Why write? The teacher learns the most by teaching. Learning accesses our better versions. The unbounded basketball universe offers broad arcs of individual and team development. Education demands critical thinking. Have a point of view and work to impact your audience. I enjoy great prose like The Boys in the Boat, In These Girls Hope Is a Muscle, Deep Survival, anything from David Halberstam. Good writing should please both the reader and the author.
Whom do I want as readers? I want as broad an audience as the subject warrants. An article on pick-and-roll defense doesn't merit flowery prose or change the world. I want more young people reading (anything), because reading changes us, evolves us. Reading has profound and differing effects on our brains.
Whom do I want to read? My favorite sports columnist is Christopher Gasper. He blends traditional with newer (analytics) journalism, and embraces controversy and the sport and society interplay. For example he writes about Harry Edwards, the prominent sociologist and Civil Rights leader, "few have done more than Harry Edwards, the renowned sociologist, civil rights activist, and inveterate advocate for the black athlete, to change the way athletes are viewed — not just as one-dimensional performers, but as three-dimensional people with beliefs."
What do readers want? As a reader, I want truth, authenticity, and content that enlightens me, excites my curiosity. "Is it true" that Abraham Lincoln and Robert E. Lee had a cordial relationship during the Civil War? If so, then why can't certain area colleges ever meet up? Knowing that Steve Kerr's father was an educator in the Middle East (and ultimately a terrorist victim), changes the prism of understanding Kerr. But because I'm not literally selling it's hard to know whether readers are "buying."
What do I enjoy writing? I want to see "both sides of the trade," to move beyond 'confirmation bias' and labels to insight. We know that Team A beat Team B because they scored more points. But why and how? How does the hero transcend ordinary or the villain descend into corruption? When is the rise or descent about values or principles instead of money? How can nice guys finish first and spread that ethos?
As always, thanks for reading...and thinking.
As always, thanks for reading...and thinking.