MLB Hot Stove: Indians sign Mike Napoli
December 16, 2015MLB News: Cleveland Indians sign outfielder Rajai Davis
December 16, 2015WFNY is proud of our assortment of dedicated writers and especially grateful to be blessed with its daily readership. As part of our year-end festivities, WFNY offers an Author Spotlight series to allow the readers to get to know the writers a little better through a representative sampling of their 2015 pieces, for the true spotlight on an author’s soul is in the writing one has completed.
Writing is many things to those who try it. It is a joy and a burden, freedom and restriction. Writing is simple, it is complex. More importantly, writing can be a glimpse into the essence of the author who the reader might never see but gets to know over time.
The purpose of literature is to turn blood into ink. ~T.S. Eliot
One ought only to write when one leaves a piece of one’s own flesh in the inkpot, each time one dips one’s pen. ~Leo Tolstoy
Love letters and poems aren’t the least bit difficult to write, if you write directly from your heart into the ink and don’t channel through your brain first. ~Terri Guillemets
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Who is Scott Sargent?
Resident magazine aficionado and long-form nerd who reads authors like most others listen to singers/songwriters. While enjoying some of today’s stylings, I’ll occasionally throw on an oldie-but-goodie from Hunter S. Thompson or David Foster Wallace like you would that old Doors or Dylan album. Not because there’s a lack of options, but because they’re just that much more refined and harnessing work of masterful artists is always a powerful experience. I believe the “embrace debate” culture is the worst thing to ever happen to modern sports fandom. I secretly loathe the coverage given to transactions and events like the NFL or NBA Draft while understanding the market for such. I believe in such ideals as “chemistry”, that managers and head coaches make a difference and that some items simply cannot be explained by analytics. And I maintain that Paul Brown is the most under-discussed member of Cleveland sports history, the Indians should have won the 1997 World Series and that had LeBron James and the Cavs met Kobe Bryant and the Lakers in the 2009 NBA Finals, we’d still be talking about the nuances and outcome of that series today.
Here are five works that best describe Scott from 2015
Here are five works from 2015 at WFNY that best describe who I believe I am as a writer. Each work has a word association captioned with it to describe the part of me I believe is described through it.
Observant: Nothing left to give, but a future for the taking: A story following Game 6 of the NBA Finals, the Cavaliers falling to the Golden State Warriors.
Nostalgic: On Mo Williams, Regrets and Homecomings: Thinking back of Mo Williams’ first stint with the Cavs and what his return means for the future
Ambitious: The Matrix: Unloaded: A profile of former Cavaliers forward Shawn Marion, a statistical anomaly
Adventurous: “What the hell am I doing?” Brian Miser and the life of a human cannonball: An on-location piece covering a man who lights himself on fire for a living
Experimental: The Ky’s The Limit: A second-person narrative about Kyrie Irving’s journey through the 2014-15 NBA season
Explanation of works
The 2015 calendar year was an interesting one in that I had to take a deep dive into the memory banks to come up with my five pieces that I felt were worth re-sharing. I’m a firm believer in “being there” to write the true story—setting scenes, mining sources, obtaining insight no one else has. I won’t read game recaps by individuals who weren’t at said game; I rarely read columns that don’t incorporate some sort of uniquely present reporting. I realize that it’s possible to write around a lot of items in the event they’re unattainable, but I don’t believe I’m a strong enough writer to do that dance. Others may be able to freestyle and fill in the gaps; I need the crutch of reporting out those details.
Writing about Brian Miser was a selfish piece, once that didn’t really fit the scope of WFNY, but one that I couldn’t pass up once I was able to stand just a few feet away from him as he engaged in an event that is understandably his living, but one that I couldn’t even fathom taking part in. The Marion piece was a straight profile, the words orbiting around an idea that someone so underappreciated in Cleveland could eventually be a Hall of Famer. Writing about Kyrie in the second person was a fun task, something that I had no intention of doing when I sat down to write a story on his late-season heroics. The Mo Williams story is one that I feel will be a model of mine way down the road when all I have to cling to are faint memories and how I felt during those specific times. But standing there watching LeBron James, the most talented and captivating athlete I will ever cover as long as I’m alive—this much, I am certain—crippled by a mix of defeat and exhaustion was something I’ll never forget.
Game 6 of the NBA Finals, and I took the gamble and left my seat a bit early, opting to head down and wait in the line to get in to the locker room. It’s a weird scene, but one that’s required if I were to obtain anything of substance. If not for that move, I would not have watched Dan Gilbert or been able to see David Griffin and that entire scene. That night, much of the media was down the hall awaiting players and coaches as they were coming to the podium, an NBA champion having just been crowned. I opted to just hang out in an eerily quiet locker room—seriously, no one said a word louder than a whisper. I maintain that if not for that gamble, that desire to get something different than what I knew would be penned by the other hundred-or-so folks with writer-based media credentials, my efforts would be pointless.
A quote that will always stick with me is from “This American Life” creator Ira Glass. “It’s like harnessing luck as an industrial product. You want to get hit by lightning, so you have to wander around for a long time in the rain.” So many quotes that have been used in my pieces were not obtained with said pieces in mind. I gather, annotate, chronicle, and hope that one day, they will be worthwhile, that they can be shared to either provide basis for a story or simply support one that is rooted in something else.1 There’s a good chance that standing aimlessly in that locker room would’ve provided nothing and that I was missing something in the visitor’s locker room or in the hall way or outside the team’s tunnel. But had I not made that gamble, I would not have been able to write one of my favorite pieces since we started this here site. Trust me: Covering a win would have been much more enjoyable as a fan, but getting to cover how such a supreme athlete dealt with loss—that, that was one hell of an experience.
- The picture above is of my actual post-game notes that allowed that piece to come to life. [↩]
10 Comments
http://media3.popsugar-assets.com/files/2015/02/23/780/n/1922398/f8f3ef19c41e58e2_Meryl-Streep0AQQj5.xxxlarge/i/Meryl-Streep-Gives-Women-Standing-Ovation.gif
I mean, in comparison with the 12 Days of WFNY Christmas, this new year-end thing kinda feels like a 1-year Membership to the Jelly of the Month Club, but I guess it is the gift that keeps on giving.
In all seriousness, though, this is nice. Well done. Thanks for writing.
lol what is this even
I expected to click on this link and find it empty….
Sorry to disappoint.
http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/wrih.gif
Said elsewhere, but bears repeating. Scott is the guy who makes the rest of us look good, editing not only our text, but formatting/social media engagement/tons of random stuff. What you see on the site has likely passed across his eyes before publishing (unless we snuck something by him). All while being a better writer than most here too (as can be seen from his work shared above).
haha. i liked the Mo Williams piece the best. good work all around.
i tip my cap to SCOTT & all the writers at WFNY …