Friday, January 06, 2012

Sports Illustrated Writing: from Chris Ballard & Michael Rosenberg

Two excellent feature stories from the last two issues of Sports Illustrated.

From the Jan 6 edition was Tom Brady As You Forgot Him by Michael Rosenberg. It's been widely reported that Brady was a 6th round NFL draft pick out of Michigan, but Rosenberg provides a lot of interesting back story to his time there. Conventional wisdom seems to be that he was always great and nobody noticed, but Rosenberg does a really good job detailing Brady's college experience and how that helped shaped him. Additionally, Rosenberg writes some pretty interesting content on fellow Michigan QB Drew Henson, his career and relationship with Brady.

In the Dec 26 Pictures of the Year issue Chris Ballard wrote The Kiss on the Vancouver riots after the Canucks Game 7 defeat. His story really stood out as solid writing that examined multiple characters associated with the riots (a policeman, a rioter, the couple photographed kissing on the street, person who took the picture) and walked though their experiences chronologically. Was a compelling read that felt like it had been reported on very well.