Typically, we add links to stories as they become available and with Texas being the first game of the season, we’ve been adding links for a few days now. Some are better than others, obviously, but we’d like to commend one in particular.
The Duke Chronicle tends to be a bit hit or miss with sportswriting, and writing in general, to be honest. It’s not surprising.
First, it’s not like Duke has a journalism school. People write there because they like to write. And second, not everyone can do it. The
late John Feinstein could. He shot across the pages of the Chronicle like a comet. He had a bold, cocky style that was way beyond his years (at times it was too bold though. In his book about Triangle basketball, Three Paths To Glory, Feinstein had an infuriating number of lazy mistakes. In his final book, Five Banners, which we helped to proofread, there were a significant number of mistakes as well. Hopefully, they were corrected before publication).
Feinstein was talented enough to make a legendary career out of sportswriting, which he leveraged into other areas, including an entertaining NPR feature with legendary baseball radio man Red Barber and working with the Navy football broadcast crew, but he was unusually gifted.
Sophie Levenson’s current column about Duke Basketball moms is not hit or miss. It’s very well written and puts things together beautifully. Our one criticism is this line: “And she had Darren when she was 20 years old, which makes her a force of nature.”
Since Levenson is (presumably) an American not much older than 20, it’s understandable that she would say this, but the reality is that in much of the rest of the world women tend to have babies earlier than in the U.S. and the West. Having a first baby at 20 is fairly typical – the global average is 23.1 – which obviously means many women have babies at much younger ages than that. Having a baby at a younger age makes you grow up quickly, but the whole business is by definition a force of nature no matter how old you are when it happens. There’s nothing particularly special or unusual about becoming a mother at 20, except to the modern Western mind.
But that’s the only line that really jumps out and it just reflects youth and inexperience, both of which will inevitably fade. The talent will remain.
In general, this is one of the best articles we have read in the Chronicle in a very long time. It was engaging from beginning to end and we really recommend that you read it.
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