S.I. A-Rod Story

What did you think of the story on A-Rod in the latest SI? Did you notice how many times the writer used the phrase, "I asked him."

 

I thought it was terrific. Verducci's earned the right to use first-person when he so chooses. I think that it works in this piece. I don't think he's doing it to toot his horn. Quite the opposite. I think when you're writing about someone as enigmatic as A-Rod, you may use first person on a story like this just to escape the burden of being an omnipotent narrator who knows all. The POV allows Verducci to readily admit he's human and as such can't fill in all the blanks.

Great detail about A-Rod twirling his wedding ring around his finger, and showing up at 1 a.m. in a perfectly pressed suit and tie when answering his hotel room door.

The only thing I thought about when reading to the end was that Verducci perhaps hadn't accounted for A-Rod's second-half resurgence, and kind of had to shoehorn that into a story about his struggles. Reminds me of writing a game on deadline, then the outcome changes in the last couple of minutes, and you have to find a way to polish everything else to fit that new truth.