Slate on Albom

Bryan Curtis of Slate writes about the Freep's Mitch Albom here. It's really more about his novel writing, but it does touch on his sports writing, too -- actually, this article connects the two.

T.O a day later

Lots of looking back at the T.O.-Story-That-Apparently-Wasn't yesterday. Jay Hart in the Allentown Morning Call basically says it was mostly the media's fault. Gregg Doyel on CBS SportsLine says there's no way that was the case, that you had a famous athlete and a police report saying a suicide attempt was involved.

In the Miami Herald, Dan Le Batard leans in the "blame the media" direction, but he says he's "explaining" not "condemning." I read the column twice, and Dan never mentions from what I can see that he does a radio show with T.O.

In the Boston Globe, Dan Shaughnessy is in the "media made it a circus" camp as well.

And this is Jason Whitlock in the Kansas City Star, saying that when you've been a look-at-me guy for as long as T.O. has been, you've got to expect this sort of thing.

Interesting new site

Steve Marantz sent me a link to an interesting new site, which is called Sports Media Guide. From home page intro: "SMG is a website for fans, media professionals and media students. SMG's mission is to humanize sports media while exploring the art and craft of sports coverage. SMG is a teaching resource for high school, college and graduate school curricula."

It's a series of interviews with people in the business, and the firstwas Aug. 17. Helene Elliott was the latest.

Important note on press freedom

Something extremely important to all of us in the business is happening Thursday in San Francisco. Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams will find out of they will be doing jail time for refusing to name their source(s) in the BALCO grand jury testimony case.

I'm going to cheat and let sj.com do the compilation for me, but want to cross-link it. There's a growing thread on the whole thing here. A show of solidarity is scheduled for those who can make it at 1:30 p.m. PT on Thurday. All the details are on the thread.

Whitlock on Kornheiser

Jason Whitlock writes column about Tony Kornheiser in today's Kansas City Star. It's a nice read and I have no problems with it -- but I note nonjudgmentally how much this business has changed in 20 years. It might have happened after a death or a retirement, but can you imagine, in the regular course of things, Jimmy Cannon writing a column about Red Smith, for example?