Grantland

[JBill]

I've listened to two episodes of the Men in Blazers podcast (long commute), with Michael Davies and Roger Bennett, and it's very funny. Seems designed for new EPL fans, especially the first one, you can follow their discussion pretty easily and not get lost.

Grantland Network is currently No. 2 overall in itunes, probably helped a little by Simmons hosting the first one.

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

Reality TV League! Bad QB Fantasy League! Fall TV Cancellation Fantasy League!

Ve have vays of making you read these things! YOU MUST READ EVERYTHING!

 

[Rook05]

Do people like Dave Jacoby? I like listening to the BS Report but had to start ignoring the ones that involved him. His Grantland headlines seem to involve a lot of hateraid which I find to be tiring (look at how bad/stupid XYZ is!). Maybe it's my violent hatred of MTV-style reality TV, but I couldn't have less interest in his schtick.

 

[rglawyer]

Good piece today by Chris Jones on the psychological and physical strain of being a hockey enforcer framed around a long interview with Stu Grimson, who's certainly no grim reaper in "real life."

I'll be honest with you — it might be the hardest job in professional sports. I know I had a hard time playing that role. The threat of losing, the physical suffering, the humiliation of defeat — none of that is easy.

The Survivor

 

[BS_SoxFan]

Do people like Dave Jacoby? I like listening to the BS Report but had to start ignoring the ones that involved him. His Grantland headlines seem to involve a lot of hateraid which I find to be tiring (look at how bad/stupid XYZ is!). Maybe it's my violent hatred of MTV-style reality TV, but I couldn't have less interest in his schtick.

I like him, though I also enjoy some of the trashy reality TV (The Challenge, Jersey Shore, etc.) that he and Simmons usually discuss. Obviously his writing and podcasts aren't the most intellectually stimulating offerings that Grantland has, but they're entertaining and help to pass the time at work, the gym, walking to school, etc. It's never the first podcast I have to listen to and/or column I have to read, but he usually provides a couple laughs and I don't expect that much more from him.

 

[Fishercat]

Same here. I like Dave Jacoby because I like the trashy reality TV they watch and he's clearly the more sane of the group and more in tune with what's going on. If he's on the B.S. Report, I'll listen earlier than I would for other guests.

 

[Spacemans Bong]

That's probably a big part of it - my commute is a 30-40 minute drive to work, and I basically listen to either T&R or music the whole way. It's not just Grantland - I've never been sufficiently motivated to incorporate getting podcasts on a mobile device or whatever and making it part of my routine.

You're missing out. Podcasts are basically radio but with no commercials and usually, though not always, more stimulating content. Plus it's on demand, so instead of being stuck with Francesa talks horse racing, I can just dial up Francesa's Peter Gammons interview, or Joe Sheehan and Rany Jayzerali talking baseball at a far more cerebral level than any commercial radio station could.

 

[weeba]

You're missing out. Podcasts are basically radio but with no commercials and usually, though not always, more stimulating content. Plus it's on demand, so instead of being stuck with Francesa talks horse racing, I can just dial up Francesa's Peter Gammons interview, or Joe Sheehan and Rany Jayzerali talking baseball at a far more cerebral level than any commercial radio station could.

Ditto. If you're into the comedy scene, there are ton of good ones (Nerdist, WTF, Girl on Guy, Comedy Bang Bang)

 

[JimD]

Grantland was one of the 'sponsors' of this morning's Mike & Mike radio show. Greenberg pronounced it like 'Grantlin'.

 

[JimBoSox9]

You're missing out. Podcasts are basically radio but with no commercials and usually, though not always, more stimulating content. Plus it's on demand, so instead of being stuck with Francesa talks horse racing, I can just dial up Francesa's Peter Gammons interview, or Joe Sheehan and Rany Jayzerali talking baseball at a far more cerebral level than any commercial radio station could.

Ok, I'll bite. Meet me in the Tech forum.

 

[Kevin Jewkilis]

I kind of enjoyed the dispatch from the world of Division III football, though there is a certain irony about it. Maritime Marine Academy may be different, but at a school like Amherst, nobody young enough to know how to use a computer gives a shit about the football team. Maybe the alumni office will get permission from ESPN to mail copies out to all the really old alumni with a note, "See, they got good! Not until decades after you graduated, but they eventually got good!"

 

[BGrif21125]

I thought the Mayweather article today by Eric Raskin was well done.

Ring Magazine just announced major layoffs this past week, and a lot of longtime writers/editors (including Raskin, I believe) were dumped. Boxing would seem to be an area where Grantland could carve out a niche, if they were motivated to do so. It would entail covering more than just the big fights, however.

 

[BrazilianSoxFan]

Okay, this was funny:

When I was first approached by my friend Bill "The Sports Guy" Simmons to write a gambling blog for Grantland I was tickled pink. I mean c'mon — that voice of his is hilarious.
In all honesty I was excited about the opportunity but felt that before I took the gig I owed it to myself to at least do some research and find out what kind of guy Grantland Rice — the man for which this website was named — was. More importantly — how similar was he to the editor in chief of said website.

Here's what I found out.

Grantland Rice played football for Vanderbilt University. During his four years he accumulated a broken arm, four ribs torn from his spinal column, a broken collar bone and a broken shoulder blade. He continued on to track and field where he broke a big toe when he dropped a 16-pound hammer during a training session.

Bill Simmons's pickup basketball career was cut short 7 years ago after he suffered a back spasm while bending over to hit the pause button on a DVD player during his 1,000th viewing of Varsity Blues.

While working in Nashville, Rice used a telegraph wire hook-up from the ballpark with recruited telegraphers to relay game information in a bulletin-type style. This was seen as a useful device in important games to relay detailed information just moments after a big play was made.

While watching NCAA tournament play Simmons routinely tweets about the milkshakes he forces his wife to pick up on the other side of town.

Rice routinely compared sporting events and athletes to specific historical battles and soldiers in Greek mythology.

Simmons compares them to his favorite characters on Basketball Wives.

Rice associated with distinguished writers with distinguished names like Ring Lardner, Heywood Broun, Damon Runyon, W.O. McGeehan.

Simmons associates with grown men named JackO, J Bug, Henchman and The Blue Boy.

In 1901 Rice happily took a job for $5 a week writing for the Nashville Daily.

Each week Simmons spills more than $5 worth of caramel macchiato on his brand new Boston Bruins jersey.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying Grantland Rice wouldn't have liked Simmons. I'm saying he would've hated him. The truth is The Sports Guy has more in common with Condoleezza — than Grantland Rice.

http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-triangle/post/_/id/3847/cousin-sals-gambling-blog-week-1

 

[FungosWithJimy]

Good piece today by Chris Jones on the psychological and physical strain of being a hockey enforcer framed around a long interview with Stu Grimson, who's certainly no grim reaper in "real life."



The Survivor

I agree. This was a very good piece. I actually felt that it could have been longer and more detailed. But I'm nitpicking here.

 

[LTF]

I kind of enjoyed the dispatch from the world of Division III football, though there is a certain irony about it. Maritime Marine Academy may be different, but at a school like Amherst, nobody young enough to know how to use a computer gives a shit about the football team. Maybe the alumni office will get permission from ESPN to mail copies out to all the really old alumni with a note, "See, they got good! Not until decades after you graduated, but they eventually got good!"

I loved this piece. And I'm loving just about everything Klosterman has done for Grantland, which is saying much since previously I had never really paid attention to his work.

 

[DJnVa]

Grantland was one of the 'sponsors' of this morning's Mike & Mike radio show. Greenberg pronounced it like 'Grantlin'.

I thought that's how it was pronounced. At least that's how Red Smith pronounced it.

 

[Stu Nahan]

Wading through SG's NFL picks column this week has the reward of a small discussion of the NBA lockout.

Simmons

Speaking of catastrophes, I'm launching a new segment in the NFL picks column this season: the NBA Lockout Watch, sponsored by Anusol. That's right, Anusol, the cream you should buy for your itchy anus. If you're clawing at your anus like a bear trying to break through a camper's tent, it's time for Anusol. Anyway, here's this week's edition of the Anusol NBA Lockout Watch (feel free to skip four paragraphs to the next game) …

After wasting nearly the whole summer pointing fingers, leaking stories to reporters and doing everything except getting in a room and negotiating, Billy Hunter's side finally came down a little … and, of course, instead of just agreeing on a better revenue split (right now it's 57/43 for the players, but both sides know it will land somewhere around 51/49), four-year maxes for guaranteed contracts (easily achievable, and absolutely necessary because teams literally can't stop themselves from overpaying players and being crippled by their deals) and a slightly harder salary cap — three moves that would have gotten us 87 percent of the way there — a few of the newer owners (Cleveland's Dan Gilbert and Phoenix's Robert Sarver are the biggies) are now pushing for even more stuff and that's bogging everything down. This faction believes the players' side is crumbling because a few of the biggest NBA agents (Jeff Schwartz, Arn Tellem, etc.) lost faith in Hunter and are investigating the decertification process (which would be THE dumbest thing they could do). These owners don't just want to win this lockout, they want to take a hatchet to 65 years of progress by NBA players … who, by the way, did nothing wrong other than continue to cash in on the ridiculous contracts that owners kept giving them.

Let's take a step back and consider the stupidity of this. Sarver and Gilbert both overpaid for their teams and hope to blow up the system, then create a more favorable one that would cover up the fact that they overpaid for their teams. In Gilbert's case, he coddled LeBron for years, overpaid just about every player on his team (did Daniel Gibson write his deal himself?), showed no roster savvy whatsoever (his front office was really the Bizarro Sam Presti), crippled his own cap season after season, then flipped out when LeBron finally said, "I gotta get out of here, I need to play with better players"5 … and now he blames "the system" for what happened because there are apparently no mirrors in his house. Sarver overpaid for the Suns, realized it about a year later, then spent the next few years pinching pennies … which would have been fine if he didn't have a legitimate chance to win the title from 2005 to 2008 and also in 2010. He's the kind of guy who watched Steve Kerr build a team that came within a couple of breaks of making the 2010 Finals, then offered Kerr a pay cut. His fans hate him; hell, his own players hate him. When I made a few Sarver/Gilbert tweets yesterday, Steve Nash retweeted one of the anti-Sarver tweets.

Why do two owners with CLEAR AGENDAS like Sarver and Gilbert have any input here? It's a great question. The NFL had three of its best and most ruthless owners (Bob Kraft, Jerry Jones and Jerry Richardson) handling its lockout; the NBA has the likes of Sarver, Gilbert, New York's James Dolan and Minnesota's Glen Taylor involved. Have you watched how they run their teams? For god's sake, Taylor just splurged on a coach (Rick Adelman) who told him in no uncertain terms, "I am not answering to your current GM," so instead of firing that GM (David Kahn, the least respected GM in the league by a landslide), Taylor decided, "OK, you don't have to answer to him" AND KEPT BOTH GUYS!!!!!!!! And Dolan is Dolan — he's basically the train from Unstoppable at all times. Why should I expect those four owners to have great insight into solving something as complicated as a labor dispute?

And are we really missing games over this? You should have labor stoppages only because of real issues — like what we had in 1964, when the players nearly sat out the All-Star Game in Boston because they were being treated so badly, or in 1998, when the players were suddenly making so much money that the owners needed a better way to protect themselves. We're not even close to that. I can tell you right now where we're ending up: 51/49 split, four-year max deals, slightly harder cap. So effing get there already. Enough with the posturing. And by the way, both sides could mention the fans once in a while, or show at least a little urgency that they're about to blow all momentum from one of the best seasons in the history of the league. If they think anyone except for die-hard basketball fans will care that there's no NBA in October, November and December — when we'll be focused on the baseball playoffs, the NFL and college football — then they're even more delusional than I thought. I hate everybody in this. Seriously. Both sides make me want to throw up. That was your Anusol NBA Lockout Watch for this week. Back to football.

 

[Spacemans Bong]

Simmons missed an open goal there. Jerry Richardson was the prick to end all pricks in the NFL lockout, and Kraft and others basically shooed him out of the room so that the grown ups could negotiate.

 

[PBDWake]

Simmons missed an open goal there. Jerry Richardson was the prick to end all pricks in the NFL lockout, and Kraft and others basically shooed him out of the room so that the grown ups could negotiate.

That would sort of ruin the narrative he's been pushing since the Brady contract negotiations that Kraft is a ruthless, miserly dick.

 

[dolomite133]

ESPN continues to do Grantland no favors. That ad campaign is right up there with the one for Terriers. It speaks to the choir and does nothing to "expand the brand."

 

[PBDWake]

Wading through SG's NFL picks column this week has the reward of a small discussion of the NBA lockout.

Simmons

Interesting note with regard to this... Chris Broussard came out with a report that said the exact opposite of what Simmons is saying. Basically, it reported that Sarver is one of the more lenient owners, and the real hawk owners are a couple of the larger market teams unhappy with the current revenue sharing plan, so if they're going to be giving out a ton of money on the revenue sharing end, they want to keep costs down, both their own and the teams receiving the money, in order to maximize profit.

 

[Spacemans Bong]

A lot of you guys have mentioned this, but listening to the Grantland Network podcasts bought it to my ears.

Do these guys know Grantland Rice's name was pronounced grant-lin' and not grant-LAND? Obviously not. I've defended the name before but if its writers don't know how to say it then it should be something else.

 

[JBill]

Ring Magazine just announced major layoffs this past week, and a lot of longtime writers/editors (including Raskin, I believe) were dumped.

Phenomenal oral history today by Raskin on Hagler-Leonard, he talked to everyone.

I love these oral histories, they seem to be averaging one per month.

 

[NatetheGreat]

Daryl Morey's pieace struck me as little too handwringing. Basically he frets that the Moneyball movie will set up this caricature of a conflict between crusty old Joe Morgan-esque morons and a bunch of Ivy Whiz Kids, and that a lot of people who don't really know anything about the topic are gonna buy into it. But I don't think thats the case. First, because Brad Pitt is the champion of the "nerd side" here and he's about as far from a nerd caricature as you can get, but also because the concepts discussed in the book are pretty simple, and I'll wager they'll be even more simple in the film. "Getting on base matters more than what you look like in baseball" isn't really that hard a concept to grasp, even for people who don't know anything about the sport.

 

[Marciano490]

Phenomenal oral history today by Raskin on Hagler-Leonard, he talked to everyone.

I love these oral histories, they seem to be averaging one per month.

After training at Petronelli's for almost a decade, I was disappointed to not see any quotes from Goody in there (unless I missed them). Still, it was a great read. Now, if only Leonard would admit he lost that fight, badly...

 

[Shelterdog]

For some idiotic reason, the hipster football guy (John Brandon) gives book recommendations.

Today's rec: The Old Man and the Sea.

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7031829/tide-vs-gators-problem-uva-nice-steak-tucson

THANKS BRO! NEVER HEARD OF THAT ONE!

 

[JBill]

Was it Grantland linking to last night's gamethread that overwhelmed SoSH this morning? Thanks guys.

 

[cornwalls@6]

Maybe the single stupidest fucking essay that Grantland has posted to date. God, how can someone who clearly fancies himself a zietgeist-surfing hipster still be trotting out this tired, lame old saw?? Pink hats vs. true fans, really?? What's next, his article on how Wilco have become "dad rock"?? Jesus, do any of these lemmings actually have an original thought on anything??





http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7034858/f@#-guys

 

[Shelterdog]

Maybe the single stupidest fucking essay that Grantland has posted to date. God, how can someone who clearly fancies himself a zietgeist-surfing hipster still be trotting out this tired, lame old saw?? Pink hats vs. true fans, really?? What's next, his article on how Wilco have become "dad rock"?? Jesus, do any of these lemmings actually have an original thought on anything??

Well he is 30 years old so I'm sure he's an old diehard sox fan.

 

[JimBoSox9]

Was it Grantland linking to last night's gamethread that overwhelmed SoSH this morning? Thanks guys.

It almost has to be. I'd estimate a 99.929999% chance that it was the cause. The traffic volume differences between here and there are kilometers versus miliimeters. If 1 out of 50 readers of that article click through, I bet we're hosed. They edited the piece to remove the link and say we're down:

As a last little hurrah, here's a fascinating piece of Internet kitsch: Last night's game thread from the "Sons of Sam Horn" Red Sox message board. First, fair warning, beware the foul language. Start here, with Boston batting in the top of the ninth, and go page to page to witness the awful collapse of faith as their nightmare unfolds. Best or worst thing you'll read all day. (Eds note: Looks like the site is currently down. Sorry about that!)

On the brighter side, Jay Caspian Kang's short column was quite good, at once idolizing and poking fun at the perception of the pre-2004 Red Sox fanbase.

When I woke up this morning, I thought, "Hey, maybe this crushing defeat will kill off some of the Cowboy-Uppers and the Pink-Hatters and we'll be closer to the ideal mix of Red Sox fans: old angry drunk guys in bars, young angry drunk guys in bars, old and young angry drunk guys at Fenway who heckle Harvard-y fans and/or minorities, minorities who feel weird about being Sox fans, openly hate the city of Boston, and, as a result, secretly want the Sox to lose forever."

 

[Tartan]

On the brighter side, Jay Caspian Kang's short column was quite good, at once idolizing and poking fun at the perception of the pre-2004 Red Sox fanbase.

That article works best as a post-game stream of consciousness, I suppose, but it didn't really have a point or an original thought.

 

[The Social Chair]

I have strongly disliked everything I've read by Jay Caspian Kang. His writing on A Tribe Called Quest is still the worst thing that's been published on Grantland.

Klosterman's nostalgia piece today was a fun read.

 

[JimBoSox9]

YMMV, but I really think you guys may be missing the point of the Kang article. Equally likely - I'm reading into something that isn't there. Maybe he played that column straight. Given the lead, though, I don't think so.

 

[MyDaughterLovesTomGordon]

YMMV, but I really think you guys may be missing the point of the Kang article. Equally likely - I'm reading into something that isn't there. Maybe he played that column straight. Given the lead, though, I don't think so.

Oh, I TOTALLY think he was being 100 percent straight (sarcasm emoticon goes here):

Now that I'm getting old and my interest in sabermetrics (not to mention my job in sports media) has left me a cold, heartless shell of a human being who thinks only about all the injustice all those stupid BBWAA morons keep heaping on Tim Raines' doorstep...

I don't love his sense of humor, but I think the piece walked a nice line. There's a temptation, of course, for people like SoSHers to feel possessive of the Sox and feel like their pain is worse and their feelings matter more than those of the "pink hats," who came to the team when the success came. And it doesn't do any harm really to vent in that way on a message board or in a blog or to your buddies ... as long as you realize how ridiculous you actually are have some self-awareness.

The part JimBo quoted part of that, as is the sentences before:

First, we don't have to pretend to root for these assholes anymore. Second, the old kick-in-the-balls feeling is back! We get to go back to our favorite pastime: complaining about this shitty team and its shitty GM and what the fuck is wrong with Crawford and did you hear what this guy told me about what John Lackey did when he was at that bar in the Back Bay?

I don't think any of us missed how dead the board was this summer when the Sox were cruising and all was right in the world, and how active it became when everything started to go to shit. All of us are such huge Sox fans that the only time we want to write about them is when they suck. Makes sense to me.

 

[JBill]

Two good hockey/concussion columns.

One by Katie Baker, a timeline of the Crosby injury and rehab efforts:

Sidney Crosby's lost year

And a great piece by Ken Dryden:

Time for the NHL to get head smart

 

[PBDWake]

Has anyone bothered with "Friday Morning QB"? I found it this morning while poking around, as it exists to critique NBC's Thursday Night Comedy Lineup. And holy shit is Andy Greenwald either a tool, dumbass, or both. From the very first edition, we get this scathing little blurb on Community.

The hardest show on television to love (and, judging by the ratings, to watch) returned last night with its hackles raised, spitting and sputtering with meta references, half-hearted apologies, and the sour, self-aware aroma of a show expecting to be cancelled — and that somehow it’s all our fault. “We’re gonna finally be fine!” the cast — save Chevy Chase who either can’t be bothered or no one on staff is brave enough to ask him to sing — belted in an extended opening number, declaring their intentions to be less weird.

Except that the opening song number? The reason Chevy Chase wasn't in that number was because the sole purpose of that number was an expression of joy over Chevy Chase's character no longer being in the group of friends. There's a lot more dreck to be had, factual errors in his reviews, and some mean spirited cracks at nerds and fat jokes at Jon Goodman, but he apparently approaches this whole endeavour with the enthusiasm you'd expect out of a mandatory prison sentence.

 

[johnmd20]

I haven't read Grantland nearly as much as I thought I would. There is a lot of great stuff but it is difficult to find and the site design couldn't be worse. It's like the new facebook redesign, there is no timeline and no easy way to find things, it's just littered everywhere. And having not allowed comments was a huge mistake. Spam or not on the comments section, when I read a column I like or hate, I do like to check out occasional comments. NY Times has them, WS Journal has them, every blog has them, but Grantland doesn't have them? Who are they, the KGB, stifling information and discourse?

I am surprised they put so much money into this site and have a site design which was stolen from 2001.

I have liked Klosterman's stuff, as I always have. And I thought the MLB playoff previews were absolutely stellar, but I'm visiting the site every 3-4 days, not multiple times a day. I wasn't expecting more, but I was expecting better. Maybe the site design is causing me to miss the best columns but judging by this very inactive thread, I don't think I'm alone.

 

[PBDWake]

I agree, JMD. I don't know if it was this was their intention, but I was forced into it by necessity, but I basically just follow their twitter account and click whatever interesting comes across the feed. But 140 characters to grab me seems counter intuitive to the idea of long form writing.

 

[JBill]

I check it out every day, but I also rely on their twitter feed for the most part. Their main page is not a good setup for that much content, IMO.

They have comments on their FB page for every article, and someone asked them why they don't just move those over to the main site, like a lot of websites that require a FB login to comment. One of the editors responded that they were in the process of changing some design elements, so I hope that means they are going to redesign a lot. ESPN has spent a lot of money on advertising and the site has a ton of great writers and content, IMO, so it's a shame a lot of it gets lost in a confusing and cheap looking layout.

Edit: johnmd20, if you're looking for links, here are a few pieces I liked in the last week:

On WWE and Organized Labor
The Winter of Jerry West
What the Joker was doing Naked

 

[johnmd20]

I check it out every day, but I also rely on their twitter feed for the most part. Their main page is not a good setup for that much content, IMO.

They have comments on their FB page for every article, and someone asked them why they don't just move those over to the main site, like a lot of websites that require a FB login to comment. One of the editors responded that they were in the process of changing some design elements, so I hope that means they are going to redesign a lot. ESPN has spent a lot of money on advertising and the site has a ton of great writers and content, IMO, so it's a shame a lot of it gets lost in a confusing and cheap looking layout.

Edit: johnmd20, if you're looking for links, here are a few pieces I liked in the last week:

On WWE and Organized Labor
The Winter of Jerry West
What the Joker was doing Naked

You just wonder what they were thinking about when they originally designed the site. There aren't even dates on any of the columns, which is inconceivable to me. Yes, if you click on the column you get the date, but you would think they would list the dates on the home page.

I liked that WWE column, thanks very much for pointing it out, I hadn't seen it.

By the way, I am not saying Grantland's content has been poor, because it hasn't, there have been some great pieces and the volume is copious. But that volume becomes a burden because the site is challenging to navigate. This causes me to visit the site less.

And the comments thing is silly but it's not necessary to stifle discourse. Some of the best parts of reading columns online is seeing the reaction. Granted, this is more apt for sites like economist.com(comments are fantastic on this site) and nyt.com, because, for example, CBS Sportsline's commentary is atrocious,(as it is for sites like Marketwatch) but you would think Grantland would be interested in seeing what people thought. Then again, this is Simmons' baby and he doesn't very much like to hear what people think if they disagree with him in any way. He should change that, however. Allowing facebook postings is such a wimpy way of dealing with it.

 

[Shelterdog]

And the comments thing is silly but it's not necessary to stifle discourse.

IIRC, the plan is that they'll have a fixed number of paid subscribers-like a thousand-who are the only ones who can comment. Not sure when/if this actually gets rolled out.

 

[johnmd20]

IIRC, the plan is that they'll have a fixed number of paid subscribers-like a thousand-who are the only ones who can comment. Not sure when/if this actually gets rolled out.

Which is, uh, much worse. So only the chosen 1% can speak? I say OCCUPY GRANTLAND. :lol:

 

[dolomite133]

[Rant] Grantland has been a failure of marketing, design and conception.

THIS is what Bill Simmons wanted? A pretentiously named web site with no clear focus? Would it have killed him and ESPN just to allow for something along the line of "Bill Simmons SportsWorld" and let him have a column archive, new columns posts, web extras, video pieces featuring Bill and his famous friends, regular columns written by comics and humorists, a hot chick of the week and something to do with betting? Because that's his audience.

On the other hand, if you want to design a site featuring the highest quality sports writing, you don't build it around Bill Simmons, no matter how funny and popular and loved he is. Because he is simply not the best living American sports writer, or anything close to that. He is a widely liked sports-based humorist, plain and simple.

In closing, this site as it stands now is an unfocused, terribly laid out, confused mess. [/Rant]

 

[Infield Infidel]

IIRC, the plan is that they'll have a fixed number of paid subscribers-like a thousand-who are the only ones who can comment. Not sure when/if this actually gets rolled out.

Which is, uh, much worse. So only the chosen 1% can speak? I say OCCUPY GRANTLAND. :lol:

So you are complaining about a site limiting commenters to paid subscribers -- on a site that limits commenting to paid subscribers. Don't you think that raises the quality of commenting?

I don't know why you keep harping on it because, unlike WSJ or NYT, commenting on sports news web-sites are the dreck of the dreck. It's awful. Have you ever read comments on ESPN articles?

here's a sampling

Spoiler

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/conversation?gameId=311009108
are you kidding me? I.ve been booted 4 times.........cause the east is mad cause there NYY & Philly's have been knocked out? Wah Wah you cry babbies.....typical liberal slag.........we lost..so we'll mess it up for everyone..........you sore sport losers!

brewers beat cards because of home field advantage and get home field advantage in the world series man this year is just lining up for the brew crew cnt wait to buy the Milwaukee Brewers world series champs hat bahahahaha

When will ESPN's analysts take a stand and criticize the divisional series? Or the wild card system? Mediocre teams who get hot for a few days do not deserve to be playing in baseball's premeir event, the World Series, but under the current system this is usually what you get. The Cards are last year's Giants, or the 2008 Dodgers, or the 2007 Rockies, or the 2006 Tigers, or the 2003 Marlins, etc., all flawed frauds that faked their way to the Championship Series or World Series. Selig, your sport is a joke.

This is what happens when the Yankees don't win the World Series every year, baseball becomes a joke. Thank you for your great speech oh wise one. I bet you thought it was funny when the Rays got really hot and beat out the Red Sox on the last day though huh? Oh how your great logic is flawed.

where's pujols i thought he was the best

here's one from a column
http://espn.go.com/espn/conversations/_/id/7051062/there-lot-these-buffalo-bills

Spoiler

This is absurd. To think the Bills were...and are...going to continue to put up 30+ points a game, run through teams, make comeback wins every week, is just downright laughable. Are the Bills sitting at 3-1? Yes. Will the finish the season with just 1 loss...2 losses...3 losses? My guess is they chalk up 5 at minimum...possibly up towards 8 and then no one will talk about them the second half of the season. Writers like to jump on these bandwagon teams. If the Bills lose their next two no one will even mention them on a weekly basis any more.
Chalk the win up to the number one defense and the continued improvement and leadership in Dalton...WHO-DEY!

Wow, Gene. No mention that the Bengals have the number 1 Defense in the NFL. Nice biased reporting. Your problem is that you are one of the same reporters sucking the Bills off last week and now you can't believe that you spent so much time lavishing them with praise that you can't stand to be wrong the following week. Maybe the Bengals aren't relevant yet but I know who is not relevant and that is you Gene. Maybe you can tell everyone how awesome Aaron Rodgers and the Packers are this week. That would be big headline news coming from an amateur like you. Great reporting

This article is hilarious and the comments by fans afterward, even more so. You would have thought from reading the comments alone that this article rewrote the history books.
@CincyJoe81 - dude, build your own bridge and get yourself over it.

CincyJoe81
u mad bro???

Gene, YOU ARE A FOOL for writing such an article. It's actually a little childish and unruly. You must be from Buffalo and I bet you never played a competitive sport in your life. So therefore, you wouldnt know what it is like to WIN and be excited about it. You are a goon Gene!

Great article! Tough loss but might as well get that first loss out of the way so we can just focus on playing ball. I for one prefer that Bills to keep that underdog mentality that helped them comeback on two consecutive games. Bengals have a solid D, but I for one think they were weak when we would run slants into the middle. I would have liked to see our offense take advantage of that more than they did. Also I didn't see much running to the outside. Seemed everything was trying to go up the middle. I'm not familiar with Bengals D, but who would they have on the outside that would make us stick to the middle? Or was this more in reference to our O-line? Scott played great though! That man did not take his eyes off the ball on that pick for even one millisecond!

Anyone else think that given depth at secondary as soon as the Bills can, they should have McKelvin moved down to 3rd CB? Early in the game that mismatch between Green and him was noticed was a matter of time before he gave up a big play to Green.

If this is the kind of content you are missing, or that you look forward to at the end of an article, I don't know what to tell you. It's either people attacking or slurping the writer, attacking other commenters, or just nonsensical thoughts that have little to do with anything written. It adds almost nothing, and probably detracts from the column. Comments are fine if you think it will add to the discussion, and even if there is some good commenting, there's a lot of chaff to muddle through to get to the wheat

 

[Shelterdog]

So you are complaining about a site limiting commenters to paid subscribers -- on a site that limits commenting to paid subscribers. Don't you think that raises the quality of commenting?

I don't have a big problem with limiting the number of commentators, but I'm pretty skeptical about what BSG would do with it. I assume he'd block everyone who criticizes him (just like he blocks twitter followers who criticize him or just like he took his ball and when home from the site when SJH used facts and logic to destroy him). -

 

[Dehere]

[Rant] Grantland has been a failure of marketing, design and conception.

THIS is what Bill Simmons wanted? A pretentiously named web site with no clear focus? Would it have killed him and ESPN just to allow for something along the line of "Bill Simmons SportsWorld" and let him have a column archive, new columns posts, web extras, video pieces featuring Bill and his famous friends, regular columns written by comics and humorists, a hot chick of the week and something to do with betting? Because that's his audience.

On the other hand, if you want to design a site featuring the highest quality sports writing, you don't build it around Bill Simmons, no matter how funny and popular and loved he is. Because he is simply not the best living American sports writer, or anything close to that. He is a widely liked sports-based humorist, plain and simple.

In closing, this site as it stands now is an unfocused, terribly laid out, confused mess. [/Rant]

Well, to partly defend SImmons, 30 For 30 was also unfocused and built around BSG's ideas to at least some extent and it turned out to be arguably the best thing ESPN has ever done. Unfocused isn't inherently a bad thing in journalism - The New Yorker is unfocused, so is 60 Minutes, etc. - and Simmons has had a hand in at least one ambitious project that worked out really well.

I don't love Grantland either but it's simply because most of the writing just isn't very insightful or funny. To me it's mostly a failure of execution, not marketing, design, or concept.

 

[ethangl]

there is no timeline

You can find the link to the timeline where you normally find the link to a timeline: under the turtle. Duh.

http://www.grantland...caseyoumissedit

 

[JBill]

I don't have a big problem with limiting the number of commentators, but I'm pretty skeptical about what BSG would do with it. I assume he'd block everyone who criticizes him (just like he blocks twitter followers who criticize him or just like he took his ball and when home from the site when SJH used facts and logic to destroy him). -

I think this came out a few months ago, the limited number of commentators, and Simmons tweeted this in response:

sportsguy33 Bill Simmons
Wow some erroneous info out there on the new site already. Specifically: we're not having "exclusive" member message boards, that is wrong.

If they ever enable comments on the site itself, they will probably have some system that limits comments, or rates commentators, like Gawker does. But if they were going to do a "pay for play" deal, I think they would have done it already.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

So, Molly Lambert wrote a sixth-grade book report on "Boardwalk Empire"? What a star!

 

[Infield Infidel]

I'm so glad to see Chris Brown from SmartFootball writing for Grantland. If you like the ins-and-outs of football playcalling, both current and historical, he's got a damn near encyclopedic knowledge of the subject. I've been following SmartFootball for about a year, and seeing him stretch out in a longer format is worthwhile

Green Bay dig pattern

Strategic legacy of Al Davis


edit- but really, the biggest problem I have with the site is the copy-editing and final-eyeing. They put an NBA banner on the Green Bay story I linked above. How do you not catch that? I know it's not a big deal but it's rampant throughout the site, I see something like that every time I go to Grantland. It is a huge turn-off for me at least