Frank DeFord

I second the bobby knight article

 

I sat next to Deford at women's basketball at the 96 olympics and I count that as among the biggest thrill I had during that cursed event, right up there with seeing Michael Johnson run ahead of a flashbulb wave. The comments that he is exceedingly nice are spot on.

as for the 'do, I always thought it made him look like the editor from The Daily Planet ...

 

The Paulie Walnuts parallel remains irresistible.

 

Yes. Infrastructure. Used at their will.

 

Highly recommend each of Double Down's links, especially "The Boxer and the Blonde," which opens SI's Fifty Years of Great Writing. And I'll add the piece that closes it, "The Best There Ever Was".

He's speaking at Chautauqua at the end of June. I've already asked for a vacation day.

 

Sounds to me like they jumped out of a plane without a parachute. Somebody will catch me . . . won't they?

Call it "business". Call it "infrastructure." I call it stupid and hopelessly shortsighted.

 

The Toughest Coach There Ever Was was my favorite Deford piece. And I actually think he stole his look from Grandpa Munster.

 

Run, don't walk, to your local library and find a copy of Deford's "The World's Tallest Midget." It's a compilation of his best work.

And one of its stories, "The Toughest Coach There Ever Was," remains to this day my all-time favorite sports story. Which, as Deford is quick to credit, was based on a newspaper story written by the Clarion-Ledger's Rick Cleveland.

A co-worker in her early 30s saw Deford recently at a writers conference in Alabama. She came back in awe of the stories he told and has my copy of "Midget."

 

The reason why I went into writing was because of Deford.
He did a piece, actually it was a play for Sports Illustrated on the death of Nolan Richardson's daughter.
I dug around the SI vault to find the link and but it was in 1986 1988, I was 16 18 and I thought it was one of the most spectacular things ever.

Edit to add link:
http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1127093/index.htm

 

Distribution.

Minimal advertising.

Insane expenses.

Shuffle and deal.

 

"Got To Do Some Coachin'" I believe it was called.

 

I hate his NPR spots. But when Deford cares about his subject, there aren't many, if any, out there who are better...