must-have magazines

I subscribed to the Oxford American for several years when it first started, usually enjoyed it, but I haven't seen it much since it was reborn. I always enjoyed John T. Edge's stuff.

 

I like Basketball Times. I also enjoy reading Slam, even though the prose can be challenging since five years in a rural, mostly-white environment have dulled the edge of my urban slang lexicon.

I am a big fan of The Hockey News and Pro Football Weekly.

The little "Digest" (Baseball, Hockey, etc.) magazines are funny...the whole format seems dated and their profiles kind of suck but I enjoy the historical features and stats and the mags are so cheap that it's not really criminal to fork over the chump change...reading those mags is kind of like stepping back in time; I almost expect to see a "Manny's Baseball Land" ad in the back.

I had a love/hate thing with Baseball Weekly until they changed format...now I rarely buy it.

Outside of sports, I enjoy Harper's. The Progressive and In These Times are good magazines for folks of my political persuasion.

For the men's stuff, I used to really like Men's Health, but I dropped my sub when it seemed like every issue was the same. Yes, I know I should work out every day and eat broccoli and salmon for dinner every evening. So I read Esquire for my men's-magazine interest and it's pretty good.

Irish America magazine frustrates the hell out of me. I'd subscribe if they would write a little less about the lace-curtain types and more about the rest of us. They had a good interview with George Carlin recently and I thought about subscribing...then the next issue had a beauty queen or some crap on the cover. WTF.

Time and Newsweek suck balls.

 

Outside
Bicycling
National Geographic

 

I read Outside for years, but I didn't renew this year because I don't think the magazine is anywhere near what it used to be.

 

I'm just getting into it. So for me, it's nice. Bicycling is OK, but just a bike geek/gear mag.

 

Thanks for the tip on The Economist. Just spent an hour at Borders and enjoyed most of the stories I read. I like its makeup: sections of stories based on every region of the world. There was a quirky little sidebar on what might happen to worker donkeys in Mardin. Something else caught my eye, which I didn't know: Daniel Ortega is president of Nicaragua again, but he's a new and improved Ortega, with a second chance. Uh-huh, sure. Reminds me of Rumsfeld, who got his second chance, and we see how that worked out.

As an aside, an Ivy League kid interned for me last summer. I gave him one of the local legion baseball teams and he did a great job for me. Come fall term he studied in England and got a part-time gig with The Economist. Throughout the school year I e-mailed him asking him to come back and write for me during the summer, but he was having a more fruitful time with The Economist. It's better suited to his personality, but still ... it's tough to lose a good baseball writer.

 

I think the new editor might be returning Outside to its old quality. I really enjoyed the newest issue.

I subscribe to...
Esquire
Outside
Men's Journal
Newsweek
SI (my mother's annual birthday gift to me since I was 9)
Oxford American
Field & Stream
Gray's Sporting Journal
Fly Fisherman
Fly Rod & Reel

 

High Times

 

Esquire

SI (out of habit)

And I'm surprised no one has said GQ, personally I love the mag. I'm buy no means fashionable, but I think the writing is great. And, almost every month has one sports story.

 

Re: GC ... David (??) Gay's story on Big Papi last year was absolutely wonderful.

 

Really good story in Time this week on the Pope's upcoming visit to Turkey. Also a good point/counterpoint about what Benedict "gets right" and "gets wrong" about his turbulent speech in German in September.