Inside Sports

The Sunday Long Read

 

Good stuff, thanks. It was a great mag for a while. I read every issue during its peak run.

 

Damn, Walsh looked like Santa Claus even back then. Remember some buddies saying that a few years ago when they were at the WWL.
Wasn't Inside Sports the first to use OPS, or at least the first publication to print it? Think there's still some issues in the attic at my parents'
house.

 

You mean Inside Sports is still around? Growing up 70s-80s, I always thought of Inside Sports as Sports Illustrated's red-headed ugly stepchild.

 

It was the SI wannabe.

 

No; the last issue was 1998.

 

Hated The Good Doctor (didn't care for his reincarnation here, either). Liked the magazine otherwise. Couldn't take my eyes off Cyndy Garvey when I saw that issue.

 

One of the top editors at Inside Sports when it was based in Evanston, Ill., in the '80s was a guy who'd been a sportswriter in the early '70s in the Quad Cities (home of my first employer). I'd lost track of him until a few years ago, when I found out he was doing PR work and also was a stringer covering high school sports for the Daily Herald in the Chicago area. Didn't know him very well because he'd left the Quad Cities about 10 years before I got there, but he'd probably be at least 70 by now.

 

Here's the Garvey piece. Pretty stunning expose for its time.

» Trouble in Paradise Bronx Banter

 

When I was like 9, 10 years old, I had a subscription to SI, Sport, Inside Sports, sporting news and Baseball Digest. My room was a fire hazard, but it was worth it. Inside Sports was terrific. Gotta go down that rabbit hole and read more old articles.

 

My God, "The House" section is like stepping into a timewarp! Decoration has changed so much!

 

SPORT had the best pictures. As a kid, SI was very wordy, and oddly enough the "illustrated" part of the mag really took a back seat until ESPN arrived. Inside Sports was a nice mix in its first incarnation. It's where I first read Gary Smith.

I remember hating that Garvey article - GET TO IT MAN! - as a kid. And if I were the Garveys I would have been upset, the article comes off as kind of mean and mocking. I understand the people kind of hating the Garveys back in the day - I never felt it was especially deserved. So they tried to project a certain image - who isn't guilty of that?