The Best American Sports Writing 2014 (61 page)

Contributors' Notes

Award-winning sportswriter R
ON
B
ORGES
is a columnist for the
Boston Herald.
Before joining the
Herald
in 2007, he wrote for the
Boston Globe
, primarily covering football and boxing.

F
LINDER
B
OYD
is a California native and freelance writer. A former professional basketball player who lived in France, Spain, the United Kingdom, Slovakia, and Greece during a 10-year career, he now resides in New York. He also holds degrees from Dartmouth College and Queen Mary, University of London.

T
IMOTHY
B
URKE
has served as Deadspin's video/assignment editor since 2011. He previously spent 10 years in higher education teaching communication, rhetoric, and media courses. He lives in St. Petersburg, Florida.

J
ACK
D
ICKEY
is a writer for
Time
and
Sports Illustrated.
He previously wrote for Deadspin. Originally from Guilford, Connecticut, he now lives in New York.

K
ATHY
D
OBIE
is a freelance writer who lives in Brooklyn and writes for
GQ, Harper's Magazine
, and
O Magazine.
She is the author of the memoir
The Only Girl in the Car.

I
AN
F
RAZIER
is a staff writer for
The New Yorker
and the author of many books, including
Great Plains, On the Rez, The Cursing Mommy's Book of Days
, and
Travels in Siberia.
A native of Cleveland and a graduate of Harvard, he lives in New Jersey.

Originally from Northern California, A
LICE
G
REGORY
is a writer living in New York. Her work has appeared in publications including the
New York Times, GQ, Harper's Magazine, New York
, and
newyorker.com
.

A
MANDA
H
ESS
is a
Slate
staff writer, a cofounder of
Tomorrow
magazine, and a contributor to
The Book of Jezebel.
Her work has appeared in
ESPN: The Magazine, Wired, Elle
, the
Los Angeles Times, T: The New York Times Style Magazine, Pacific Standard
, and the
Village Voice.
She has lived in Wisconsin, Nevada, Washington, Arizona, and California but now resides begrudgingly in Brooklyn.

P
ATRICK
H
RUBY
is a writer for Sports on Earth and a contributor to
Washingtonian
magazine and elsewhere. He has worked for
ESPN.com
and the
Washington Times
and taught journalism at Georgetown University. He holds degrees from Georgetown and Northwestern and lives in Washington, DC, with his wife, Saphira. This is his fifth appearance in
The Best American Sports Writing.

C
HRIS
J
ONES
is a writer-at-large for
Esquire
and a senior writer for
ESPN: The Magazine.
He has won two National Magazine Awards for his feature writing and two National Headliner Awards for his columns. This is his fourth appearance in
The Best American Sports Writing.
He lives in Port Hope, Ontario, with his wife and two boys.

J
AY
C
ASPIAN
K
ANG
is the author of the novel
The Dead Do Not Improve.
His journalism has appeared in the
New York Times Magazine
and
Grantland.com
.

R
AFFI
K
HATCHADOURIAN
is a staff writer for
The New Yorker.
His work has been shortlisted for two National Magazine Awards: one in profile writing, and the otherâin conjunction with the magazine's digital teamâfor multimedia. In 2008, his feature on the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society was included in
The Best American Nonrequired Reading.

B
ROOK
L
ARMER
is a contributing writer for the
New York Times Magazine
and
National Geographic
and the author of
Operation Yao Ming
, a tale of China's global emergence told through the prism of sports. An award-winning foreign correspondent, Larmer covered Mexico and Central America for the
Christian Science Monitor
and worked for more than a decade at
Newsweek
as the bureau chief in Buenos Aires, Miami, Hong Kong, and Shanghai. From his current base in Asia, he travels widely on assignment, occasionally indulging his interest in sports stories that illuminate the societies around them. A graduate of Williams College, Larmer lives in Beijing with his wife and two sons.

J
ONATHAN
M
AHLER
is a reporter at the
New York Times
and a longtime contributing writer to the
New York Times Magazine.
He is the author of the bestselling
Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning, The Challenge: How a Maverick Navy Officer and a Young Law Professor Risked Their Careers to Defend the Constitutionâand Won
, and
Death Comes to Happy Valley.
He lives in Brooklyn.

J
EREMY
M
ARKOVICH
is an Emmy Awardâwinning producer with WCNC-TV, a columnist at
Charlotte
magazine, and a contributor to
Our State Magazine
and
SBNation.com
. A graduate of Ohio University, he lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, with his wife, Kelsey, their newborn son, Charlie, and their dog, Lucy. His website is
www.jeremymarkovich.com
.

B
EN
M
CGRATH
has been a staff writer for
The New Yorker
since 2003. He lives in the lower Hudson Valley.

Floridian freelancer B
UCKY
M
C
M
AHON
is a writer, painter, and sculptorâas well as a tennis enthusiast, barefoot runner, and stand-up paddle surfer. He's currently at work on a play about William Butler Yeats and the supernatural, while pitching stories about extreme sports, wildlife, the environment, and the arts.

D
AVID
M
ERRILL
is a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and former high school wrestler. He lives with his wife and two children in New York City.

N
ICK
P
AUMGARTEN
is a staff writer at
The New Yorker.

C
HARLES
P. P
IERCE
is a staff writer for
Grantland.com
and the author of
Idiot America.
He writes regularly for
Esquire
, is the lead writer for
Esquire.com
's The Politics Blog, and is a frequent guest on National Public Radio. This is his ninth appearance in
The Best American Sports Writing.

M
ARY
P
ILON
is an award-winning sports reporter at the
New York Times
and author of
The Monopolists
, a book that chronicles the secret history of the world-famous board game. She previously worked as a staff reporter at the
Wall Street Journal
, where she wrote about various aspects of economics and the financial crisis. She has worked at
Gawker, USA Today
, and
New York
magazine and is an honors graduate of New York University. She made
Forbes
magazine's first-ever “30 Under 30” list for media. A native Oregonian and fledgling marathoner, she lives in New York City. Visit her website at
marypilon.com
and find her on Twitter
@marypilon
.

A
MANDA
R
IPLEY
is an investigative journalist for
Time, The Atlantic
, and other magazines. She is the author, most recently, of
The Smartest Kids in the Worldâand How They Got That Way
, a
New York Times
bestseller. Her first book,
The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikesâand Why
, was published in 15 countries and turned into a PBS documentary. Before joining
Time
as a writer in 2000, Ripley covered the DC courts for
Washington City Paper
and Capitol Hill for
Congressional Quarterly.
A graduate of Cornell University, she lives in Washington, DC, where she is an Emerson Senior Fellow.

S
TEPHEN
R
ODRICK
is a contributing editor at
Rolling Stone
and
Men's Journal.
He is also a contributing writer for the
New York Times Magazine.
This is his fifth appearance in
The Best American Sports Writing.
His book
The
Magical Stranger
, a reported memoir on the death of his pilot father, Commander Peter Rodrick, off the USS
Kitty Hawk
, was recently released in paperback. He lives in Los Angeles.

E
LI
S
ASLOW
is a staff writer for the
Washington Post
and a contributor to
ESPN: The Magazine.
He has won a Polk Award for national reporting and been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in feature writing. His first book,
Ten Letters: The Stories Americans Tell Their President
, was published in 2012. He lives in Takoma Park, Maryland, with his wife and two daughters.

When he was growing up, C
HRISTOPHER
S
OLOMON
cared so little about following organized sports, or running footraces, that his father called his statistics-obsessed older sister “the son I never had.” Today he's the one who writes frequently about athletes and the outdoors for
Runner's World
, the
New York Times Magazine
and the
New York Times
Sunday travel section,
Outside
magazine, and other publications. His writing has also appeared in
The Best American Travel Writing.
He lives in Seattle, and his writing lives at
www.chrissolomon.net
. His dad has come around and now claims him.

P
AUL
S
OLOTAROFF
is a contributing editor for
Men's Journal
and the author of
The Group
and
The House of Purple Hearts.
This is his eighth appearance in
The Best American Sports Writing.

D
ON
V
AN
N
ATTA
J
R
. is a senior writer for
ESPN: The Magazine
and
ESPN.com
. He joined ESPN in January 2012 after 16 years as a
New York Times
correspondent based in Washington, London, Miami, and New York. Prior to that, he worked for eight years at the
Miami Herald.
A member of three Pulitzer Prizeâwinning teams, Van Natta is the author of
First Off the Tee
and the coauthor of
Her Way
, both
New York Times
bestsellers, and
Wonder Girl.
He lives in Miami with his wife, Lizette Alvarez, who is a
Times
correspondent, and their two daughters.