For the last six weeks, I’ve been a naked sportswriter. I mean, rest assured, I wore clothes, but it has been more than 30 years since I’ve gone this long without donning a press credential, or scribbling furiously into a notebook, or measuring each day by a word count.
The break was necessary, though uncomfortable, to make some alterations before allowing this work to become my lifestyle again. As a new columnist at The Athletic, I wanted to be intentional about my craft, purpose and desire to connect with a different audience. You deserve more than a stiff-necked scribe who simply went to the hamster wheel dealership and traded models.
The hiatus wasn’t about rest as much as reckoning. I used the time to reevaluate sports, their meaning and the incessant noise disrupting our shared experience, all with one critical professional question in mind: What’s the role of the sports column in an era that favors attention over nuance?
Some peers, smart ones, have conceded the death of this tradition. It is nearing extinction, they say. People respond mostly to hot takes with a character limit, they say. People would rather yell at pundits on television than reach for their reading glasses. The discourse is louder, faster and angrier than ever, and it turns media members into engagement fiends. The rage feels like passion, but it rarely asks anything of us except repetition.
For six weeks, I have been preparing to do a job that received a terminal diagnosis long ago. Why? Maybe that’s all I know now. After writing a column for 22 years — in Orlando, then Louisville, then Seattle, then D.C. — the challenge to write worthwhile opinions about sports is an obsession I can’t kick. From the moment I accepted this role as a callow 25-year-old, it has been the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Maybe my fate is to see the craft through to the end.
Or I could do what I intend to do: play a small role in helping the tradition outlast the gloomy forecast.
I’m with you, not just writing stuff for you to read. In just shy of 10 years, The Athletic has become a destination for the kind of sports experience I value most. It’s a community built around storytelling. It’s a place that satisfies intense fan interest with curiosity and context rather than posturing and spectacle. Although I’m a generalist and not an expert or beat writer, I’m here because I love to dig deeper, think harder and take your mind somewhere new.
Yes, I’m a loudmouth columnist who sometimes talks that annoying talk. Yes, I will poke at uncomfortable truths. Yes, I will rip some of your sacred cows. Accountability and moral clarity are at the core of what I do, no matter who it upsets. But I won’t ever be a jerk just because enraging you can be fun and profitable. I have a code. I call it “integrity of thought,” which means you can trust that everything I write is true to my well-researched feelings and not a nefarious manipulation.
During those six weeks, I’ve observed everything from the self-destruction of former Michigan football coach Sherrone Moore to Michael Jordan dunking on NASCAR to NBA draft picks gaining eligibility to play college basketball. On every occasion, I wanted to open the laptop and do what I’ve always done. But the point was to evolve. The best storytelling requires revision.
In my silence, a new opinionist took over the Brewer household. My youngest son, 10, is now obsessed with sports. Basketball, mostly. He hits harder than me.
The other day, after talking about how the Sabrina 2 Nikes are his favorite shoes, Austin declared: “The Denver Nuggets traded Michael Porter Jr. … because he had brain farts.” After learning that Michael Jordan came out of retirement one last time to play for the Washington Wizards, the boy decided to refer to that version of MJ as “Trash Wizards Jordan.” When LeBron James celebrated his 41st birthday, my sweet son and his 13-year-old brother shared a mischievous glance and offered some well-wishes to “LeUnc James.”
It’s all good, playful fun. Yet, one habit bothers me. Whenever any star has a bad game, or whenever Austin discovers a flaw in researching a legend, the child reflexively calls them “trash,” and then, well, starts trashing them.
At 10, I led with wonder. His default is criticism. He cuts deep because he already knows it will get the most attention.
I fear how quickly this virus is spreading.
If sports are subtly teaching the next generation how to talk about people, then the way that I, and everyone in the industry, write about sports matters more than we admit.
Maybe I can’t stop the virus, but I can refuse to spread it.