Wright Thompson's finest work ever

His "Love Letter to Southern Football" is tremendous.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/eticket/story?page=southernfootball&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab1pos1

 

Ah, yes, football in the South ... dressed up in sentimentality, yet again, with no mention of academic fraud at Auburn, Alabama paying for recruits in Memphis, and the SEC's absolute inability to follow NCAA rules, as extensively laid out by the AJC within the last few years.

Wright Thompson can do so much better.

(edited to remove over-the-top jerkiness)

 

I didn't say it was "fair and balanced" -- just well-written. (And that coming from someone who wouldn't give Wright a reach-around for sneezing random words onto a sheet of paper like Mizzou would)

 

Technically well-written? I guess, but it just didn't hold me, and I'm a guy who generally reads every word Wright Thompson writes.

You know what I'd much rather have read from Wright? A real hard look at why Alabama is comfortable paying Nick Saban tens of million to coach football when its secondary education system is one of the worst in the country?

 

Man... he is straight from the antebellums in The Lords of Discipline.

A little creepy to me.

 

As someone who grew up on the Big Ten, I find it appropriate that the photo ESPN chose to accompany this story is someone with a long instrument in their mouth... much like the prose...
Who the fuck cares how Georgia came up and beat a 4-6 Michigan team before a half full stadium 42 years ago... the Civil War is over, deal with it.

 

Couldn't get through the first five graphs. Then forced myself to. Resisted the urge to vomit from all the sugary syrup.

Wright, who could be one of the best ever, needs an editor with the guts to tell him when to stop, just stop, highlight it all, hit delete, and start over.

 

Mizzou wouldn't dream of doing it with this story; it praises the south, dontcha know...

 

Boring.

 

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing writers that an editor shouldn't exist.
Didn't Verbal Kint say that?

 

I got as far as "I missed football season." Even to that point it was typical Thompson overwritten tripe.
The guy has talent but when the hell is some editor going to tell him to dial it back three notches ...
Everything of his that gets posted here is lots of pretty words and turns of phrases that take you nowhere.

 

I am one of Wright's biggest defenders on the board, but this one was too much. Too many cliches. Too much prose.