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Sportswriters have changed more than sportswriting.

Every time you write anything, at least half your readers are going to disagree with you. A big part of sports writing is how you respond to that tension.

Journalism is a team sport. Writing novels is golf: it's you and the ball.

I think of sports writers as mediating between two worlds. Athletes probably think of sports writers as not macho enough. And people in high culture probably think of sports writers as jocks or something. They are in an interestingly complex position in which they have to mediate the world of body and the world of words.

Writing is like a contact sport, like football. You can get hurt, but you enjoy it.

I'm not a sportswriter.

The media has changed. We now give broadcast licenses to philosophies instead of people. People get confused and think there is no difference between news and entertainment. People who project themselves as journalists on television don't know the first thing about journalism. They are just there stirring up a hockey game.

A sportswriter's life means never sitting with your wife or family at the games. Still working after everyone has gone to the party... Digging beneath a coach's lies, not to forget those of athletic directors and general managers and owners of pro teams. Keeping a confidence. Risking it.

The new disease was named chronic traumatic encephalopathy, and the NFL fervently and repeatedly denied that such a thing had anything to do with the league or its players.

We are essentially in the business of telling stories. We would like to think that most of our stories are basically human stories with sports as a backdrop.