The Best American Sports Writing 1995

Sports Illustrated veteran Dan Jenkins (Semi-Tough) guest-edits this collection, the fifth installment in a series that has been gaining momentum and respect since 1991. This year's edition offers a fine sampling of high-quality sports journalism covering the unsung heroes, the fallen stars, the greed, racism, sexism, and media feeding frenzies that have dominated headlines in recent months. O.J. Simpson, Tonya Harding, and the baseball strike make their obligatory appearances, as do the less scandalous subjects of fly-fishing and world-record mile runners. Some pieces, such as David Kindred's cliche-ridden profile of Ted Williams, ``A Hitter First, A Hitter Always,'' are less about newsworthy events than they are about the author's own need to hear himself talk. (Yes, himself--of 28 contributors, only three are women.) On the other hand, Steve Rushin's ``1954-1994: How We Got Here'' is an important contribution and deserves to be read widely. Flawlessly written and painstakingly researched, his five-part essay examines key events and people in American culture through their contributions to sports: how through television, for example, we got from instant replay to the demand for instant gratification; how the first domed stadium led to the Mall of America in Bloomington, Ill., where there are two dozen stores in which you can buy a Starter jacket but only two bookstores. Rushin and the other writers featured in this collection have given us not only some of the best sports writing of the year but also some of the best all-around journalism. (Nov.)