Jones/ESPNMAG

I think a lot of people have been ripping ESPN The Mag for a long time even though they don't read it, which is a strange way to critically judge something. The feature writing in The Mag, especially by Friend, Keown, Thompson, Wickersham, Bradley, Adelson, Olney has been very good for quite awhile. If you chuck the magazine because you can't get past the Mike and Mike blurbs or the Stu Scott chat in the beginning, you're missing out on a lot of good sports writing.

 

Yes, but you get the same stories online and usually a few days faster. The Mag does hit my mailbox.

 

Allow me to paraphrase noted author Mick Foley:

• I like to write.
  
• I like to write well and have many people read my writing.
  
• I like to be paid well for doing so.
  

 

So if you're right, which I think you are, there's a pretty big problem, don't you think? As I posted earlier, if you have all this talent on your staff, why do so many people have such a low opinion of the magazine? Why should intelligent readers HAVE to 'get past' the hollas and the insane graphics and the insipid chats and other promotional junk?

 

• 
  
  "Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. And it will leave you unfulfilled."
  
  BARACK OBAMA, speech, Jul. 12, 2006

 

• 
  
  Clever. When you don't have an argument, you quote those who are far more intelligent than you.
  
  There is nothing wrong with being ambitious. Most people are. That said, a person can be ambitious, can want to write the hell out of a story and still be paid for it. That does not make them a sellout, no matter what you say.

 

And you try and support your position by quoting Mick Foley- wow.

 

Well, that's my point. I get the magazine in the mail only because they force it on you if you subscribe to Insider and I never read it because you get sensory overload trying to find the good stuff through overdone design and filler crap.

And I'd humbly suggest that the TV side has the same problem. The talent is fine but the problem is someone is telling them they have to be gimmicky and snarky and oh-so-clever all of the time.

They've been trying to out-clever one another ever since the Olbermann-Patrick days. Someone mistakenly decided it was more about the catch phrases than good work. That same guy is probably in charge of the magazine's layout and design. That same guy also goes to a lot of meetings where they talk about "capturing" the younger demographic. That same guy is probably a 57-year-old white male who couldn't point out cool if you spotted him Antarctica.

 

I did not quote him. I paraphrased Mick Foley.

Let me ask you. Have you written a NY Times No. 1 best seller? Because I know I haven't. I'm pretty sure you haven't. But I do know that Mr. Foley has.

 

We should all aspire to such greatness.

 

My favorite response from someone accused of being a bit of a sell-out. Dave Eggers from 2000.

Complete interview (and the selling out part is at the bottom. read it all, it's worth it):

http://www.armchairnews.com/freelance/eggers.html

Some of his answer: