Malcolm Gladwell's Grantland piece on owners

[NovaScotian]

once again, gladwell presents a list of 'interesting' facts that are organized in such a way as to disguise his lack of real expertise behind a veneer of "oh, gosh, i never thought of it like that" inducing drivel. his tactic here is to impress the reader with his ability to make a connection between the economics of the art world and the sports world, but makes an ultimately obvious point: good owners treat their teams like businessmen, and bad owners treat their teams like toys. what he doesn't touch on are all the awful owners who run their teams like very shrewd businessmen: see Donald Sterling. i understand that gladwell has described his job as being 'professionally curious,' but is anyone else tired of his epic musings which only resolve into trite conclusions?

Malcolm%u00252BGladwell%2527s%2BDiscovered%2Bthe%2BExtremely%2BLucky%2BJob%2Bof%2BHaving%2BRich%.jpg link

i don't know about you folks, but this is just the latest example of how grantland has (predictably, according to the post linked above) turned out to be a shell of the intellectual and cultural force it was posing as. based on the quality of the current group they have together, i'm much more excited about the classical.

[SuperTurkey]

once again, gladwell presents a list of 'interesting' facts that are organized in such a way as to disguise his lack of real expertise behind a veneer of "oh, gosh, i never thought of it like that" inducing drivel. his tactic here is to impress the reader with his ability to make a connection between the economics of the art world and the sports world, but makes an ultimately obvious point: good owners treat their teams like businessmen, and bad owners treat their teams like toys. what he doesn't touch on are all the awful owners who run their teams like very shrewd businessmen: see Donald Sterling. i understand that gladwell has described his job as being 'professionally curious,' but is anyone else tired of his epic musings which only resolve into trite conclusions?

Malcolm%u00252BGladwell%2527s%2BDiscovered%2Bthe%2BExtremely%2BLucky%2BJob%2Bof%2BHaving%2BRich%.jpg link

i don't know about you folks, but this is just the latest example of how grantland has (predictably, according to the post linked above) turned out to be a shell of the intellectual and cultural force it was posing as. based on the quality of the current group they have together, i'm much more excited about the classical.

Absolutely agreed about Grantland. It's no great surprise that Gladwell and Simmons are friends -- in their respective fields (pseudo-scientific rambling and sports-entertainment), they are both hacks who have convinced themselves that their success is a result of their talent. It follows that a blog formed by uniting Simmons, Gladwell, Klosterman and others would be a mess of high aspirations and underwhelming results.

Edit: This is one of the best lines I've ever read in a takedown piece:

"Bill Simmons is to Grantland Rice what Tucker Max is to Hunter Thompson."

[quakerdevil11]

I think you missed the point of the article. It was not that "good" owners treat their teams like a business while "bad" owners treat their teams like toys, it was simply that sports franchises are toys. Albeit, in order to have one of these toys you have to be extremely rich. The problem is with the economy being what it is owners can no longer treat these entities as toys and are trying to derive (consistent/annual) income from them. As an undergrad I took a business of sports class and one of the first things we were told was that for most owning a team is not a lucrative endeavor (many teams lose money annually or break even). You don't buy a team because you think it will make you money (except for when you sell it of course), you buy it because you have too much money and you can live out your childhood dreams by owning a franchise.

I agree, Gladwell's musings aren't as profound on second glance as they appear at first, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have a point. I think he's spot on here.

[Jarhead]

Perhaps I am missing something, but how does this thread qualify for the EK board?

[alteran]

Perhaps I am missing something, but how does this thread qualify for the EK board?

My understanding was that anything mentioned on the front page was valid for discussion on the EK Board.

[superdave]

I think the sales of Simmons' and Gladwell's books speak to their talent.

[NSDukeFan]

once again, gladwell presents a list of 'interesting' facts that are organized in such a way as to disguise his lack of real expertise behind a veneer of "oh, gosh, i never thought of it like that" inducing drivel. his tactic here is to impress the reader with his ability to make a connection between the economics of the art world and the sports world, but makes an ultimately obvious point: good owners treat their teams like businessmen, and bad owners treat their teams like toys. what he doesn't touch on are all the awful owners who run their teams like very shrewd businessmen: see Donald Sterling. i understand that gladwell has described his job as being 'professionally curious,' but is anyone else tired of his epic musings which only resolve into trite conclusions?

Malcolm%u00252BGladwell%2527s%2BDiscovered%2Bthe%2BExtremely%2BLucky%2BJob%2Bof%2BHaving%2BRich%.jpg link

i don't know about you folks, but this is just the latest example of how grantland has (predictably, according to the post linked above) turned out to be a shell of the intellectual and cultural force it was posing as. based on the quality of the current group they have together, i'm much more excited about the classical.

I'm not tired of Gladwell or Simmons, though I have only read one of each of their books and I do read some Grantland and all of Simmons' basketball columns. I don't know if Grantland is much of an intellectual and cultural force, but I do find some of it entertaining and sometimes thought provoking. I would say the same for what I have read by both Gladwell and Simmons. I don't know if something that appeals to the masses (like me) will ever be able to be a leading intellectual force.

[SuperTurkey]

I think the sales of Simmons' and Gladwell's books speak to their talent.

Indeed. I feel the same way about every sold-out Miley Cyrus concert.

[A-Tex Devil]

I think this thread is a little harsh on Grantland (but not necessarily Gladwell's article, which was horrible).

It wasn't setting out to be the Atlantic, or even Salon. It was a place where Simmons and the other columnists (many of whom are esteemed authors) could have a format in which they weren't bound by ESPN's editorial board and censorship, but would still be focused on sports and pop culture.

Simmons isn't as unique as he once was, but most sports blogs today, from Deadspin, to EDSBS to [name "funny" sports blog] were made possible in part because of Simmons' early efforts.

I am struggling with Grantland right now because I hate the format of the web page and it's not always clear what the articles are going to be about (no lead picture, things like that), so I'll start reading something that is totally different than what I was expecting.

All that said, I applaud the effort, and hopefully they work out some kinks, because it has the potential to be great.

And as an aside -- if went through high school and college in the '90s and Chuck Klosterman's pop culture essays don't resonate with you, I don't know what to say.

[Mike Corey]

I think the sales of Simmons' and Gladwell's books speak to their talent.

Talent, no. Popularity, yes.

Gladwell is, at least, a superior writer to Simmons, whose prolific writing is nine parts sugar and one part substance.

[MartyClark]

once again, gladwell presents a list of 'interesting' facts that are organized in such a way as to disguise his lack of real expertise behind a veneer of "oh, gosh, i never thought of it like that" inducing drivel. his tactic here is to impress the reader with his ability to make a connection between the economics of the art world and the sports world, but makes an ultimately obvious point: good owners treat their teams like businessmen, and bad owners treat their teams like toys. what he doesn't touch on are all the awful owners who run their teams like very shrewd businessmen: see Donald Sterling. i understand that gladwell has described his job as being 'professionally curious,' but is anyone else tired of his epic musings which only resolve into trite conclusions?

Malcolm%u00252BGladwell%2527s%2BDiscovered%2Bthe%2BExtremely%2BLucky%2BJob%2Bof%2BHaving%2BRich%.jpg link

i don't know about you folks, but this is just the latest example of how grantland has (predictably, according to the post linked above) turned out to be a shell of the intellectual and cultural force it was posing as. based on the quality of the current group they have together, i'm much more excited about the classical.

I wan't familiar with Grantland before your post. I agree with a subsequent poster that this has little to do with Duke basketball but, even so, it's an interesting thread. I read "The Tipping Point" and was thoroughly unimpressed with Gladwell. I subsequently read "What The Dog Saw", a collection of articles from The New Yorker and was really entertained by this guy's writing.

The article on NBA ownership was interesting but ultimately a bit superficial. I think the guy can write, increasingly a lost art. I see your point though and will read Gladwell with a more critical eye. Thanks for the thoughtprovoking post.

[SoCalDukeFan]

once again, gladwell presents a list of 'interesting' facts that are organized in such a way as to disguise his lack of real expertise behind a veneer of "oh, gosh, i never thought of it like that" inducing drivel. his tactic here is to impress the reader with his ability to make a connection between the economics of the art world and the sports world, but makes an ultimately obvious point: good owners treat their teams like businessmen, and bad owners treat their teams like toys. what he doesn't touch on are all the awful owners who run their teams like very shrewd businessmen: see Donald Sterling. i understand that gladwell has described his job as being 'professionally curious,' but is anyone else tired of his epic musings which only resolve into trite conclusions?

Malcolm%u00252BGladwell%2527s%2BDiscovered%2Bthe%2BExtremely%2BLucky%2BJob%2Bof%2BHaving%2BRich%.jpg link

i don't know about you folks, but this is just the latest example of how grantland has (predictably, according to the post linked above) turned out to be a shell of the intellectual and cultural force it was posing as. based on the quality of the current group they have together, i'm much more excited about the classical.

In my opinion Donald Sterling treats the Clippers like a hobby but one in which he does not want to lose money. I don't know him at all but in the few Clipper games that I have attended he sits floorside surrounded by 20 - 30 of his friends. I would guess that they all had a nice meal somewhere. He generally avoids the high risk high reward super rich contracts to superstars that can work or not work and the Clippers tend to make money every year.

If he were truly a businessman with the team then he would have moved them to Anaheim rather than Staples Center. However his commute and the trip for his Westside and Valley friends would have been longer.

SoCal

[Mal]

I think this thread is a little harsh on Grantland (but not necessarily Gladwell's article, which was horrible).

It wasn't setting out to be the Atlantic, or even Salon. It was a place where Simmons and the other columnists (many of whom are esteemed authors) could have a format in which they weren't bound by ESPN's editorial board and censorship, but would still be focused on sports and pop culture.

Simmons isn't as unique as he once was, but most sports blogs today, from Deadspin, to EDSBS to [name "funny" sports blog] were made possible in part because of Simmons' early efforts.

I am struggling with Grantland right now because I hate the format of the web page and it's not always clear what the articles are going to be about (no lead picture, things like that), so I'll start reading something that is totally different than what I was expecting.

All that said, I applaud the effort, and hopefully they work out some kinks, because it has the potential to be great.

And as an aside -- if went through high school and college in the '90s and Chuck Klosterman's pop culture essays don't resonate with you, I don't know what to say.

Thumbs up to all of this. There's a place in the world for Grantland, imperfect though it may be. And though I grew tired of Simmon's schtick about 6-7 years ago after reading the same article for the 50th time, there's no question that he's had an immense impact on sports media generally. Completely agree on Klosterman - he's astute and actually has what are ultimately more profound insights than Gladwell most of the time, without the same wrapper of pseudo-intellectualism.

Gladwell's an interesting one for me. Sometimes, his angular, question conventional wisdom way of coming at something does provide a fresh insight or great food for thought or the kernel of a revelatory understanding of something, in the best Lewin/Dubner tradition. More often, however, he arrives at a possible insight, assumes he's found the one answer without considering or discussing any other possible causation or counters, and plows ahead to some questionable ultimate resolution, in the worst Lewin/Dubner (or Thomas Friedman) tradition. His intellectual rigor is to send his ideas, in the form of a chocolate bunny, through a line of hungry children, pay no attention to their pulling off of limbs as they pass it along, and when it makes it to the end of the line take it back, torso only, and declare "Look! It survived. Proven correct!" He's best suited for essay, as there's no question he's an entertaining and thought-provoking writer. Extending his ideas to full book format just doesn't work very well, though, IMHO. The Matthew Effect portion of "Outliers" and the discussion of cultural differences as a possible explanation for such things as prevalence of plane crashes in the same book were really interesting and worthwhile to me, but they'd have been better in the New Yorker, without the other 8 chapters of Gold-Leafed Obviousness.

[BoozerWasFouled]

I think the sales of Simmons' and Gladwell's books speak to their talent.

Do you think the sales of McDonald's hamburgers speak to the talent of their chefs?

[Turk]

Thumbs up to all of this. There's a place in the world for Grantland, imperfect though it may be. And though I grew tired of Simmon's schtick about 6-7 years ago after reading the same article for the 50th time, there's no question that he's had an immense impact on sports media generally. Completely agree on Klosterman - he's astute and actually has what are ultimately more profound insights than Gladwell most of the time, without the same wrapper of pseudo-intellectualism.

Gladwell's an interesting one for me. Sometimes, his angular, question conventional wisdom way of coming at something does provide a fresh insight or great food for thought or the kernel of a revelatory understanding of something, in the best Lewin/Dubner tradition. More often, however, he arrives at a possible insight, assumes he's found the one answer without considering or discussing any other possible causation or counters, and plows ahead to some questionable ultimate resolution, in the worst Lewin/Dubner (or Thomas Friedman) tradition. His intellectual rigor is to send his ideas, in the form of a chocolate bunny, through a line of hungry children, pay no attention to their pulling off of limbs as they pass it along, and when it makes it to the end of the line take it back, torso only, and declare "Look! It survived. Proven correct!" He's best suited for essay, as there's no question he's an entertaining and thought-provoking writer. Extending his ideas to full book format just doesn't work very well, though, IMHO. The Matthew Effect portion of "Outliers" and the discussion of cultural differences as a possible explanation for such things as prevalence of plane crashes in the same book were really interesting and worthwhile to me, but they'd have been better in the New Yorker, without the other 8 chapters of Gold-Leafed Obviousness.

Mal, great post. I have had mixed thoughts about Gladwell, but never sorted them out as well as you just did. (Although lowbrow Simmons fan that I am, I now have to admit my ignorance and go wiki Lewin/Dubner).

As for Grantland, there is a disconnect between its explicit homage to Grantland Rice, widely acclaimed as a pioneer who elevated sportswriting to a literary form, and the scattershot, "throw anything at the wall and see what sticks" approach currently displayed thus far. Hollywood fluff? Reality TV fantasy league? Oh please. Clearly Simmons and crew had too many pints at the pub when they decided to have a go with that one. On the other hand, the loner who lasted a few days at the WSOP wrote a very raw, painfully honest, and insightful series on his experiences. (JasonEvans, did you see it?) So my biggest complaint about Grantland is that it's not easy for me to sort out the good stuff from the junk, but I admire their effort. There is definitely an opportunity for a site like Grantland, as serious sports commentary on the Worldwide Leader has been deteriorating for quite some time (Bilas being the exception to the rule).

And bonus points for posting on the Devils in China:
http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-tr...hina-and-dubai

and the NC Pro-Am "Rucker of the South":
http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-tr...r-of-the-south

Not news to DBR faithful, but still spreading the love to a wider audience. I'll stick with it, especially anything Klosterman posts.

[Andy7207]

once again, gladwell presents a list of 'interesting' facts that are organized in such a way as to disguise his lack of real expertise behind a veneer of "oh, gosh, i never thought of it like that" inducing drivel.

I thought one of the marks of a good writer is the ability to introduce new insights that the reader possibly hasn't thought of before. I think Gladwell does this well. Am I missing something? What sorts of articles would have made Grantland a "success"? Gladwell writes clearly, makes an argument, and tries to find new angles of looking at issues. Maybe a small sample of people finds his conclusions unimaginative, but not everybody has heard the argument that profits should be irrelevant when running a sports franchise (a conclusion that I don't necessarily find obvious).

Also, a few of the Duke articles on Grantland are written by Shane Ryan, author of the "Seth Curry Saves Duke" blog. He's pretty good too, in my opinion.

[NovaScotian]

As for Grantland, there is a disconnect between its explicit homage to Grantland Rice, widely acclaimed as a pioneer who elevated sportswriting to a literary form, and the scattershot, "throw anything at the wall and see what sticks" approach currently displayed thus far. Hollywood fluff? Reality TV fantasy league? Oh please. Clearly Simmons and crew had too many pints at the pub when they decided to have a go with that one.

first off, i don't think simmons et al had anything to do with choosing the name of the site, which is why it is totally incongruous with a lot of the material they've posted.
nevertheless, they did choose to position themselves as 'the atlantic' of sports, or really a place where whatever passes for 'intelligent' sports and culture writing can be found. you're right about the scattershot stuff undermining any serious journalism (or commentary or whatever term you want to give this brand of creative non-fiction), and is all the more confusing when viewed under the spectre of grantland rice.

On the other hand, the loner who lasted a few days at the WSOP wrote a very raw, painfully honest, and insightful series on his experiences. (JasonEvans, did you see it?) So my biggest complaint about Grantland is that it's not easy for me to sort out the good stuff from the junk, but I admire their effort. There is definitely an opportunity for a site like Grantland, as serious sports commentary on the Worldwide Leader has been deteriorating for quite some time (Bilas being the exception to the rule).

And bonus points for posting on the Devils in China:
http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-tr...hina-and-dubai

and the NC Pro-Am "Rucker of the South":
http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-tr...r-of-the-south

Not news to DBR faithful, but still spreading the love to a wider audience. I'll stick with it, especially anything Klosterman posts.

those WSOP ok poker post were exceptional, and they were written by one of my favorite writers, brooklyn's own colson whitehead. he's not actually a sportswriter at all, which is nice. i admit i was hopeful the site would end up more in this direction - since it was intended to be less focused on sports, i thought they would invite more writers who are just writers, not sports writers, but at this point it's just whitehead, klosterman
what's more, is that the non-sports writing is basically all crap (and i'm including some of the things klosterman has written for the site). although i do appreciate him dearly and his work (especially killing yourself to live), klosterman falls into the same exact category as simmons and gladwell in that their work is nipping at the edges of high brow without the actual intellectual gravitas that makes the work stand up to a second or third pass. i think we've covered in this thread how meaningless a lot of gladwell's longer work is. simmons, too, often makes arguments that obnoxious (ryan reynolds is not a movie star) or very obvious (who else here read 700 pages of his history of basketball only to learn that "the secret" is just "putting the team ahead of oneself?"). klosterman is admittedly less guilty of this as its harder to pin his work down as frivolous, because music criticism is almost an entirely frivolous genre of writing (who is it who said "writing about music is like dancing about architecture"?). while his focus now has broadened to turning pop-culture on its head, he still uses his faux-intellectualism and excessive footnotes to insist that he is making a broad statement about what culture means, when he is really just showing off his knowledge about monkey movies, or doing asinine investigations of crappy classic rock songs or writing obvious things about popular tv shows. i expected a lot better from him since he was basically granted the freedom to write whatever he wants, not just whatever he can.

I thought one of the marks of a good writer is the ability to introduce new insights that the reader possibly hasn't thought of before. I think Gladwell does this well. Am I missing something? What sorts of articles would have made Grantland a "success"? Gladwell writes clearly, makes an argument, and tries to find new angles of looking at issues. Maybe a small sample of people finds his conclusions unimaginative, but not everybody has heard the argument that profits should be irrelevant when running a sports franchise (a conclusion that I don't necessarily find obvious).

Also, a few of the Duke articles on Grantland are written by Shane Ryan, author of the "Seth Curry Saves Duke" blog. He's pretty good too, in my opinion.

i actually really admire shane ryan (his new blog, tobacco road blues, looks very promising) and i have appreciated the stuff by katie baker and ben cohen (linked above, also a duke guy). but these are the second and third tier writers on the site. those who receive top billing, in my opinion, should really be pulling their weight, and just because they use footnotes and write essays that are 1000 words too long doesn't qualify it as intelligent.

[Mal]

...I now have to admit my ignorance and go wiki Lewin/Dubner.

Probably not ignorance on your part - more that I used the wrong name for one of them! It's Levitt, not Lewin. They're the Freakonomics guys.

[Duvall]

I think this thread is a little harsh on Grantland (but not necessarily Gladwell's article, which was horrible).

It wasn't setting out to be the Atlantic, or even Salon. It was a place where Simmons and the other columnists (many of whom are esteemed authors) could have a format in which they weren't bound by ESPN's editorial board and censorship, but would still be focused on sports and pop culture.

Simmons isn't as unique as he once was, but most sports blogs today, from Deadspin, to EDSBS to [name "funny" sports blog] were made possible in part because of Simmons' early efforts.

Wait - I thought you were trying to be *less* harsh on Simmons.

[UrinalCake]

As an undergrad I took a business of sports class and one of the first things we were told was that for most owning a team is not a lucrative endeavor (many teams lose money annually or break even). You don't buy a team because you think it will make you money (except for when you sell it of course), you buy it because you have too much money and you can live out your childhood dreams by owning a franchise.

I haven't taken a class, but I always understood that owning a sports team was a long-term investment. You might lose money on a year-to-year basis, but over the long haul its value appreciates at a high rate. A team can always be sold at a profit, often for more than it's really worth because there are so few of them available.