duke…A LOT).
April 6th, 2010 at 9:48 am
http://twitter.com/LavarArrington
This week LaVar Arrington spoke about what is being called one of the biggest trades in football history. Of course, what I’m talking about is Donovan McNabb coming to the Washington Redskins.
He also was discussing the NCAA National Championship and what it would mean for the Butler basketball program as well as mid majors across the country.
He also is able to promote his twitter account during his radio show to get listener to follow him.
April 6th, 2010 at 10:04 am
http://yankees.lhblogs.com/
This week Borden and Jennings talked about the Yankees opening game, obviously. They played the Red Sox, and although the game went downhill in the later innings, it was still an interesting game.
I liked how Jennings wrote, in detail, the most exciting moment of the game (double play by Jeter and Gardner). He used a quote by Jeter to help describe the moment.
Everything they wrote flowed, I didn’t have to stop and re-read something because it didn’t make sense. I paid close attention to the numbers and how they write them, so I don’t make the mistakes of writing numbers like I used to.
April 6th, 2010 at 10:57 am
http://www.thehockeynews.com/articles/32661-Campbells-Cuts-Olympic-participation-slowing-end-of-NHL-season.html
This week Ken Campbell is discussing the role of the NHL in the Olympics. He cites how the Olympics could have potentially hurt the NHL by wearing down its best players because this year maybe the first time in decades that the NHL has not had a 50 goal scorer.
He sets his argument by using examples of why the NHL should not be in the Olympics, and then counter argues this point with why the NHL should participate in the Olympics. Essentially playing devils advocate throughout the article, he allows the reader to see both sides and come to his or her own conclusion.
April 6th, 2010 at 1:01 pm
http://jay-mariotti.fanhouse.com/2010/03/31/ncaa-takes-phony-road-in-hoops-expansion-farce/
Jay this week talked about how with the possible expansion of the tournament coming up in the next few years, the NCAA is operating a very hypocritical farce that the NCAA is operating under. He mentions the fact that while the NCAA is perfectly willing to do this to Basketball, they want to leave the football system as is and that to him is very hypocritical.