Best Magazine Writing: from Esquire & Sports Illustrated

Related to a prior post I did on book authors I look to read, I wanted to use this post to list out some of my favorite magazine writing I've linked to over the last few years.

It's tough to be terribly scientific in narrowing down my favorites and there's a good number of them, so perhaps the best way to go at a listing is to do so by publication said stories came from.

So... here's some of my favorite magazine writing from both Esquire and Sports Illustrated that I've linked to in this blog (with post, or posts, to follow containing work from other magazines):


Esquire Magazine writing:

- "The Things That Carried Him" by Chris Jones. Story won a National Magazine award for feature writing and is about one soldier's journey home after being killed in Iraq. Perhaps my favorite magazine writing and linked to July 2008 in my first iteration of consistent blog posting.

- "Why We Shouldn't End Our Manned Space Program" also by Chris Jones. Linked to from a Jan 2009 post that featured an image of the Barack Obama poster by Shepard Fairey.


- "American Surprise: How Election Night Brought Us Home Again" by Charles P. Pierce. Linked to in Dec 2008, it's a very short piece with the author's feelings of Obama's election in a historical context. One of those works that feels like every word was uniquely chosen for it's impact.

- "The World's Healthiest 75-Year-Old Man" by Susan Casey. About Malibu based workout fanatic Don Wildman and his exercise regimen... and cadre of celebrity and athlete workout partners. Linked to in July 2008.


Sports Illustrated writing:

- "Miracle on the South Side" by Lee Jenkins. Detailed and emotional filled piece about White Sox pitcher Mark Buehrle's perfect game... the 18th in Major League history. Linked to in an Aug 2009 post.

- "Big Love "cc!" by S.L. Price. An in-depth profile of Yankees pitch CC Sabathia. Great writer that accomplishes something I wouldn't have thought possible... it made me want to see a Yankee player do well and win. Linked to in an Apr 2009 post.

MLB Perfect Game Article from Sports Illustrated

Really cool piece titled "Miracle On The South Side" from the the latest Sports Illustrated on Mark Buehrle's perfect game.

Written by Lee Jenkins, it chronicles the events around the White Sox pitcher throwing on July 30th only the 18th perfect game in major league history. Compared to this, mere no-hitters are practically a commonplace event with there having been 263 in the major leagues.

Just a really well written story about an amazing event. Also makes me feel bad for Jonathan Sanchez of the Giants (who lost his July 10 perfect game to an 8th inning Juan Uribe error) and all other "close but not close enough" pitchers detailed in this sidebar piece.

----

Additionally of interest from this SI issue was this Kenny Moore written piece about the opening ceremonies of the 1984 Summer Olympics. Very short and very solid writing from a guy that I wrote about in this blog post.