Must reads for the younger generation...

I recommend "How To Be Lovely and Talented While Twittering" by Jessica DaSilva.

But seriously... Growing up a St. Louis brat, I loved the fine Cardinal books by Bob Broeg (who wrote/edited at the P-D). "Redbirds" is still the most colorful history of the team I've read, and "The Pilot Light and the Gashouse Gang" is good stuff about vintage baseball.

I remember being 14 and meeting Broeg at a book signing at Busch. He was the first guy I remember telling I wanted to be a sportswriter.

 

I'm just now reading "Three Nights In August" Some of Bissinger's turn of phrase and his colour is tremendous.

 

For quick inspiration, I turn to "BASW of the Century," though I doubt I'll ever write anything about Muhammad Ali.

 

"The Gay Talese Reader" is about as good as it gets.

Pat Jordan's recent collection is pretty good, too.

Mitch Albom has a few anthologies out there, which I would recommend if you're interested in developing a voice in your writing.

 

Frank Mankiewicz, shown in the documentary Gonzo, had this immortal line about HST's reports from back then: "he was the most accurate, but the least factual."

I'd include David Wolf's "Foul: The Connie Hawkins Story" to any list of "must read" sports books.

 

Heinz, for certain.

But to back up a step, Hemingway for the sheer power of plain writing.

And if it's not asking too much, the newbie could have read at least the previous week's worth of papers. At least a month's worth of sports sections, ideally.

 

Definitely. I got through the 800-page paperback in 3-4 days.

 

I recently dug out Brave New World and quickly realized I'd forgotten how twisted it was. The fact that something like that was written in the 30s fascinates me, especially since the first test tube baby wasn't even born until 1978.

 

George Plimpton "On Sports"

I'll second BASW of the Century. Bob Considine's take on the Louis-Schmeling fight is outstanding (I love his lede: 'Listen to this, buddy, for it comes from a guy whose palms are still wet, whose throat is still dry, and whose jaw is still agape from the utter shock of watching Joe Louis knock out Max Schmeling.')

 

Young Gentlemen, Young Ladies,

I presume that it's an anthology of piecework rather than book-length or magazine-type material that will be your compass for either a long career or imminent unemployment. If I'm going to look at stuff beyond the BASW and oft-repeated classics:

1. If you can find Press Box edited by Red Smith, pick it up. Not his own stuff but, as the jacket notes, his favorite sports stories by other folks. Heinz is in there (Red Grange) and Considine's Joe-Max piece, but also Gene Tunney writing about The Long Count ("As a kid on the West Side of New York City fooling around with boxing gloves, I had been, for some reason of temperament, more interested in dodging a blow than striking one.") and some names that didn't make it into the BASWotC. Funny, a guy who expressed little interest in basketball, he picks McPhee's Bradley's last game.

2. Likewise, look for Jim Cannon's Nobody Asked Me But ... Penguin did a reprint years back.

3. Standard Red Smith stuff. The Red Smith Reader. Strawberries in the Wintertime.

4. The Joy of Sport by Michael Novak. Not newspaper stuff, more of a philosophical and sociological questioning about sport's place in society ... it sounds like crap (by a guy at a conservative think-tank no less) but it's truly great.

YD&OHS, etc