Glad for what we've got; done with what we've lost
A New Years' Eve note of thanks and excitement
One of my favorite things about New Year’s Eve is how it makes everyone a little bit introspective.
It’s one of the days of the year where it’s OK to look backward and forward at the same time. It’s a chance to reflect on your life - even for just a moment - and take stock in what’s going well and what you’d like to make a little bit better. And I know that New Year’s resolutions don’t work and are often a fool’s errand.1 But I still love the promise and possibility that New Year’s brings.
And with that, a brief note looking back and ahead at Sports Media Guy.
I try not to pay too much attention to numbers on a regular basis, since I’m on record that this is a place for me to riff and noodle and have a writing practice rather than have this be a serious blog about serious topics. I’ve got a day job that I love, so I have the luxury of not caring about numbers.
I’m grateful for every one of you who subscribes, to the nearly 250 new subscribers who’ve joined this year and to those of you who’ve been here since the Tiny Letter days.
Thanks for sharing, commenting, and reading.
SMG’s Most Popular Posts of 2024
Legal sports gambling that you can access on your phone at literally any moment you want it is a whole other ball game.
It’s easy to look back and remember only the good stuff. But there was plenty of bad stuff on Twitter, both individually and collectively.
Breaking news can win you a lot of awards and get you a lot of promotions. But there’s no award you’ll win, no promotion you’ll get, by breaking news that somebody died.
I love the idea of a writing practice. I love the idea of noodling in public, of trying things out, seeing where things go. And I hope you enjoy taking these little trips with me.
I don’t need to talk about the way he revolutionized NBA beat reporting. I don’t need to tell you he’s the best breaking news reporter in sports journalism, if not all of journalism.But a few stories to tell you the kind of person Woj is.
My Favorite Posts of 2024
These didn’t do the the numbers that the ones above did, but I’m really proud of these and really loved writing them.
This one is probably the platonic ideal of a Sports Media Guy post.
Here’s to 2025. Here’s to more rabbit holes, more random history, more learning, and more community. It’s what’s gonna get us through.
The idea is that the calendar is an arbitrary date on which to create life changes, and that if resolutions really worked you’d already be doing the thing you resolved to do. And I get that logic, but it’s always bothered me a bit because it doesn’t allow room and space for people to change, and it feels just one step away from “if you don’t want to be depressed, you should just be less sad.”