Longreads Best of 2015: Sports Writing

We asked a few writers and editors to choose some of their favorite stories of the year in various categories.

我们请几位作家和编辑在不同类别中选择一些他们今年最喜欢的故事。

Here, the best in sports writing.

这里是最好的体育写作。

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Mina KimesSenior Writer at ESPN the Magazine and espn.com.

Mina Kimes ESPN 杂志和 espn.com 的高级撰稿人。

## This is Why NFL Star Greg Hardy was Arrested for Assaulting his Girlfriend (Diana Moskovitz, Deadspin)

## 这就是 NFL 球星格雷格·哈迪因殴打女友而被捕的原因（戴安娜·莫斯科维茨、Deadspin）

Last year, the NFL was rocked by several incidents of domestic violence, starting in September with the release of a video of Ray Rice’s assault of his then-fiancee and peaking in February, when charges against star defensive end Greg Hardy were dismissed after his accuser disappeared.

去年，美国国家橄榄球联盟(NFL)因多起家庭暴力事件而震动，从9月份雷·赖斯(Ray Rice)殴打其当时未婚妻的视频开始，到2月份达到顶峰，当时针对明星防守端锋格雷格·哈迪(Greg Hardy)的指控在原告失踪后被驳回。

By November, most football fans had moved on.

到了十一月，大多数球迷已经离开了。

Diana Moskovitz did not.

戴安娜·莫斯科维茨没有。

She continued to tirelessly report on the issue, and in November, Deadspin published a devastating scoop: pictures that showed exactly what happened between Hardy and his ex-girlfriend, Nicole Holder, that night in Charlotte.

她继续不知疲倦地报道这个问题，11 月，Deadspin 发表了一篇毁灭性的独家新闻：照片准确地展示了哈迪和他的前女友妮可·霍尔德当晚在夏洛特之间发生的事情。

Moskovitz’s piece, which laid out the facts of the case in meticulous detail, forced many to confront what had happened.

莫斯科维茨的文章细致地阐述了案件的事实，迫使许多人面对所发生的事情。

It also pushed readers to ask why it took photographic evidence to make the world care.

它还促使读者问为什么要通过照片证据来引起全世界的关注。

## Broke (Spencer Hall, EDSBS)

## 破产（Spencer Hall，EDSBS）

A common criticism of longform writing, especially on the internet, is that it’s too self-centered; too many features rely on the first person, and too many writers insert themselves into their pieces.

对长篇写作的常见批评，尤其是在互联网上，是它太以自我为中心；太多的故事情节依赖于第一人称，太多的作家将自己融入到自己的作品中。

This is often true.

这通常是正确的。

But sometimes, as with the case of this stunning Spencer Hall essay, it’s an incredibly effective technique.

但有时，就像斯宾塞·霍尔这篇令人惊叹的文章一样，这是一种非常有效的技巧。

By juxtaposing the story of his own family’s financial struggles with the larger story of the systematic impoverishment of college athletes, Hall compels readers to look at the issue in a new way: through the lens of personal pain.

通过将自己家庭的经济困难的故事与大学运动员系统性贫困的更大故事并列起来，霍尔迫使读者以一种新的方式看待这个问题：通过个人痛苦的镜头。

He shows us that the controversy over whether college athletes should be paid for their services isn’t an intellectual or economic debate, but an ethical one.

他向我们展示了关于大学运动员是否应该为其服务付费的争议不是一场智力或经济辩论，而是一场道德辩论。

By denying athletes the right to earn a living, the NCAA forces them to live with the looming threat of financial insecurity—an ache that Hall himself knows all too well.

通过剥夺运动员谋生的权利，NCAA 迫使他们承受迫在眉睫的经济不安全威胁——霍尔本人对这种痛苦深有体会。

Glenn StoutSeries Editor of the Best American Sports Writing, and Longform Editor for SB Nation.

Glenn Stout 是美国最佳体育写作系列的编辑，也是 SB Nation 的长篇编辑。

## The Education of Alex Rodriguez (J.R.

## 亚历克斯·罗德里格斯 (J.R.

Moehringer, ESPN Magazine)

莫林格，ESPN 杂志）

What I find most impressive about J.R.

J.R. 给我印象最深的一点是

Moehringer’s profile about Alex Rodriguez is that despite the tremendous advantage he had having access to his subject over a period of months and the luxury to spend so much time with him (more than 100 hours), he still bothered to write this story in an innovative way.

莫林格（Moehringer）对亚历克斯·罗德里格斯（Alex Rodriguez）的描述是，尽管他拥有在几个月内接触他的主题的巨大优势，并且有幸与他共度如此多的时间（超过 100 个小时），但他仍然不厌其烦地以创新的方式写这个故事。

Rodriguez is not quoted in the story at all, an approach that both reveals a deep understanding of Rodriguez as a character—no matter what he has ever said about himself, it never seems to come out as intended or remotely spontaneous—but it also shows that Moehringer, as a writer, is still willing to experiment and take risks.

故事中根本没有引用罗德里格斯的话，这种做法既揭示了对罗德里格斯这个角色的深刻理解——无论他对自己说过什么，似乎从来都不是按照预期或完全自发的——但它也表明莫林格作为一名作家，仍然愿意尝试和冒险。

We’re all familiar with the write-around, where a writer doesn’t have access and is forced to present a silent character.

我们都熟悉“环绕写作”，即作家无权访问，被迫呈现一个沉默的角色。

In this story, Moehringer turns that device on its head, and the result, A-Rod without A-Rod’s constant commentary on all things A-Rod, makes Rodriguez somehow even more accessible, and, shockingly, even sympathetic.

在这个故事中，莫林格彻底颠覆了这一策略，其结果是，没有 A-Rod 的 A-Rod 对所有 A-Rod 事物的不断评论，让罗德里格斯在某种程度上变得更加平易近人，令人震惊的是，甚至更富有同情心。

## The King Of Tides (Kim Cross, Southwest: The Magazine)

## 潮汐之王（Kim Cross，西南：杂志）

One of my favorite sports stories this year was really hard to find—it’s from an airline magazine, and although it is available online, it is so in sort of a PDF format, which isn’t much in vogue.

今年我最喜欢的体育故事之一真的很难找到——它来自一本航空杂志，虽然可以在网上找到，但它是 PDF 格式的，不太流行。

So unless you flew Southwest, you might have missed this.

所以除非你飞西南航空，否则你可能会错过这个。

It’s a small, quiet story about fishing, a memoir about Cross’s father, and in that, is thoroughly unremarkable.

这是一个关于钓鱼的小而安静的故事，是一本关于克罗斯父亲的回忆录，在这方面，完全是平淡无奇的。

In fact, I often counsel young writers NOT to write memoirs, and if they do, not to write them about their parents or grandparents, because the results are often either too trite and cloying or claustrophobically and uncomfortably private.

事实上，我经常建议年轻作家不要写回忆录，如果他们写了，也不要写关于他们的父母或祖父母的回忆录，因为结果往往要么太陈腐、令人腻味，要么幽闭恐怖、令人不安的私密性。

Yet this lovely story avoids those pitfalls, and became one I’ve shared among other writers as much as any other this year, and has informed my work on similar stories.

然而，这个可爱的故事避免了这些陷阱，成为我今年与其他作家分享的故事，并为我关于类似故事的工作提供了信息。

It taught me something about memoir—I think Cross’s relentless use of unique and absolutely specific detail allows the story to come off as thoroughly authentic.

它教会了我一些关于回忆录的知识——我认为克罗斯对独特且绝对具体的细节的不懈使用让这个故事显得完全真实。

Moreover, that specificity in almost every sentence (go ahead and check) leads the reader, I think, to find similar moments of explicit authenticity in his or her own private stories.

此外，我认为，几乎每句话的特殊性（继续检查）都会引导读者在他或她自己的私人故事中找到类似的明确真实性的时刻。

In the end, we don’t so much identify with Cross’s story as much as we use it as a conduit to identify with and notice our own.

最后，与其说我们认同克罗斯的故事，不如说我们把它作为认同和注意到我们自己的故事的渠道。

How else to explain how I found my own father, who never fished and certainly never took me fishing, in her story, about her father, who did?

否则如何解释我如何在她关于她父亲的故事中找到了我自己的父亲，他从来没有钓鱼过，当然也从来没有带我去钓鱼？

Don Van Natta Jr.Senior Writer at ESPN.

小唐·范纳塔 (Don Van Natta Jr.) ESPN 高级撰稿人。

## The Unhappy King of Snooker (Sam Knight, The New Yorker)

## 不幸的斯诺克之王（萨姆·奈特，《纽约客》）

At 39, Ronnie “The Rocket” O’Sullivan is the world’s best snooker player.

39岁的“火箭”罗尼·奥沙利文是世界上最好的斯诺克选手。

Just don’t ask him how or why he got to the top.

只是不要问他如何或为何登上顶峰。

He’s as mystified as anyone as to why he can make the white ball dance and why, for three long years, he could not.

他和其他人一样困惑，为什么他能让白球跳舞，为什么在长达三年的时间里他却做不到。

Mastery of anything is often hard to decipher and harder to explain.

掌握任何事物通常都很难破译，也更难解释。

The Rocket is also baffled by what the game has done for him—and to him.

火箭队也对这场比赛为他和他自己所做的事情感到困惑。

He seems happier when he’s not playing but can’t enjoy it because then he starts worrying he’s not playing enough.

当他不打球时，他看起来会更快乐，但无法享受比赛，因为那时他开始担心自己打得不够多。

Sam Knight not only makes you care about O’Sullivan’s aggravations and annoyances, but he makes you understand them, practically feel them.

萨姆·奈特不仅让你关心奥沙利文的恼怒和烦恼，而且让你理解它们，切实感受到它们。

Featuring hilarious quotes (“I have told my son he ain’t fucking playing snooker, because I love him too much”), gritty details and a triple-banked final paragraph, this is my favorite sports profile of 2015.

这是我 2015 年最喜欢的体育简介，其中包含搞笑的引言（“我告诉我儿子他他妈的他不会打斯诺克，因为我太爱他了”）、坚韧的细节和三重的最后一段。

## A Force Unleashed (Tim Layden, Sports Illustrated, Appearing online in 2015)

## A Force Unleashed（蒂姆·莱登，《体育画报》，2015 年在线发表）

Thirty years ago, Mike Tyson launched his boxing career in Catskill, NY.

三十年前，迈克·泰森在纽约卡茨基尔开始了他的拳击生涯。

Tim Layden, then a young, hungry reporter for The Schnectady Gazette and The Albany Times Union, was by Tyson’s side, carefully chronicling Iron Mike’s first professional bouts.

蒂姆·莱登当时是《施奈塔迪公报》和《奥尔巴尼时报联盟》的一名年轻而饥渴的记者，他站在泰森身边，仔细记录了“铁人迈克”的第一场职业比赛。

Without acknowledging it, Tyson and Layden shared a hunger to get out of upstate New York.

泰森和雷登虽然没有承认这一点，但他们都渴望离开纽约州北部。

Tyson goes “from Knockout Curiosity to heavyweight champion to the precipice of Full-Blown Freak Show,: while Layden reaches his profession’s pinnacle at Sports Illustrated, where he’s worked with distinction for 21 years.

泰森“从淘汰赛好奇心到重量级冠军，再到全面畸形秀的悬崖：而雷登在《体育画报》中达到了职业生涯的顶峰，他在那里工作了 21 年，表现出色。

Old-school journalists will nod at the lyrically told moments: trying to get a reluctant source to chat (Tyson’s no-comment was delivered via a playful punch to Layden’s gut); winning a seat among the inner-circle of wise, grizzled scribes (Layden secretly dumped his beer into a toilet to keep up appearances); being the fresh-faced hotshot who “gets all the reps.” I’ve long admired Layden’s work about every conceivable sporting subject, but never before has he written something so personal and so powerful.

老派记者会对那些抒情的时刻点头：试图与一个不情愿的消息来源聊天（泰森的不发表评论是通过开玩笑地打雷登的肚子来传达的）；在睿智、头发花白的文士圈子中赢得一席之地（莱登偷偷地将啤酒倒进厕所以维持形象）；成为“获得所有代表”的新鲜面孔。我一直很欣赏雷登关于每一个可以想象的体育主题的作品，但他以前从未写过如此个人化和如此有力的东西。

Erik MalinowskiFreelance writer based near San Francisco.

埃里克·马林诺夫斯基 (Erik Malinowski) 是旧金山附近的自由作家。

## The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived On (Wright Thompson, ESPN)

## 有史以来最伟大的击球手（赖特·汤普森，ESPN）

The life of Ted Williams has long been a reliable source for some of the most lyrical and beloved sports writing ever put to paper.

泰德·威廉姆斯的生平长期以来一直是一些有史以来最抒情和最受欢迎的体育写作的可靠来源。

But in this narrative—which took years to coalesce—Thompson’s focus is not trained on the Splendid Splinter but rather Claudia Williams, Ted’s last surviving child and the one burdened with protecting his legacy.

但在这个花了数年时间才凝聚起来的叙述中，汤普森的焦点不是灿烂的碎片，而是克劳迪娅·威廉姆斯，特德最后一个幸存的孩子，也是肩负保护他的遗产的人。

The result is a heart-breaking examination of family, of remembrance, of death and the kind of deep love that binds us together, especially in the most turbulent of times.

结果是对家庭、纪念、死亡以及将我们联系在一起的深沉的爱的令人心碎的审视，尤其是在最动荡的时代。

Thompson’s 2015 was, for him, a typically superb year that resulted in some of the most ambitious sports writing anyone dared attempt.

对汤普森来说，2015 年是典型的辉煌一年，他写出了一些任何人都敢于尝试的最雄心勃勃的体育写作。

I’d argue this was his most relatable and affecting piece.

我认为这是他最能引起共鸣和影响的作品。

## Life’s Rich Pageant: Meet a Florida Man (Holly Anderson, Grantland)

## 生活丰富选美：遇见佛罗里达男人（霍莉·安德森，格兰特兰）

For me, the biggest (and saddest) story in sports media was the abrupt folding of Grantland, which was a near-daily source for some of the most tenaciously reported and elegantly written prose in sports writing.

对我来说，体育媒体中最大（也是最悲伤）的故事是《格兰特兰》的突然倒闭，它几乎每天都是体育写作中报道最顽强、文笔最优美的散文的来源。

But Grantland was at its most captivating when it pushed its own fuzzy boundaries and made you wonder how exactly something got published (even as you were thankful that it was).

但《格兰特兰》最迷人的地方在于，它突破了自己的模糊界限，让你想知道某些东西到底是如何出版的（即使你对此表示庆幸）。

Anderson’s harrowing and hilarious tale of a Florida man embarking on a bowfishing trip gone horribly, painfully awry encapsulates this ethos in every anecdote and cringe-worthy turn of events, even as it doubles as a riveting piece of culture writing that enlightens rather than patronizes.

安德森讲述了一名佛罗里达男子开始钓鱼之旅的悲惨又搞笑的故事，他在每一个轶事和令人畏缩的事件转折中都体现了这种精神，尽管它同时也是一部引人入胜的文化作品，启发而不是居高临下。

Would anyone else have published this piece?

还有其他人会发表这篇文章吗？

Maybe, but maybe not.

也许，但也许不是。

Point is, Grantland did, and the site shall live on in our hearts, for this piece and so many of its daring brethren.

重点是，格兰特兰做到了，这个网站将永远活在我们心中，因为这件作品和它的许多勇敢的兄弟。

Longreads Editor’s Pick: Matthew Giles@hudsongiles

长读编辑推荐：Matthew Giles@hudsongiles

## Chip Kelly, Football’s Most Intriguing Figure, Is Also Its Most Unknown (Kent Babb, The Washington Post)

## 奇普·凯利，足球界最迷人的人物，也是最不为人知的人物（肯特·巴布，《华盛顿邮报》）

Many a profile has been written about Chip Kelly, head coach of the Philadelphia Eagles, and each has an anecdote of how the sui generis coach goes to great lengths to maintain his privacy off the field.

关于费城老鹰队主教练奇普·凯利的简介有很多，每一篇都有一段轶事，讲述这位独特的教练如何竭尽全力保护自己在场外的隐私。

Yet Babb, one of the best profile writers working at the moment, manages to not only track down and interview Kelly’s ex-wife (a first, since those same profiles all reported he was a lifelong bachelor), he fleshes out in great detail a portrait of an individual who had a life before becoming Kelly of daily urine tests and heart rate monitors.

然而，巴布是目前最优秀的人物简介作家之一，他不仅成功地找到并采访了凯利的前妻（这是第一次，因为这些人物简介都报道说他是终身单身汉），他还详细地描绘了一个在成为凯利之前每天进行尿检和心率监测的人的生活。

In Babb’s telling, Kelly’s idiosyncrasies don’t define him.

在巴布的讲述中，凯利的特质并不能定义他。

## Crunching the Numbers: College Basketball Players Can’t Wear 6, 7, 8, or 9 (Zach Schonbrun, The New York Times)

## 计算数字：大学篮球运动员不能穿 6、7、8 或 9 号（Zach Schonbrun，《纽约时报》）

College basketball is one of my many passions, but I never for a moment considered the origins of uniform numbers in the college game.

大学篮球是我众多爱好之一，但我从未考虑过大学比赛中制服号码的起源。

Schonbrun’s takes a great question—”Why do college uniforms only include the numbers 0 through 5?”—and goes beyond the answer (referees can signal a player for a foul just once), reporting when the practice started and whether it needs to be changed as more and more universities are added to the Division I ranks.

美泉宫提出了一个很好的问题——“为什么大学制服只包含数字 0 到 5？”——并超越了答案（裁判只能向球员发出犯规信号一次），报告了这种做法何时开始，以及随着越来越多的大学加入一级联赛行列，是否需要改变。