Grantland

Rudi Fingers

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Nell Scovell's piece on being a correspondent for the Globe sports section in the early 80's is outstanding.

Nell Scovell said:
In September 1981, Vince Doria, editor of the Boston Globe sports page, called me up from the minors. Each year, the Globe hired four correspondents from local colleges to cover what was still called "schoolboy sports." Out of the blue, I got the nod. Next thing you know, I'm typing into a newfangled Atex system and breathing the same air as major league sportswriters Will McDonough, Bob Ryan, Michael Madden, Lesley Visser, Peter Gammons, and Leigh Montville. I quickly learned how to swear, guzzle lousy coffee, and find towns in Massachusetts that are still not on Google maps. I also received the best journalism advice of my life.

And I ignored it.
 

Leather

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It's fine until she just starts talking about herself for the last half.

More anecdotes, less about how great you are.
 

kobayashis bail bonds

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I couldn't help but notice that in that section Rudi Fingers quotes, the list of "major league sportswriters" didn't include Shaughnessy. Can somebody with a longer memory help me out? Is this a telling omission, or was Dan not yet with the Globe in September of 1981?

(I feel as though I remember him covering the Celtics in the early 80s, so I'm leaning toward "telling omission," but I just don't know for sure. And my Google-fu is failing me tonight.)
 

kobayashis bail bonds

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As it turns out, Wikipedia's not really as authoritative as I'd like it to be. For one thing, there's the gap between the 20-year claim on the one hand and the 1982 date as the Celtics beat reporter on the other. And that '82 date is awfully close to the time in question. This isn't to say that Wikipedia is entirely unreliable -- I think we're past that -- but it is to say that "trust, but verify" might be a better way to think about fine-grained questions than simply sticking to the Wiki.

So, I did some digging in the Globe online archives this AM, in case anyone was wondering the same thing I did. I looked for articles he wrote dating from 1/1980 to 12/1981. It looks as if the earliest he wrote with a "Globe Staff" byline is on 9/23/81, with regular work coming after that.

Now it looks like the answer was more complicated. Shaughnessy was there by the time Scovell describes. More than that, he arrived at roughly the same time she did. But, while he's no rookie reporter (he wrote for the Washington Star), he wasn't well-established in the Globe sports world. In terms of navigating the office, he may well have been closer to Sovell than to Ryan, Montville, Gammons or McDonough. And while he's already practicing the bad-vibe brigade style that we know him for (first few headlines* "Fenway Fever not Contagious" & "Another Near-Miss), he's probably too new to be notorious for it yet. Especially with all the great stuff coming out from Gammons et. al. in the Globe heyday.

In other words: Dan was there. But his omission from the list probably wasn't a slight (as much as I'd prefer to read it that way), but rather a reflection of seniority in the Globe at that time.

And there's the answer to a question that may only have interested me. But now you have it, too, just in case you were wondering.

---
*I know, he probably didn't write the headlines.
 

Leather

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That's a whole lotta' CHB right there!

Honestly, if he was a highly-regarded writer today, she probably would have mentioned him. I'm sure she's aware they overlapped, even slightly (I mean, she has to be, right?) but just decided not to mention him because she didn't really have to.
 
M

MentalDisabldLst

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Pretty good honkin' piece by Charlie Pierce predicting the decline and fall of the NCAA today: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7177921/the-beginning-end-ncaa.
I only hope that he ends up right.

One of the suggestions I liked in this regard came, I think, from TMQ:

- Colleges recruit players from high schools as normal
- Those players don't attend class or continue the charade that they are students
- They can get paid minor-league salaries, enough to live on
- After they exhaust their eligibility, and if and when their pro days are over, they have the unlimited right to come back to the college and get a 4-year education, for free.

Colleges still have teams of 18-to-22-year-olds. The athletes in the glamour sports aren't made to perpetuate the farce that they are "student-athletes". They get paid for their services. And they get something out of the relationship sooner or later beyond being farm-league fodder. They get a piece of the TV-revenue deals from the football-factory schools, in some small fashion, despite the fact that 98% of them will never see the field for a professional team. It lets schools be both institutions of learning and focal points for rapid sports fans, with minimal conflicts between the two: the profits from the latter (this time, revenue minus expenses) subsidize the former.
 

mandro ramtinez

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Chuck Klosterman has a piece today on his subjective list of the top 50 college basketball players ever. His preference for guys whose most notable basketball moments were in college leaves out guys like Russell, Havlicek, Oscar and Jordan. He ranks Khalid El-Amin 22nd, which strikes me as outrageous, but the list is so entangled in his own personal memories that it seems unnecessary to scream that he is wrong. I think by the standards Klosterman sets out, Pearl Washington is the biggest omission and Grant Hill deserves a spot since his college career was so outstanding and injuries robbed him of a shot to reach those heights in the NBA. Laettner is ranked 8th but I think he belongs in the top 5 at worst.

Klosterman's top 50
 

TheGazelle

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Chuck Klosterman has a piece today on his subjective list of the top 50 college basketball players ever. His preference for guys whose most notable basketball moments were in college leaves out guys like Russell, Havlicek, Oscar and Jordan. He ranks Khalid El-Amin 22nd, which strikes me as outrageous, but the list is so entangled in his own personal memories that it seems unnecessary to scream that he is wrong. I think by the standards Klosterman sets out, Pearl Washington is the biggest omission and Grant Hill deserves a spot since his college career was so outstanding and injuries robbed him of a shot to reach those heights in the NBA. Laettner is ranked 8th but I think he belongs in the top 5 at worst.

Klosterman's top 50

Although I agree the list has tons of structural problems, I'll defend Klosterman a little. The second bullet of his criteria for creating the list is "The individual's college career must be more meaningful than his pro career." That's why you don't see anyone that was great in the NBA (Ewing is another guy) on the list. In fact, it's the entire purpose of the list (although he does cheat and put Walton and Kareem on. I think Walton is defensible. Kareem is a joke).
 

mandro ramtinez

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It's clear that Klosterman is making a list of 50 players he really likes. I think my list, if I made one, would be very different but I still enjoyed reading Klosterman's take. I am glad he wrote it if only for a chance to think about actual basketball being played instead of this horrendous lockout.
 

Rocco Graziosa

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Chuck Klosterman has a piece today on his subjective list of the top 50 college basketball players ever. His preference for guys whose most notable basketball moments were in college leaves out guys like Russell, Havlicek, Oscar and Jordan. He ranks Khalid El-Amin 22nd, which strikes me as outrageous, but the list is so entangled in his own personal memories that it seems unnecessary to scream that he is wrong. I think by the standards Klosterman sets out, Pearl Washington is the biggest omission and Grant Hill deserves a spot since his college career was so outstanding and injuries robbed him of a shot to reach those heights in the NBA. Laettner is ranked 8th but I think he belongs in the top 5 at worst.

Klosterman's top 50

I enjoyed the piece but your right.......Laetner is at WORST a top 5. In fact I've had many a late night beer infused argument as to whether or not Laetner is THE best college player of all time. I'll tell you from experience, the argument isn't hard to make.

And just to set the record straight, I dispise Dook and HATED Laetner when he played.

Edit: One portion of Laetner's career that I realy enjoyed was his matchup with Chris Webber. It was obvious from the start that Webber despised Laenter and wanted desperately embarrass him like he just about every player he had faced. But he couldn't do it to Laetner. Laetner not only wasn't intimitated, he took it right to Webber, and to be honest I don't think that had ever happened to Webber to that point. Now thats not to say Webber didn't play well, but in the long run Laetner won the matchup both team wise and one on one.
 

Rusty Gate

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Jul 15, 2005
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Bill Bradley is another surprising omission. He wasn't a good enough pro to be excluded from the list. And Cazzie Russell, the Magic to Bradley's Bird, could also have made the list.
 

JBill

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http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7186103/why-players-cave

Liked this summary of the economics and what's at issue in the NBA lockout. Helpful for someone like me who is not really paying close attention.
 

Rook05

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I know he's a busy dude, but at least Page 2 got Bill to post his weekly column before the close of business EST. Seems weird to have your main traffic driver's work hit the site after most people are done with the week's rat race.
 

Mo's OBP

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It was a good column today though. RIP ALAN ARKIN
I did like the article, he clearly is invested emotionally in the subject, which helps the quality (if not the length). As someone his age, I totally know where his coming from, although I must say I never was tempted to watch Best Defense or Holy Man.
 

Clears Cleaver

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Aug 1, 2001
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I am finding myself spending more time on Grantland than any other site lately. And I avoid klostwrman and Molly. I love the low-brow stuff from cousin sal and jacoby. The kstie baker NHL stuff is good. The shorts are good. The soccer stuff is good. My only complaint is my complaint with most writing. It sometimes tries to be too hip or the writer tries too hard to be funny/clever and loses the narrative.

I have not tried the jalen rose podcasts yet. Anyone?
 

FungosWithJimy

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Although I agree the list has tons of structural problems, I'll defend Klosterman a little. The second bullet of his criteria for creating the list is "The individual's college career must be more meaningful than his pro career." That's why you don't see anyone that was great in the NBA (Ewing is another guy) on the list. In fact, it's the entire purpose of the list (although he does cheat and put Walton and Kareem on. I think Walton is defensible. Kareem is a joke).
Yeah I was about to go crazy about Tim Duncan, until I read that little bullet point.
 

SidelineCameras

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Michael Weinreb's piece about Penn State is well done. I feel bad for everyone from Penn State who's not guilty of anything but who is ashamed and won't ever be able to root for their team the same way again.
 

Gunfighter 09

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As the parent of a four year old daughter, I enjoyed this one:

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7208243/how-take-your-4-year-old-daughter-football-game
 

JBill

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Michael Weinreb's piece about Penn State is well done. I feel bad for everyone from Penn State who's not guilty of anything but who is ashamed and won't ever be able to root for their team the same way again.
He has another really good one today: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7215590/the-culture-unrest-penn-state

Really he's just about the only Penn State person I've seen that's been able to express his shame and sadness in a way that doesn't make me think they're all part of a Paterno cult. Grantland lucked out.
 

Marciano490

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Jane Leavy on Penn State is a must read.
It's definitely the most lyrically written thing I've ever read on ESPN, but she seemed to opportunistically and misleadingly potray her experience to try to create a lead-in for her story. Her friend was raped, but, in the end, she was in no way molested, raped or assaulted. It cheapens the experience of others to try to analyze their suffering through a personal lens that is no way properly calibrated to understand or empathize.
 

galumph

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It's definitely the most lyrically written thing I've ever read on ESPN, but she seemed to opportunistically and misleadingly potray her experience to try to create a lead-in for her story. Her friend was raped, but, in the end, she was in no way molested, raped or assaulted. It cheapens the experience of others to try to analyze their suffering through a personal lens that is no way properly calibrated to understand or empathize.
"I dragged my friend away from her assailant; when my assailant pinned me against a bed and professed her love, I hit her across the room and forever lost whatever fluency I had in French."

'Pinned me against a bed' by itself is at least simple assault, so you're wrong there. Doing it while 'professing her love' and after plying her (a minor) with alcohol is assault with sexual intent in almost any U.S. courtroom: at least 4th degree sexual assault ("Sexual contact with a person without the consent of that person or sexual intercourse with a person 16-18 years old.") and could be as high as a 2nd degree sexual assault depending on the interpretation of the teacher's husband's involvement ("sexual intercourse or sexual contact without consent while aided or abetted by one or more person").

Just because what Leavy wrote doesn't fit into your own personal definitions doesn't change what it was.
 

Leather

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"I dragged my friend away from her assailant; when my assailant pinned me against a bed and professed her love, I hit her across the room and forever lost whatever fluency I had in French."

'Pinned me against a bed' by itself is at least simple assault, so you're wrong there. Doing it while 'professing her love' and after plying her (a minor) with alcohol is assault with sexual intent in almost any U.S. courtroom: at least 4th degree sexual assault ("Sexual contact with a person without the consent of that person or sexual intercourse with a person 16-18 years old.") and could be as high as a 2nd degree sexual assault depending on the interpretation of the teacher's husband's involvement ("sexual intercourse or sexual contact without consent while aided or abetted by one or more person").

Just because what Leavy wrote doesn't fit into your own personal definitions doesn't change what it was.
Lol.

1) It's not assault, it's battery. At least in terms of tort law.
2) Good luck getting a courtroom to agree with that definition of sexual assault, or sexual contact.

I get your point, but you are very much overstating your case here. Are you just pulling these definitions off of wikipedia, or what?
 

galumph

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Lol.

1) It's not assault, it's battery. At least in terms of tort law.
2) Good luck getting a courtroom to agree with that definition of sexual assault, or sexual contact.

I get your point, but you are very much overstating your case here. Are you just pulling these definitions off of wikipedia, or what?
They come from multiple state statutes. The specific wording I used comes from the statutes of Minnesota and Wisconsin, but they are almost word for word duplicates of other state statutes as well.

Also, there is no such term as "sexual battery", only "sexual assault", which is why I used the word "assault" as a general term in this context. However I would argue that Leavy's writing about the fear of reprisal would lead the action towards her to be considered assault as well, and not just battery.
 

Leather

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They come from multiple state statutes. The specific wording I used comes from the statutes of Minnesota and Wisconsin, but they are almost word for word duplicates of other state statutes as well.

Also, there is no such term as "sexual battery", only "sexual assault", which is why I used the word "assault" as a general term in this context. However I would argue that Leavy's writing about the fear of reprisal would lead the action towards her to be considered assault as well, and not just battery.
It's not sexual assault because there was no sexual conduct. Therefore, those statutes do not apply. Hence, any charge would be under tort law (or a basic assault/battery statute) The applicable tort would be battery, which is generally defined as "an unwelcome touching."

If she was placed in imminent fear of physical danger to her person, she might also throw in a garden variety assault charge, if that jurisdiction does not merge that with battery.

All of this is, of course, irrelevant because the alleged attack took place in a foreign country.

For the record, I found her personal anecdote distracting and not pertinent. A 17 year old girl (an adult in many jurisdictions) getting hit on forcefully by a woman is not even in the same hemisphere as a 10 year old getting raped.
 

Spacemans Bong

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The only way that anecdote was remotely pertinent was if she used it as an example of what an institution should do, since it sounds like the nun fired the teacher before Leavy even left the country.

Otherwise it was just a sad story. I don't discount the trauma of a teacher coming on to you in a foreign country, but it's not even in the same hemisphere as the stuff Sandusky put his victims though.
 

johnmd20

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For the record, I found her personal anecdote distracting and not pertinent. A 17 year old girl (an adult in many jurisdictions) getting hit on forcefully by a woman is not even in the same hemisphere as a 10 year old getting raped.
Completely agree. She shoehorned that story in and it felt exploitative of everything that happened at Penn State.

LOOK WHAT HAPPENED TO ME, I RELATE. No you don't, Jane, no you don't at all.
 

Marciano490

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"I dragged my friend away from her assailant; when my assailant pinned me against a bed and professed her love, I hit her across the room and forever lost whatever fluency I had in French."

'Pinned me against a bed' by itself is at least simple assault, so you're wrong there. Doing it while 'professing her love' and after plying her (a minor) with alcohol is assault with sexual intent in almost any U.S. courtroom: at least 4th degree sexual assault ("Sexual contact with a person without the consent of that person or sexual intercourse with a person 16-18 years old.") and could be as high as a 2nd degree sexual assault depending on the interpretation of the teacher's husband's involvement ("sexual intercourse or sexual contact without consent while aided or abetted by one or more person").

Just because what Leavy wrote doesn't fit into your own personal definitions doesn't change what it was.
Dr. Leather more or less covered this for me, but just a couple of points:

1. I don't know why you're culling your statutes from random jurisdictions; I assume to reinforce your point. But as was astutely pointed out, you could never get a jury to convict under anything based on the story above (which, I'm assuming was presented to us in the most horrifying light possible, with its nastier contours coarsened through 30 years of recollection). Basically, she's saying someone held her and said she loved her. There wasn't even a kiss. It seems like you're trying to use criminal law to basically make it so that nobody could ever hit on anyone ever again. I get that it sucks to be made uncomfortable, but, really, this wasn't rape, it wasn't criminal, and it's an incredibly inappropriate way to attempt to tie in or empathize with children who were repeatedly orally and anally raped.

2. It's not just that what Leavy wrote doesn't fit into my personal definitions, it doesn't fit into any legal definition of assault or battery (and, yes, I know you people have won battery tort suits after getting smoke blown in their face). What happened to her friend is skeevy and horrendous, and I get that it was probably the creepiest moment of her life, but, really, she sounds like the kind of girl who comes by your dorm room crying at 3 am, asks you to go beat the shit out of some guy, and then you finally hear through all the tears and blubbering that someone tried to feel her up over her shirt after the second date.

In the context in which she told this story, it was exploitative, pathetic and ill-advised. She's like Dave Chappelle at Narcotics Anonymous telling cock-sucking coke heads about her weed addiction.
 

Gravistar

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Charles Pierce's piece just put up on Grantland is the best thing I've read on the Penn State scandal. To be clear, it's the emotion of the piece, and not necessarily its logic, that I find so compelling. But the worlds he links - Penn State as an academic institution, NCAA football, corporate America during the recession, and the Catholic church, child abuse, and public prayer -- all adds up to a tremendous diatribe/jeremiad.
 

NatetheGreat

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Yeah Pierce killed it. Picking him up was smart of Simmons, and speaks well of him given their history, and Simmons' own tendency to be thin-skinned. Whatever their past, Pierce can really write and this is one of the best pieces I've read on the Penn State scandal.
 
Sep 27, 2004
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Another example of a Grantland hack trying to be monumental and forcing the story.
Clearly you haven't read any of her books because Leavy is in no way a hack. I agree her anecdote didn't really fit the PSU situation. She was trying to make the point that unwanted sexual contact between adults and teenagers is scary and confusing, but it didn't work.
 

Tartan

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Clearly you haven't read any of her books because Leavy is in no way a hack. I agree her anecdote didn't really fit the PSU situation. She was trying to make the point that unwanted sexual contact between adults and teenagers is scary and confusing, but it didn't work.
I'd also say that, for the most part, Grantland's writers aren't hacks. The only ones whose material I find consistently hard to read are Kang and Carles.
 

Tartan

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Charles Pierce's piece just put up on Grantland is the best thing I've read on the Penn State scandal. To be clear, it's the emotion of the piece, and not necessarily its logic, that I find so compelling. But the worlds he links - Penn State as an academic institution, NCAA football, corporate America during the recession, and the Catholic church, child abuse, and public prayer -- all adds up to a tremendous diatribe/jeremiad.
I agree. Superb piece. I was sickened by the (unfortunately predictable) onslaught of "with this game, Penn State can begin healing" pieces vomited by the likes of ESPN. This more or less eviscerates them.
 

Burt Reynoldz

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The Dub Dot Heezy.
I'd also say that, for the most part, Grantland's writers aren't hacks. The only ones whose material I find consistently hard to read are Kang and Carles.
I actually came in here to post about Kang. I've thought that everything I've read of his thus far was complete garbage, but I just read his piece on the Marquez/Pacquiao fight. Now, I'm a casual boxing fan, but by no means am I a die-hard, and I didn't watch this particular fight. However, I enjoyed the article quite a bit. I'm left wondering though if I like it because I don't know any better having not watched this fight or being that well-versed in the world of boxing and its associated nonsense, or if he actually managed to churn out something worthwhile.
 

nattysez

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Pierce's article is kind of what I had in mind for JoePos's book -- a biography of Paterno that incorporated a study of how the little deceits required to run a big-time D1 football program help to build an atmosphere of institutional tolerance for even the worst humankind has to offer, regardless of how moral or well-meaning those within the institution may be. But it doesn't sound to me like JoePos is ready to write the book that way -- I hope that changes (or he determines that what happened at PSU had different origins).
 

Dehere

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I agree. Superb piece. I was sickened by the (unfortunately predictable) onslaught of "with this game, Penn State can begin healing" pieces vomited by the likes of ESPN. This more or less eviscerates them.
Scorching piece, and I respect the unsparing use of the word "raped". I've seen too many stories that use softer words like "abuse" or "assault" or even vaguer terms like "the events" or "the incidents" at Penn State. Pierce's pointed word choice makes his piece uncomfortable to read, and it should be uncomfortable to read.
 

Tartan

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I actually came in here to post about Kang. I've thought that everything I've read of his thus far was complete garbage, but I just read his piece on the Marquez/Pacquiao fight. Now, I'm a casual boxing fan, but by no means am I a die-hard, and I didn't watch this particular fight. However, I enjoyed the article quite a bit. I'm left wondering though if I like it because I don't know any better having not watched this fight or being that well-versed in the world of boxing and its associated nonsense, or if he actually managed to churn out something worthwhile.
I completely agree, actually. I posted that before reading his article today. I've since read it, and I quite enjoyed it. I think he's letting his emotions get the best of him at the end (when the article does fall apart somewhat; his rant at the end seems more driven by the emotion of his personal experience than the reality of the fight itself) but he showed he can churn out a compelling first-person narrative.
 

Tartan

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Re-reading the Kang piece, I'm kind of reassessing it. He really does botch the ending. I hate, hate, hate it when writers have arguments like this:

[font="Georgia]I have no idea what fight the judges watched, but before the decision was announced in that bar in Oaxaca, the fight had one clear winner and one massive loser.[/font][font="Georgia] [/quote][/font]
[font="Georgia] [/font]
[font="Arial"]No shit. You were in Oaxaca. It's one thing if his point was the emotion of watching Marquez lose a highly-charged, controversial decision in Mexico. But to trot this out as evidence that Marquez was the clear winner, as refutation of people who weren't watching in an environment like Kang's and thought the fight was close, is weak writing. I still think the first 60+% of the article was excellent, but when he lost the narrative, he lost the article as well. Emotional anecdotes can work wonders in adding to feel of a piece, building atmosphere, illustrating a point etc. but they're useless to me as arguments in and of themselves.[/font]