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S.L. Price makes me hate myself

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by WaylonJennings, Dec 5, 2008.

  1. To me, the mark of a great writer is different than the barometer most might use. A lot of people are impressed by Gary Smith because he can take obscure, unknown topics and spin a great story. To me, that's easy. The hard part is taking someone well-known and over-covered and keep me turning the pages.

    I present Paul Pierce:

    http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1149382/index.htm
     
  2. Double Down

    Double Down Well-Known Member

    I've been saying for a better part of a year that, though Smith has the better overall body of work and is obviously one of the best -- if not the best -- we've ever had, RIGHT NOW Scott Price is the best feature writer at Sports Illustrated.
     
  3. Wonder when he's going to put out an anthology? I'd buy it for sure.

    He wrote in "Far Afield" that he was offered the Chicago Tribune columnist job eventually given to Mike Downey. I'm sure he would have been tremendous, but probably ultimately unsatisfied being confined to 800 words a pop.
     
  4. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Scott's one of the best ever. His stuff is also as good now as it was 20 years ago, unlike other SI writers (cough Rushin) (cough Reilly) who get cocky and lazy and start phoning it in.
     
  5. ditto
     
  6. Sly

    Sly Active Member

    Also, he probably wouldn't have been happy being pushed out the door to make room for Mariotti.
     
  7. I Digress

    I Digress Guest

    You what I liked best about the Price piece...the first word wasn't 'I'.... smith has tons of admirers here, that's cool, but it has always rubbed me wrong that he inserts himself in his stuff. there was a while back about the one about the stanford female hoops player that I had to read the beginning of three or four times before I could unwrap smith's intrusion and figure out what the story was about. And it was a heartwrenching story that I thought he did a great disservice to by writing about how it impacted him, or something like that... but the piece on Pierce was terrific. It was a good issue of SI.
     
  8. beardpuller

    beardpuller Active Member

    Guy really does the work, doesn't he? Talking to the estranged dad, the half-brother, George Karl. In this piece, the reporting made the writing.
     
  9. broadway joe

    broadway joe Guest

    You're probably right that he finds the column form too limiting, even though he has been a newspaper columnist. He seemed to be in the regular rotation of Point After writers when Reilly first left, but he hasn't done one in quite a while now.
     
  10. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    He would have been 10,000X better than Downey turned out to be.
     
  11. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Scott Price is tremendous. Works hard and has stayed on top of his game for all these years. Truly enjoyed the Pierce story.

    I'm not going to marvel at the work ethic too much, though. Combine his salary, his status within that operation in terms of job security --just my hunch-- and the time allowed to chase stories, and there are many people who would be able to show similar reporting work. That is not a knock in any way. But none of us deserves praise just because we avoid some temptations -- ``cocky and lazy and start phoning it in'' -- that lessers pros do not.
     
  12. Appgrad05

    Appgrad05 Active Member

    The Pierce story was great.
    All in all, probably my favorite SI in recent memory. Very nice Phelps story, an excellent story on the HS basketball game in Alabama and Gary's Stanton Barrett story is quality.
     
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