Sports « The New New Blog

Archive for the ‘Sports’ Category

Interview in New York magazine

Sunday, November 29th, 2009

Michael Lewis was recently interviewed by New York magazine’s Vulture during the premier of The Blind Side in NYC.

Would it be a good movie? I didn’t think about that. And I really am pleased with how it turned out. When I met John Lee Hancock, I just thought, This is a good soul. You meet a lot of people in the movie business who say they’re writers who are not writers. And when I met him, I just thought he had the sensibility of a writer. And I think it’s a good thing when the writer is directing it, too, so it’s one vision. He didn’t have any interest at all in what I thought, except he’s polite, so he pretends to have an interest. He just does his own thing, and I thought that was a really good thing, too.

Tags: John Lee Hancock, Liars' Poker, Moneyball, movie, The Blind Side
Posted in Opinion, Sports | No Comments »

The Blind Side movie trailer released

Friday, August 7th, 2009

Warner Bros released the first trailer for The Blind Side on Aug 3rd.

Release date is set for November 20, 2009.

Tags: movie trailer, Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side
Posted in College football | No Comments »

The No-Stats All-Star

Friday, February 13th, 2009

New York Times Magazine (February 13, 2009)

Tonight the Rockets were playing the Los Angeles Lakers, and so Battier would guard Kobe Bryant, the player he says is the most capable of humiliating him. Both Battier and the Rockets’ front office were familiar with the story line. “I’m certain that Kobe is ready to just destroy Shane,” Daryl Morey, the Rockets’ general manager, told me. “Because there’s been story after story about how Shane shut Kobe down the last time.”

Link

Tags: Basketball, Michael Lewis, NBA, New York Times Magazine, Shane Battier
Posted in Basketball, Sports | 1 Comment »

Commie Ball

Sunday, June 1st, 2008

Vanity Fair (July 2008)

Some of the greatest baseball players the world has never seen are in Cuba, where their talent is government property, and their only chance of turning pro is the risky boat ride to Florida. Gus Dominguez, an L.A. sports agent, has done more than anyone to help escaped players join major-league U.S. teams, but now he sits in a California jail, convicted of smuggling athletes. The author flies to Havana for an unprecedented scouting of the island’s stars as he reports on the twisted dynamics behind the Dominguez case.

via Commie Ball: A Journey to the End of a Revolution – Vanity Fair

Tags: Baseball, communism, cuba, Gus Dominguez, immigration, Michael Lewis, MLB, Politics, Vanity Fair
Posted in Baseball, Politics, Sports | No Comments »

The Changing Room

Sunday, February 3rd, 2008

New York Times Magazine (February 3, 2008)

The first time I walked into an N.F.L. locker room — the locker room of the New York Giants, as it happens — I was shocked by how little effort went into making me feel as if I didn’t belong. I’d grown used to baseball locker rooms, where the players’ edginess made outsiders feel instantly unwelcome and rendered useful human interaction all but impossible. In their private sanctums, baseball players behave as if someone might walk in at any moment and ask them to leave; they’re a bit like starving dogs who have just stumbled upon a slab of raw meat. Not all of them, of course — the effect is atmospheric, produced by the sum of the personalities. Give 25 professional baseball players a place to call their own and they give it a forbidding name: clubhouse. If you aren’t a member, you don’t belong.

via The Changing Room – New York Times

Tags: Michael Lewis, New York Giants, New York Times Magazine
Posted in Football, NFL, Sports | No Comments »

Serfs of the Turf

Sunday, November 11th, 2007

New York Times (November 11, 2007)

The three most lucrative college football teams in 2005 — Notre Dame, Ohio State and the University of Texas — each generated more than $60 million for their institutions. That number, which comes from the Department of Education, fails to account for the millions of dollars alumni donated to their alma maters because they were so proud of their football teams. But it still helps to explain why so many strangers to football success have reinvented themselves as football powerhouses (Rutgers?), and also why universities are spending huge sums on new football practice facilities, new football stadium skyboxes and new football coaches.

via Serfs of the Turf – New York Times

Tags: Michael Lewis, New York Times
Posted in College football, Football | No Comments »

The Kick Is Up and It's … A Career Killer

Sunday, October 28th, 2007

New York Times – Play Magazine (October 28, 2007)

The Saints had the ball, and a field goal would win it — except the ball was in the Saints’ half of the field, on the 43-yard line. And the record distance the ball would have to travel — 63 yards — was only the first of the kicker’s problems. He was kicking from a dirt surface churned up like a World War I battlefield. The ball would need to cut through the thick, humid New Orleans air and into the closed end of Tulane Stadium, where the wind swirled unpredictably. On top of all that, the kicker lacked the most basic requirement for his job: a foot.

via The Kick Is Up and It’s … A Career Killer – New York Times

Tags: kickers, Michael Lewis, New York Times, Play Magazine, Tom Dempsey
Posted in Football, NFL | No Comments »

The Jock Exchange

Monday, April 16th, 2007

Conde Nast Portfolio Magazine (May 2007 issue)

Wall Street is about to launch a new way to trade professional athletes the way you trade stocks. A piece of Tiger, anyone?

via The Jock Exchange – Portfolio.com

Tags: ASA Sports Exchange, athletes, Conde Nast Portfolio Magazine, Michael Lewis, Wall Street
Posted in Finance, Sports | No Comments »

What Keeps Bill Parcells Awake at Night

Sunday, October 29th, 2006

New York Times – Play Magazine (October 29, 2006)

After racing out to a 10-0 lead, the Cowboys collapsed. They threw interceptions, dropped passes, allowed sacks, committed penalties. The journalists know this, but they also know that they saw only the same tiny slice of the game that the fans saw on TV. They don’t really know why the team fell apart, and the only way to find out is from the inside — from some coach with a knowledge of the plays, who has studied the game film. But since the head coach, Bill Parcells, forbids his 14 assistant coaches from talking to the news media, the pool of possible informants is one. It’s as if a sensational crime has occurred in broad daylight and there’s only one witness. And he is an extraordinarily reluctant witness.

via What Keeps Bill Parcells Awake at Night – New York Times

Tags: Bill Parcells, Dallas Cowboys, Michael Lewis, New York Times, Play Magazine
Posted in Football, NFL, Sports | No Comments »

The New New Blog