If there’s one thing I love, it’s a great sports story. In the March 29, 2010 issue of Sports Illustrated, Frank Deford wrote a great sports story so different, I couldn’t help it but pass it along to you, reader.

“Sometimes the Bear Eats You: Confessions of a Sportswriter”  chronicles the life of a sports beat writer. Deford tells about some of his greatest moments:

1. On discovering Bill Bradley — the next great basketball star. Um…from Princeton? (“Naturally, everybody snickered at me as a silly Tiger, but when I told them that Bradley had turned down Duke and I threw in some statistical mumbo jumbo, they got interested.”)
2. On the hillarious beginnings of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition. (“There was just nothin’ bookin’ from the bowl games on New Year’s Day till the pitchers and catchers reported. Of course, this would serendipitiously lead to the ultimate sports journalism sacrilege, the notorious Swimsuit issue.The then SI editor, “was invariably bemused by American puritanism,” after protest letters flooded the mailroom from incensed librarians. “”Wait’ll next year’, he said. Thus from little acorns do big oaks grow. Soon enough, there was Cheryl Tiegs in a fishnet top.” Gotta love those librarians.
3. On horse jockeys: “I’m most intrigued by pitchers and jockeys, the latter because they’re such brave little people.”

The list goes on. You can fully expect to find this article in the the Best American Sportswriting of 2010. And here’s why:

1. Pace. Using a combination of long and short sentences, I found myself slowing down to savor the word or speed reading to get to the next big event. It was as if Deford was sitting beside me, coaching me through it all.
2. Tone and voice. “There was just nothin’ cookin’…” The passion was as authentic as Augie March. I pictured him with a cigarette in his mouth, tap, tap, tapping on a typewriter and taking a drink of Scotch in between paragraphs.
3. Setting. He created reality. I saw Bear Bryant’s leathery skin, wrinkled my nose at the great coach’s bad breath and saw the rows of beat writers sitting in the press box at the Alabama game.

When I stumble across these articles that make such a tremendous impact on me, it’s a reminder of life’s diversity and color. And no matter what genre you write, compound/complex sentences, imagery, word choice and a host of other elements need to find life in any genre — poetry or prose.