Saturday, January 20, 2024

Namath Weeps

Sports Illustrated is gone. It was inevitable. Sports information and opinion is a 24/7/365 endeavor now. There’s no way a weekly, even one with great writing, could survive in this current market.  I haven’t bought one in years. Decades actually. 

I find it especially sad because there were certain magazines that defined and marked the stages of my childhood and now they are all gone.  The Street and Smith Baseball Annual… The first real sign of Spring. My monthly issue of National Lampoon. That grocery bag filled with Playboys that I found in a dumpster, some of which are still stuck to the bottom of a mattress in a landfill off Staten Island.

Then there was SI.  

Sports Illustrated was more than my weekly immersion into the world of sports. It was my introduction to journalism. To developing an understanding of , “Why and how.” That there were other games, other people, people outside of the purview of the New York dailies.

Stories. The 1968 Olympics. Curt Flood. Ali-Frazier. 

Stories that deserved more than five hundred words and, since a picture is worth a thousand words, some of the best sports photography ever produced. Sometimes I would look at the covers for minutes on end before cracking open the magazine.  

Today we have so much information, are bombarded with so many images, that most of it loses meaning. 

We no longer get the pleasure that comes with waiting. Saving up for an album and then having to play it over and over because, even if you didn't like it at first, you were invested and, as it turns out, the fourth song on the flip side ends up being one of your favorites of all time. 

Sports Illustrated was like that. You spent a week with it and, after reading the "important" articles, it still sat there waiting for you to keep going. To read a small blurb about a kid in Indiana named Mattingly who was setting high school records or, to get a sense of what it was like to be a Kenyan long distance runner. 

Stories... 

Namath Weeps. And so do I.

 


8 comments:

  1. Amen.

    Truly awful what private equity and the general dumbing-down of a population can equal. The way that magazine - and most magazines - got sliced and diced and chopped up and the "brand" sold to somebody is disgusting.

    But people don't want to pay for "content" anymore. Why should writers get paid? Dark times, people Magazines were always my favorite form of media. They are almost extinct and the world is a worse place for their absence.

    And yes, there are copies of "Oui" magazine also stuck to the bottom of a mattress somewhere in Yonkers.

    The internet giveth and the internet taketh away. I'm grateful for your company, fellow galley slaves in the death barge, but I miss glossy pages.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I gave up my subscription decades ago. Along with sporting news. So, I guess I contributed to their demise.

    When I was a wee lad, our local newspaper pissed off the old people by having the audacity to publish only once a day, when there have been a morning and evening edition. This for a town under 20,000. It still exists, hanging by a thread as part of a large corporation. It is 8 pages now. Used to be three sections.

    Having instant information is great, but there's something about holding a printed page in a comfy chair. And reading the comics.

    I guess I'm just an old fart.

    Thank Yahweh for this site.

    ReplyDelete

  3. Used to get it when I was a kid.

    The end of my 8th grade year they published a maybe 8-part series, The Grizzly Bear Murder Case. Shocking shit, scared the shorts off me, but so well-done. Called attention to the problems with mopes out there recreationally feeding bears, dumping trash out back, etc., and then raising up a storm when the bears started eating people. The piece was singly responsible for the changes made nationally to bear management.

    Just thought I'd toss that in.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Mildred,

    That cover freaked me out. I didn't even read the story.

    https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/2/grizzly-bear-may-26-1969-sports-illustrated-cover.jpg

    ReplyDelete
  5. https://youtu.be/uWA7GtDmNFU?si=qIhbR0IsQYU9gUeE

    ReplyDelete

  6. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/deadly-grizzly-bear-attacks-changed-national-park-service-forever-180964462/

    ReplyDelete
  7. are we on to something with these bear attacks? could this be a premonition of what's awaiting our outfielders this coming season? what if they had to play games while wild animals roamed at random in the field?

    oh, guess what? Hal still sucks and so does Brian...

    ReplyDelete
  8. SI was a touchstone. I saved dozens of issues - especially anything with stories about the Yankees or Giants or track & field. SI and Track & Field News were my only subscriptions for years and years.

    ReplyDelete

Members of the blog can comment. To receive an e-mailed invitation, write to johnandsuzyn@gmail.com. And check spam if it doesn't show up. (Google account required.)

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.