The significance and drawbacks of stories

An omnipresent but under-discussed element of sports in our modern era is the significance of the story. We often tend to think of stories as just factual representations of what goes on in a game, but the sheer amount of action involved in sports means they have to be both more and less then that. A breakdown of every single play without any kind of cohesive narrative structure or context from the thoughts of players or coaches would accurately relate what went on, but it would be exceptionally long and tedious. Thus, we edit, and we try to relate what we saw in terms of some larger overall angle. This isn't just journalists or bloggers either, but every fan who talks about the game with their friends afterwards; the tendency is always to pick out certain aspects that struck you as the most important and build a cohesive framework of a story from them. This doesn't have to be a bad thing, as it creates much more interesting discussions than a dry blow-by-blow of every play, but as writers, readers and fans, we have to be aware of the storytelling process and careful to think about what doesn't make it into the story as well as what does.

This isn't just a sports problem, either. Think about stories in general for a second. They're as universal as it gets in our world. From the earliest days of the development of language, humans have communicated experiences, views and ideas through stories. Stories precede the written word and existed apart from it from quite some time. They're also a powerful way to communicate information, as studies of cultures with oral histories have shown; these cultures passed their history and traditions down not through systematic listings of facts, but rather via narrative frameworks. Stories began before writing, and in our modern era, they have transcended writing, becoming crucial parts of everything from television shows to video games to feature films.

Why are stories so popular? A large part of the reason is because of their ability to manufacture order out of chaos. Our world isn't easy to understand at the best of times, and recent developments have only exacerbated this. For centuries, mankind has often turned to science and rules in an attempt to explain the world, but recent scientific developments and theories like quantum mechanics, chaos theory, the butterfly effect, imaginary numbers and relativity all go to show that the world is not easily explained. There's a great dialogue on this subject in Terry Pratchett's Equal Rites, when the wizards Cutangle and Treatle are discussing the discoveries one of their new students made in this area:

Cutangle:While I'm still confused and uncertain, it's on a much higher plane, d'you see, and at least I know I'm bewildered about the really fundamental and important facts of the universe.
Treatle: I hadn't looked at it like that, but you're absolutely right. He's really pushed back the boundaries of ignorance.
They both savoured the strange warm glow of being much more ignorant than ordinary people, who were only ignorant of ordinary things."

Humans generally prefer order to chaos, but the Second Law of Thermodynamics shows us that the universe is the other way around. Thus, we need to find an orderly way to explain a tumultous world, and that's where stories come in. Unlike Pratchett's Discworld, where the presence of narrativium means that the world runs according to the laws of stories, our stories often fly in the face of the bewildering reality of our universe, though. Thanks to the chaos involved, it's rare that you see an event that can be absolutely neatly and accurately explained in narrative form, but this doesn't stop us from telling stories. In fact, even just "telling stories" is sometimes used as a euphemism for lying, which tells us a lot about the accuracy of the narrative model.

That doesn't mean that stories are bad, or even that they all share the same problems. Some of our stories and storytelling models have evolved over time, developing depth and the shades of grey I'm so found of. Of course, there isn't time or space to represent every detail and every point of view, but many of our best stories now make reference to what else may be out there and anticipate potential objections, even if they don't discuss them in full. This allows for a best-of-both-worlds approach, providing the coherence of the narrative model while increasing its accuracy.

However, this approach is only taken by a small minority. Most of our stories, whether in newspaper, website, book, song, video game or movie form, still feature clear heroes and villains, start with clear rising action, build to easily identifiable climaxes and then tie it all up with a nice little bow at the end. The problem is that life frequently departs from narrative convention. Villains often have redeeming characteristics, heroes have horrible flaws or do things to lose our trust, the climax or a particular story rarely comes at a proper time and complete and tidy resolutions are an endangered species. There's a reason "he lived happily ever after" is a storybook cliche; few people live happily ever after, and the rest of their existence is difficult to summarize in one sentence. Problems are rarely defeated decisively, once and for all; they generally rear their ugly head again at some point, even if it's only in a minimal way. Moreover, even the past is not definitively determined; as battles drag out in court, new information comes to light and legacies are burnished or tarnished, what is alters what was. This is why most biographies of living subjects end with a status update (the text overlay at the end of the movie), and why many biographies are only written after their subject's death. It's more difficult for the story to change if the subject is no longer living, but it still can be altered as other witnesses come forward and new evidence is unearthed. Yet, thanks to the rigidity of narrative and the fluidity of reality, we generally try to stick to our guns and maintain our stories even as new evidence comes to light that suggests they're incomplete. As Douglas Adams wrote in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy about the titular universal encyclopedia, "The Guide is definitive. Reality is frequently inaccurate."

How does all this relate to sports? Well, sports stories tend to be like any other non-fiction story, changing and mutating as more information comes out. An interesting example of this is newspaper game stories, which are frequently mostly composed even before the event in question ends thanks to deadlines; the narrative framework is picked, the key events to relate are chosen, the story is written and then a few choice quotes from the press conference are plugged in. Of course, this leads to frantic rewrites when unexpected events alter the course of the game. Joe Posnanski has a great piece about what it was like to cover Game Four of the 2001 World Series, which resulted in him writing three different columns thanks to rapidly changing events. We accept this as natural, but it's really quite odd if you take a step back and think about it; writing these kind of stories really is writing about the future in the past tense. Most of the time, it works just fine when events fall into the easily foreseen patterns. On occasions like that Game Four, it makes a poignant point about the issues involved in applying rigid, structured narratives to chaotic situations.

This isn't an argument to ditch the narrative form at all. On the contrary, as anyone who's tried to write a game story or column knows, it's frequently quite necessary. It's impossible to present every detail of a game in a way that makes sense or interests anyone, so we search for angles and try to stick events into a literary framework. There's nothing wrong with this per se, and it produces pieces that are significantly more readable, meaningful and important than say, a full recap of every pitch in a baseball game. However, writers, broadcasters and readers all need to think about the context of a piece and what's not being included, and writers and broadcasters need to tone down their claims to being definitive. There is no one "story of the game" in team sports, as any team sport you can name involves a significant amount of people on both sides competing over an extended duration of time and making plenty of different plays.

In any game, there are usually at least 10 or 12 potential angles you could take to turn it into a compelling narrative. None of these are necessarily more wrong or right than others; they're just different, and having as many different perspectives as possible is crucial. It's not even just the stories in a traditional narrative from that are limited by this, as analytical columns and posts often use narrative elements (such as heroes and goats) and are subject to the same constraints. Single narratives leave much out of necessity and only tell part of the real story, but combining several narratives leads to a much more complete picture of what actually went on, portraying the subtleties and the different perspectives that are often left out. This is why ESPN's Around The Horn vexes me so; it deliberately reduces complex stories and opinions to the most extreme and simplistic 30-second sound bites that can be produced, removing all nuance and subtlety and taking us from the realm of partial truth into Fantasyland.

Why bring this up now? Part of the reason is thanks to my ongoing look at the NFL in my Phoenix Pub columns; I talked about the league's superior use of the power of narrative a while back, and my column later today is going to focus on the overemphasis on quarterbacks in the stories about the league. I've also just finished reading Bill Simmons' Now I Can Die In Peace and Jeff Pearlman's The Rocket That Fell To Earth, two excellent books. In both, one of the key figures is Roger Clemens, who has perhaps been portrayed as more of a stereotypical villain than almost anyone in sports recently. I'm hoping to do reviews of these books on their own this week and discuss the different storytelling techniques they use, and the different perspectives they take towards Clemens in particular. Is Clemens really pure evil, Darth Vader minus the final redeeming transformation, is he just a misunderstood soul, or is the truth somewhere in the middle? In my mind, Clemens is a great example of the successes and drawbacks of the narrative form; there are tons of compelling stories and angles you can use to discuss him, but none of them necessarily give you the whole picture.

What's true for Clemens is true for much of the sports world. There are details, subtleties and shades of grey missing from almost every piece, and much of that's thanks to the constraints of the narrative form. I don't think that's a reason to abandon stories or the elements that go with them, as they make for compelling reading and provide us with important information. Instead, I'd suggest that writers and broadcasters move away from the definitive and try to tell a story, instead of "the story". Readers and listeners should engage with the stories they take in and think about what context is being left out; often, that information can be found in a second or third narrative piece. Stories aren't perfect, but they do provide us a way to make rational sense of a complex world, especially when grouped en masse. We can embrace them, but we need to be aware of their limitations.

The Link Train: Fear Of The Dark

It's time for another instalment of The Link Train. As always, leave links for tomorrow night's segment in the comments or send them to me via e-mail or Twitter. All sports-related submissions are welcomed. Thanks for reading!

Video Of The Day: Iron Maiden - Fear of the Dark



I'm a huge Maiden fan, but this was a song that didn't really make much of an impression on me the first time I heard it on the eponymous album. It was cool, but it didn't particularly jump out at me. I then heard them play it live at Toronto's Air Canada Centre in October 2007 (still probably the best concert I've been to; you can check out some photos from it on my Facebook page and it became one of my favourites. This song is just epic live, particularly with a good crowd like the one at their headlining set at the 2001 Rock in Rio festival (which turned into an impressive live album) above; it sends chills down your spine to hear a crowd that large singing the intro in unison.

My Links:

- My weekly The Phoenix Pub column targeted the mental side of sports this week. I tried to explain why I'll always be more impressed by a Greg Maddux, a Wayne Gretzky, a Brian Bannister or a Y.E. Yang than a Nolan Ryan, a Usain Bolt or a Tiger Woods. It's not necessarily that their feats are any better or any easier, but the mental aspect makes them more relatable, in my mind.

The Best Of The Intertubes:

Baseball:

- Kevin Kaduk has some good thoughts (and a killer headline) on the much-anticipated signing of first-overall pick Stephen Strasburg [Big League Stew].

- Also on Strasburg, but funnier; Jon Bois of The Dugout examines what his plans for all that money involve. They include a fleet of aircraft carriers covered in pennies [FanHouse].

- Tyler Kepner has a great piece on the meeting of current Yankees' bullpen coach Mike Harkey and the Mariners' Ken Griffey Jr. during the ongoing Yanks-Mariners series, 22 years after the Mariners made the decision to draft Griffey over Harkey. He also goes into the opposition of then-owner George Argyros and how Griffey eventually became crucial to the construction of Safeco Field (and thus, the survival of the team in Seattle). Well worth a read [The New York Times].

- Ian Hunter has some good thoughts on Toronto relievers Brandon League and Jesse Carlson [Blue Jay Hunter].


Football:

- The story of Tom Cable allegedly punching assistant Randy Hanson, then being cheered on by his team with "Bumaye, Cable!" (a reference to the Ali-Foreman Rumble in the Jungle) would be completely unbelievable if we weren't talking about the Raiders [Gregg Rosenthal, Pro Football Talk].

- However, it may not be as ludicrous as first thought. ESPN is reporting that no punches were thrown, based on Cable's denial to Mark Schlereth and the description of the incident former NFL scout Daniel Jeremiah obtained from a source. According to Jeremiah's source, Hanson spoke profanely to defensive coordinator John Marshall. Cable got upset and pushed Hanson's chair, and he fell and hit his jaw. That would fit with the facts and comments that have come out so far, and sounds much more reasonable than Cable slugging a guy. [ESPN, Twitter]

- Matty I breaks down the Dolphins' 12-9 win over the Jacksonville Jaguars. He has good things to say about former B.C. Lion Cameron Wake's pass-rush ability [The Phinsider].

- Jared Allen... on Twitter? [Sportress of Blogitude].


Soccer:

- Magnakai Haaskivi breaks down tomorrow's Champions League television schedule [Avoiding The Drop].

- Why Manchester United striker Dimitar Berbatov might not be the best choice for your fantasy footy team [Never Captain Nicky Butt].

- The always-excellent Chris Nee looks at Saturday's Toronto FC - D.C. United game and concludes that D.C. may be in trouble [Chris Pontius Blog].


Hockey:

- Sean Zandberg has the audio of general manager Mike Gillis' radio interview on The Team 1040 this afternoon. I listened to the interview over the airwaves on the drive home today, and it's pretty good. He had some interesting comments on new signing Sergei Shirokov (who I wrote about here), his desire to add another offensive defenceman and the progress of the Roberto Luongo contract negotiations [Nucks Misconduct].

- James Mirtle has the latest on the Thrashers' ownership mess. Yes, more NHL teams are running into major problems! By my count, the current list includes the Coyotes (fully embroiled in bankruptcy court), Predators (partly in bankruptcy court), Stars (broke owner thanks to the Liverpool mess), Lightning (broke owners who hate each other), Islanders (having massive trouble getting a new arena) and Thrashers. Any I'm missing? [From The Rink]

- David Rogers on how this summer has seen St. Louis improve dramatically while Central Division rivals Chicago have struggled [Frozen Notes].


Basketball:

- Kevin Arnovitz on three teams that might surprise people this year [TrueHoop].

- James Borbath breaks down the Roko Ukic-Amir Johnson trade [Dino Nation].

- Kelly Dwyer thinks said trade is "a steal of sorts" for Toronto [Ball Don't Lie].

- New Score Sports Federation colleague Nat brings you her top ten "DAYUM!" moments from last season [Heels on Hardwood].


Other:

- James Brown and First Derivative interview Robert Littal of Black Sports Online [The Phoenix Pub].

- Andy Hutchins on Usain Bolt's dominance [The Rookies].

- Joe Posnanski has a tremendous piece on Tiger and Yang [Joe Blog].

- Ailanthus Altissima somehow manages to continue to find interesting things to write about college sports despite the offseason. Most impressive. This week's subject: should players with criminal records be eligible for scholarships? [The Phoenix Pub].

Links, tunes and live blogs

I'll be live-blogging the B.C. Lions - Toronto Argonauts game here and at Out of Left Field at 7:30 Eastern/4:30 Pacific. Until then, here's some links to the other stuff I've been writing and some of the best stories from around the web, as well as some tuneage to get you all pumped for the game.

My pieces:

- Here's the story of Canucks' prospect Sergei Shirokov and his quest to escape the KHL [Canuck Puck].

- Here's a link to the newest edition of The Whole 110 Yards, my weekly CFL column over at The Rookies.

- The Vancouver Olympics are now only six months away. I have a story on one local group's Olympic preparations in The South Delta Leader, where I'm working for the next few weeks.

- My weekly Phoenix Pub column took aim at the lack of proper standards and treatment around concussions in sports.

- As part of those aforementioned Olympic preparations, the Richmond-Vancouver-Vancouver Airport SkyTrain line is opening on Monday. It will see heavy use during the Olympics, especially transporting athletes, journalists and officials downtown from the airport. I have a story (and a video) talking to some local transit users about their thoughts on the line [The South Delta Leader].

Best of the Interwebs:

- Shakey gives us Landon Donovan's real backstory [Style Points].

- The Pirates Fan on the worst members of Steeler Nation [The Phoenix Pub].

- Weed Against Speed on an upcoming Toronto charity soccer game featuring members of Great Big Sea, Broken Social Scene, Weezer, Bedouin Soundclash and More [Sportress of Blogitude]

- Duane Rollins on Canadian international striker Simeon Jackson's potential Premiership move [The 24th Minute]

- Chilltown on why Tim Wakefield is The Most Interesting Knuckleballer In The World [The Rookies]

- A very painful injury to the Mariners' Adrian Beltre [Gunaxin]

- Adam Best on 30 sports figures who could be aliens [Fan Addict]

- Jason Davis on Landon Donovan apparently contracting swine flu before the U.S. national team's game against Mexico [Match Fit USA]

- Brian Wawryshyn on why football is, after all, just a game [B.C. Lions Den]

Tunage:
Here's a classic most appropriate for a game in Toronto. See you shortly for the live blog!

Back In Black

Apologies for the lack of content around here lately. I've been working full-time for the past couple of weeks, filling in for editor Kurt Langmann at the Aldergrove Star, and have been swamped with other writing in my downtime, so I haven't had a lot of time to blog here. Don't panic, though; today's my last day, so things should hopefully return to normality soon and anything you still can't cope with will then be your own problem! Anyway, I'll hopefully have a real post up before the end of the day. I'm also planning to live-blog the B.C. Lions - Hamilton Tiger-Cats game tomorrow (7:30 P.M. Eastern) and the Vancouver Whitecaps - Cleveland City Stars game Saturday (7 P.M. Eastern) but until then, here's a few links to some of the other pieces I've been writing.

- A report on the BC Peewee and Bantam baseball provincials coming up this weekend. [The Aldergrove Star]

- The second part of my list of annoying fan traditions. Everyone's favourite fake umpires are on it! [The Rookies]

- My thoughts on the Canucks bringing back Kyle Wellwood. [Canuck Puck]

- A story on a group attempting to raise the profile of girls' hockey locally. Some interesting numbers on just how popular guys' minor hockey leagues are compared to girls' leagues. [The Aldergrove Star]

- My weekly column at The Phoenix Pub. This week, it's on why our ever-lessening amounts of free time favour football fandom over following baseball. [The Phoenix Pub]

- Not sports, but interesting: a story I wrote on the impact the recent heat waves and thunderstorms in the Lower Mainland had on a local fair. I even took the photo! [The Aldergrove Star]

- Also not sports, and perhaps not even interesting: my editorial in this week's paper on the recent restrictions on police Taser use in B.C. [The Aldergrove Star]

A few links and some scheduling

Hope everyone had a great weekend. I'm taking off for a few days to go camping, so things have been somewhat light around here due to preparations for that. I do have a lengthy essay on sportswriting and Malcolm Gladwell scheduled to go up tomorrow morning, though, and I should be back with fresh content Tuesday night or Wednesday morning. Until then, here's a few links to tide you over:

My work:
- A post on the Canucks' acquisition of Mikael Samuelsson [Canuck Puck
- A piece on the death of former NFL quarterback Steve McNair [The Phoenix Pub]
- A piece on the Sedins returning and a few other signings [Canuck Puck]


Other good pieces:
- James Mirtle sees the Canucks as a team with cash still to spend
[From The Rink]
- Joe Posnanski on the Royals' lack of speed
- Neate on the Raptors picking up Turkoglu [Out of Left Field]

I'm back!

Apologies for the horribly long absence; I had to spend most of the past week preparing for a move and then flew across the country yesterday. I'm back in the blogging saddle now, though, and have plenty of stuff planned here for the next few days. Until then, here's a link to two of the pieces I've managed to write in the meantime and some other pieces I've enjoyed reading recently.

- A piece I wrote Monday at Canuck Puck on the Canucks' involvement in free agent rumours and laying out my blueprint for Vancouver's free-agency moves.
- A piece analyzing the top 10 picks of the NHL draft I co-wrote over at The Rookies.
- An interesting piece by First Derivative over at The Phoenix Pub on why the acquisition of Marian Hossa may hurt the Blackhawks thanks to the length of his deal.
- Neate has a breakdown of the CFL players from the CIS ranks over at Out of Left Field.
- A great piece from Joe Posnanski on the Royals' problems handling injuries.

Thanks for putting up with me during this absence! We now return you to your regularly scheduled Sporting Madness programming.

Where has all the writing gone?

Apologies for things being slow around here lately; I've been pretty swamped with other writing work. I'll try to get a full new post up tonight, but until then, I thought I'd share a few of the other pieces I've been working on. Hope you enjoy them! Feel free to leave comments on them at those sites or here, or send them to me via e-mail (andrew_bucholtz AT hotmail.com) or Twitter. Thanks as always for reading!

- Over at my new blog, Canuck Puck, I have an analysis of how the Sedin twins stack up against other elite NHL players and why resigning them would be a great Moneypuck move.

- At The Phoenix Pub, I have a few thoughts on how the recent increase in statistical analysis has changed sports. It's a bit of a follow-up to the piece I wrote here the other day about the (partial) demise of Moneyball.

- At The Rookies, I have a piece looking at the most annoying fan traditions in sports.

The Rise of the Phoenix and the NFL's dominance

So, I've added another site to the long list of places I write for. This one, The Phoenix Pub, is imagined as a sports hangout open to all, full of comedy pieces, analytical pieces and pretty much anything else you can think of. There's already a great cast of writers and editors on board, including Sculptor, the Avoiding the Drop gang and First Derivative of The Red Carders. My initial piece for them is one of the nightly Last Call series (open-thread commenting; you can find the full schedule over there as well), featuring booze, a Big Dirty Band music video and also an analysis of some of the reasons why the NFL has become the dominant professional sports league in North America. Check it out!