The Formerly Great Rick Reilly

For anyone who reads this, I apologize for my month long absence. Looking back at my last few posts before temporarily abandoning the site, I’m struck by two things.

First, I’d like to take back my earlier statement that LeBron did not deserve the MVP award. Sure, he may not be playing in the NBA Finals right now, but he really was a one man team in the Eastern Conference Finals. However, one-on-five never works, no matter how good the one is, meaning the Magic took the Cavs expected place in the finals, derailing the whole Kobe/LeBron puppet commercial series that Nike had going.

Secondly, I wrote that if the Dodgers could play .500 baseball while Manny Ramirez was suspended, they would be fine. They have exceeded .500 and I get the feeling they would win the NL West even if he missed the rest of the regular season. The Dodgers really are that good. If he comes back with a chip on his shoulder, this team has a good shot at getting to the World Series. Anyways, enough reflection, let’s get to some new stuff.

As a faithful reader of Deadspin, I get a fair amount of Rick Reilly criticism in my daily sports reading. The man who was once my favorite sports writer has fallen on hard times. His problems certainly aren’t financial (he signed a deal worth $17 million when he came to ESPN, which he described as “ridonkulous," an odd word choice coming from a middle aged white man).

No, his problems are those of the creative kind, namely, an apparent writer’s block. He has been criticised in recent weeks for reusing old articles from his better days at Sports Illustrated. While this may be shoddy jounalism (or maybe just plain laziness), I’m all in favor of it. His new writings are just north of terrible, so if this what it takes to get the good Rick Reilly back, so be it. What I don’t understand is how his writing can be so mediocre. It’s not like he’s Bill Simmons, who writes a column that approaches novella length each week (Simmons also has a book on the NBA coming out later this year, supposedly more than 700 pages, making it the War and Peace of sports book).

No, Reilly writes the old newspaper column way, limiting himself to around 800 words. Most good writers can do that in an afternoon, and he only has to turn in one each week. Frankly, it sounds like easy money to me.

However, he recently wrote an article pleading with God to allow the Denver Nuggets to beat the Lakers (didn’t happen). This article could have been written by any literate Nuggets fan, and, come to think of it, one of them may have done a better job.

The biggest problem I have with this is the idea that Reilly thinks God cares about what happens to his basketball team. Also, he’s not writing for a local Denver paper, he’s writing for ESPN, the biggest sports website in the game. How many people care that he’s a fan of the Nuggets? Seven? Eight? I hope he continues to recycle old articles from his days at SI. It may be what makes him a relevant writer again.

Before I go, I’d like to make a few announcements. I’m going to write more frequently, but it will probably only be a few times a week. Visit the site regularly, because there are no set days for new articles. Also, I’m going to focus on basketball in most of my future writing, so look for a mock NBA Draft next week and something on Lamar Odom’s obsession with candy soon (I’ll write about it once ESPN stops mentioning it).

You stay classy San Diego.