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Episode 415: Sam Jefferies, Hammering Out Screed
563 Plays5 months ago
Sam Jefferies is the author of Legacy on Ice: Blake Geoffrion and the Fastest Game on Earth (Univ. of Wisconsin Press).
Sam talks about how he built scenes, folded in the book writing and reporting around his family and day job, listening to tape on commutes to get the material into his bloodstream, and maintaining a sense of individual style without exhausting the reader.
Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm
Show notes: brendanomeara.com
Support: Patreon.com/cnfpod
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Transcript
Introduction & Host's Services
00:00:00
Speaker
Okay, but listen, CNFers, I'm not one for many ads on this show. I don't actively court them. I only do them usually for cross-promotional purposes. The IRS doesn't get involved with that. This show takes a lot of time and part of what keeps the lights on at CNF Pot HQ is if you Yeah, maybe you'll hire me to help edit or coach up your work a generous editor helps you see what you can't see I know that's why so I solicit one if you need help cracking the code man You can email me at creative nonfiction podcast at gmail dot.com and we can start a dialogue. Okay, you know, it was just sliding into two
00:00:43
Speaker
like a hot tub um of weird jumbled memories and then, then, okay, I could actually regurgitate some of it in a way that might make sense.
Interview with Sam Jeffries Begins
00:00:58
Speaker
Oh hey, Cian efforts, it's the creative non-fiction podcast that shows since 2013, where I talk to primarily writers about telling true stories. I'm your host, Brendan O'Meara. Given that the Stanley Cup final is soon to be underway, between the Edmonton Oilers and the Florida Panthers. What better time to air this interview with Sam Jeffries, author of Legacy on Ice, Blake Jeffery on, and The Fastest Game on Earth. It is published by University of Wisconsin Press. Very few people know who Jeffery on is, but imagine a baseball player today being, say, three or four generations removed from, I don't know, Babe Ruth.
00:01:46
Speaker
And that's Blake. His grandfather, boom boom, Jeffrion, depending on who you ask, either invented the slapshot or popularized it. and Maybe that makes Babe Ruth and that analogy all the more germane. home runs were nothing new when Babe Ruth came along, but he certainly popularized and propagated the home run, among other things. Point being, Sam chronicled the burden of this legacy in Blake's injury shortened career as a professional hockey player.
Writing Process and Style
00:02:25
Speaker
And he delves into the mythos around college hockey, specifically in the Midwest, where schools like Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan live and breathe hockey. We talk about how Sam built scenes, folded in his book writing and reporting around his family and day job, listening to tape on commutes to get the material into his bloodstream, and maintaining a sense of individual style without, you know, exhausting the reader. show notes to this episode and more at BrendanOmero.com hey where you can also sign up for my Rage Against the Algorithm newsletter. I might be upping the frequency of the newsletter as I continue my emigration from social media. That's going to be
00:03:11
Speaker
You know, there's some experimentation in there as I try to promote a forthcoming book without social media at all. I will lean on the permission assets of the newsletter in this podcast.
Social Media and Listener Engagement
00:03:24
Speaker
Far more valuable than trying to get into the attention industrial complex that is social media. Plus, it just makes me feel crappy all the time. why would i so It's like, yeah would you have an alcoholic go into a bar and ah for the and say, well, it's good for your career to be in this bar, even though it's tempting and bad for the alcoholic to even be there. That's kind of my analogy of it. It's just bad for me to be there. And I'm not good, quote, at social media.
00:04:03
Speaker
That's neither here nor there. i I'm going off script, you can tell. If you dig this pod, this show, consider sharing it or leaving a review on Apple Podcast. If you do, I will coach up a piece of your writing of up to 2,000 words, words, words. email the show at Creative Nonfiction Podcasts with a screenshot of your review once it posts, and then we'll start a dialogue there. This is often a great way for you to get a sense of what it's like for me to edit on a bigger scale so you can get a little a little appetizer of it. And if you kind of like how it goes, you can consider hiring me. It's okay. We do okay.
Sam Jeffries' Background
00:04:46
Speaker
Okay, so Sam is a communications professional and freelancer based out of Seattle. His work has appeared in the Seattle Times, Sports Business Journal, Newsweek, and elsewhere. And yeah, so we're gonna get to that. We are. Parting shot on adriftness and a blood pressure reading of 146 over 93. So let's get into it, CNFers. I think I hear the crashing of the boards.
00:05:24
Speaker
w email address I thought you were like a total like, you know, West west Coast, you know, Seattle alum. I didn't realize until I read the bio in the back of your book that, you know, that you went to Wisconsin or University of yeah Wisconsin. Yeah. I'm from the Northwest originally and then I went to the Midwest and and then was gone 12 years total from the West Coast and came back. So um I'm home now, but yeah. i I spent a fair bit of time on the ground in Madison, that's for sure. Yeah. What was the the draw to head head that way for you? So I had two uncles play hockey for Wisconsin. I had kind of, a actually, um a cousin of mine founded the The Onion, the newspaper The Onion, on campus in Madison, yeah, back in 1988. And so there's there's a bit of a family tradition that Selma had moved away from and then I moved back too.
00:06:21
Speaker
Did you overlap with Blake then when you were? I did. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Three or four years.
Influences in Sports Journalism
00:06:27
Speaker
So I saw him play and I was there during his senior season during the Hobie Baker year. And so when you were when you were at Wisconsin, were were you focused on sports journalism at the time? Not at all. No, I was ah history and political science majors. I definitely got bitten by the political bug and love sports was a hockey season ticket holder, went to a ton of football and basketball. But um sports journalism wasn't
00:07:00
Speaker
wasn't really on my radar at all and and not the career path I've chosen either. And it was something that truly creative nonfiction in the sports realm was something that I found after college and then you know couldn't couldn't put enough of it up my nose. yeah Yeah, with ah respect to that, I always love finding out like that, you know, be it ah a book or a magazine article, something that you read it and it just like totally like turned your world from black and white in the color. And I've got stories and books that did that to me. And so for you, since you kind of came into it, and not as a career choice, it it just kind of lit you up in some way. You know, what were some of those pieces that you're like, oh, shit, like this is this is amazing.
00:07:48
Speaker
The last American hero is Junior Johnson ah by Tom Wolf, who, which he wrote for Esquire, blew my hair back. It's in it's in Best American Sports Writing in the Century. and it is gratuitous new journalism in every sense of the word and just flying along in pages and pages around on sentences and really indulgent as far as ah you know color after color after color in a single paragraph and I was so hooked and it was it was so absolutely unbelievable and and there are others I've since found I mean I i remember
00:08:32
Speaker
the weekend of the Mayweather Pacquiao fight, ah ordering a bunch of Norman Mailer and W.C. Hines and getting really into you know that kind of golden era of boxing, sports journalism. But I never forget first, right? I will always, always remember ah Tom Wolfe on Junior Johnson talking about ah the the move from the bootleggers to you know the dirt track stock car racing in the South. and i I think I've been to one car race in my life. It's not really something I have any interest in, but that story made the hair stand up in the back of my neck. Is that something you revisit from time to time? so Oh yeah, absolutely. it Minimum once a year and and that's definitely part of my writing process too is I would really to get things going would go back and and look at some of the
00:09:30
Speaker
stand out pieces for me like in the history of sports journalism. And that's one of them where I could go and I could read three paragraphs and just be keyed to the moon and then and then sit in front of the laptop and start absolutely hammering out screed. Yeah. It's kind of like, you know, in a like an acapella group gets up there and they like blow into that whistle tuner or whatever that is. And then they go off and sing. It's kind of like that. right and Absolutely. Absolutely. yeah Same thing. and And yeah, you hear that one note. and And that story for
Covering Sports - Challenges and Opportunities
00:10:02
Speaker
me and others too, but but that story in particular will always will always bring me back in key.
00:10:09
Speaker
I've been, ah yeah just through the research I've been doing, I've been in the Sports Illustrated vault, you know, reading a lot of the stuff from the late 60s, early 70s. And just the, those stories were just so, so good, so tight and voice driven and evocative. And I'm always like, how do they get these these quotes and paint these scenes? Like this was such a golden age of sports journalism in that era. I mean, not entirely representative, but at least the writing was just so good. Absolutely, absolutely. No, they they could really write their socks off. and And, you know, I think for me, sports agnostic, right? Do it in a way that made crew and made stock car racing and made, ah you know, whatever it was just as interesting as, for me, more core sports like hockey or baseball, things that I consider myself a fan of.
00:11:05
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's important, too, especially if if people even nowadays want to try to break into sports writing or anything. It's like try to find something that's a bit esoteric around the fringes, ah mainly because they don't get as much coverage. So you might get greater access, like similar to you. Like even though hockey is so main mainstream, it's not as mainstreamy as football and basketball or even baseball. So it's kind of like you can kind of get your way in. to the and get some access is that something that uh you experience with especially with your blake jeffrey on story oh very much so that i mean hockey is a niche sport and that's only not true in canada right and and for me canada was harder to break into getting the superstars on the phone was more difficult but in the united states i i could talk to pretty much anyone i wanted blake was a big help for that for sure but
00:12:00
Speaker
It's a fairly small community. The sports writer and then the coaches carousels and even smaller community around that. And then you know there I was looking today, you know you have college teams that are flying around on planes around the country playing in these unbelievable state of the art arenas and yet they're still farming out broadcasting or stat keeping to volunteers or to, you know, guys who are essentially hometown stringers. And and then those guys are are just treasure troves of stories and information and, and ah you know, history that all lives upstairs. So that's um um that was definitely an asset for me, for sure. And circling back to him a moment ago about talking about Tom Wolfe and like the indulgent ah over the top ah writing in, you know, it's it's
00:12:55
Speaker
that over stylized stuff can be really you know it's it's exciting to read ah but can also be very dangerous as a writer as you try to maybe impersonate it a little bit because only a few people can dance close to that to that fire and ah you know just for you over the course of your the writing you've done have you noticed that you sometimes flew too close to that sun you're like ah I can't I I'm gonna fall to earth without a doubt without a doubt I remember very distinctly a friend of mine had read an early draft I think of as of a single chapter and He said if you write like this for a whole book You're gonna wear everybody out and I thought that that really stuck with me Is it that I can I could write it all like that and I think I can do it pretty well ah but
00:13:48
Speaker
pretty well and Tom Wolfe are two different things and it it is
Book Writing like Filmmaking
00:13:54
Speaker
exhausting to read. I mean, it it really, it does drain you, your you know, your eyes, your brain, your heart as it's skipping along ah to read a story like that that's written in that style all the time. And I think that was actually really helpful to say, okay, it's not that I can't, I can even do this and make it incredibly compelling, but I I'm not writing a magazine piece, I'm writing a book and I gotta give people an opportunity to breathe too. Yeah, it's kind of like the like an action movie if it's just non-stop action. is right We do need some moments to slow down. Right, right, and then you know every car gets blown up and then it's never special, right? You don't miss the Aston Martin because you're on to the next one.
00:14:39
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. It's kind of like the last John Wick movie. ah John Wick four is just like constant ah ah action and murder. and And I was like, all right, we we need to slow down a little bit. Nope. We're definitely not slowing down at all. You got a budget and we're going to spend it, right? Exactly. We're going out with a bang. yeah Now, ah getting access to to people, you know especially at the start of a book project, can be really, really hard. And it's so important to get that get that first one.
00:15:12
Speaker
and ah in Just so happens I think the first one happened to be your central figure and that ended up just that really opens up the door for you so maybe let's just talk a little bit about how you were able to curry access to to to Blake and how you lobbied him to be like ah this is this is what I'd love to do and how I'd like to handle it. Yeah, honestly I think it's two-part. One, the way I did it the first time and then two, how very late in the process he ended up really finally trusting me and and opening up ah in ways that he hadn't before and and being
00:15:47
Speaker
and forthcoming the way I needed him to be. But early on, i mean I did a ton of research. I really wasn't talking to a lot of people, but doing all of the you know archival research and going back and watching the game film that I could and reading Gamers and ah you know examining his career and and then building a pitch case that I think
00:16:13
Speaker
you know ends up being similar to to a query for a publisher, but for the subject. And then when I did finally approach him, that the chase was its own story, and and I have actually been doing book promotion with him. I've heard a funny wrinkle about it. I ended up finding an email address for him, writing what I thought was a very compelling outreach email, which said in part, i think your story is being forgotten it had been
00:16:44
Speaker
you know almost ten years since he'd played and i obviously i wrote a book about the man i think he is an incredibly compelling story that deserves to be told but it was not it was there was an old ESPN the magazine piece from back in the day that John Buchagrass had written and that was it and so that that was part of my opening and then also trying to emphasize to him some of the extraordinary elements of his path that it's it was unusual in ways that even he hadn't thought of and that probably are impossible to see if you're living it rather than watching it. And that was enough for at least the first conversation and then really
Gaining Trust and Access
00:17:29
Speaker
making that pitch. But he ended up telling me later that, because I had simultaneously reached out to the em University of Wisconsin as well looking for contact information,
00:17:39
Speaker
And the long-time athletic director, Barry Alvarez, who's a very famous figure in college sports, called him, and he said, hey, there's some guy named Sam Jeffery sniffing around asking to try and get a hold of you. Are you comfortable with ah sharing your contact information? And like I had gotten my email you know the same week, and and he I think he kind of laughed and said, you know what? I'll i'll email him back. But thanks for the heads up. So I've i've only heard and only heard that story since the book has come out but you know it took forever and ever to get him to open up and to give me longer answers and and he was willing to give me access to anyone and everyone introduced me to coaches and trainers and players and guys who were still in NHL. and
00:18:27
Speaker
NHL coaches and and you know senior international hockey figures and that type of thing. But you know the real truth about what he went through and and how hard his injury recovery was and all these very challenging paths that he was kind of forced to take. He didn't open up until I had spoken to his wife several times, his now wife, his long-time girlfriend, and ah his his parents, but his mother specifically. And it was only when I could come back to him and share some of those details that he finally said implicitly, if not explicitly, okay, I can i can really give this guy that the straight answers.
00:19:10
Speaker
Yeah, I always go back to Richard Ben Cramer, you know, longtime Esquire writer, ah what well wrote maybe the greatest profile of all time on Ted Williams. And he was always big on, you know, finding the the women to talk to. They just have, ah they just, for what they just tend to note. ah they're more detail oriented in general, a painting with a broad brush. But like you talked to them, it's just like the details are so much more vibrant, you know, like dudes, especially athletes, who's like, yeah, whatever, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But when you talk to when you talk to girlfriends or wives or or whatever, and you you start to really see, ah see what they see and they see things up ah just a lot differently. And that just really rounds out the picture.
00:19:54
Speaker
Oh, yeah. And to be clear, Richard Ben Kramer is very much on my shelf of, you know, ah guys I need to hoover up, writers I need to hoover up to to get my engine started riding. But it is so true. and And I really found that in a big way. and Now his mom telling me about getting his original skating instructor 20 years later ah to come to his contract signing at his elementary school.
00:20:29
Speaker
when you He could barely tell me the year he'd signed his first contract and and she's telling me what the picture looked like and where they went to the framing store to get it pictured and and and then what it was like, one of my favorite details, doing his laundry when he was a professional. and NHL hockey player, but living at home when he was in Nashville because he'd been drafted by his hometown team, and here she is, ah you know, laundering some of his gear just as she did when he was in the Peewee's. But yeah, as the women talk to the women, I im i write that on my forehead. it is That was such a ah true truism for sure.
00:21:10
Speaker
And the thing you said about Blake too, in lobbying him to tell the story about how you know you his story and i was being forgotten, and that that harkens back to what you know when I spoke with Howard Bryant about his Ricky Henderson biography. and Part of him lobbying you know Ricky was telling him like, listen, like the people who know who you are are probably like kind of in their 50s, maybe in their 40s. And it's just like, people are going to forget. And we need to keep these stories alive. And it falls on the, fall falls at the feet of ah journalists and biographers to to ultimately do that. And, you know, ah Ricky ended up kind of pulling the plug on some of the access that Howard had. But that's part of the
00:21:55
Speaker
Part of lobbying these people to is just like you might think that people aren't gonna forget but people will inevitably forget so it's really important to. Kind of drive that home cuz that's how these books are what's gonna keep say blake story alive. Yeah, well Blake's story and the story of college hockey at that time and and you know when he understood that by telling his story I could tell his team's story and the program's story and and all these elements, his family's story, then I think he understood ah that it was it could be indulgent without being selfish to to tell it to me and have me tell it.
Family Legacy and Pressure
00:22:33
Speaker
Yeah, the that's the that's the other thing too. like Any good biography is not just about the central figure. It's about the world building and the ecosystem. and like So maybe speak to that about the world that you created here that is that goes beyond Blake. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think that the family element is so important and it's big part of what drew me to him that he's the first fourth generation NHL player. You know, maybe the last. What a bizarre and remarkable thing. ah But then on top of that, the story.
00:23:10
Speaker
between generations of of expectation and and weight of a legacy, however big or small that is. I mean, for him, it it is big. Of course, his grand grandfather and his grandfather are both in the Hall of Fame. Grandfather invented the slap shot. I mean, the guy played under the banners of... you know two of the patriarchs of his family in the most storied arena in professional hockey. like that's That's a crazy thing, but also his father dropped the ball and and ended up, ah you know for circumstances some of which I get in the book, busting out of the league. and I thought that was so much more resonant. and no but you know how How many of us have famous
00:23:59
Speaker
fathers or grandfathers or great-grandfathers. It's fairly unusual, but to inherit a family story or family history that is ah where the link has been broken or or you know it's been tarnished in some ways and there would be an expectation on you as the next generation to, ah whether it's bring it back or make it better or or you know change the the trajectory of where your family's headed and You know in the in the kind of grand American tradition that was so incredible and compelling to me and that's what.
00:24:39
Speaker
I really wanted to dig into when I found out about it. I mean, it was uncomfortable too because I ah really came to like his dad, his father's an incredible storyteller. He's got this great French Canadian accent and he can talk for hours. He's got one-liners and he's incredibly generous with how he talks about things and and you know a lot more. um Candid than than I really ever found Blake to be until very late in the process. Part of what he handed to to his son and you know that it kind of fell to Blake to to repair was was a legacy, was ah a family history both recent and further their back that and needed some repairing.
Life After Sports
00:25:25
Speaker
And that went so far beyond hockey and went so far beyond
00:25:31
Speaker
bla story and I think ended up being a real central part of of what the book became. Yeah, yeah it you could replace hockey with like inheriting the family bricklaying business. Absolutely. Right. Like it's that that kind of pressure that someone's like, all right, are you going to take up the family thing or are you going to do your own do your own thing? And then you got to shoulder possibly that that guilt that may be like, all right, I can't I can't do this any longer. I need to kind of find my own identity.
00:26:03
Speaker
Yeah, yeah and you know there's I think it's true for a lot of immigrant stories as well where you have first generation immigrants who come to you know come to the United States really hungry and entrepreneurial and ambitious and some of that ambition you know goes away over time and it it does it falls to that third or fourth generation to consider what what they need to do with it and what they're compelled to do with it and whether they want to walk away entirely. in your interactions with Blake, did you find that that when it when his career was over and it kind of it ended you know pretty ah like much shorter than he would have wanted because of injury, but did you send get a sense of relief ah from him when it ended? Yeah, I think it was really telling for me
00:26:53
Speaker
He gets injured, he goes on a bit of a ah mental rehab vacation. We go to Mexico, they stay on the beach. ah Him and his fiancee at the time is now wife. And it was one of the first vacations, is their first vacation ever together. And it was one of the first vacations I think he'd been on in a very, very long time. And that's that's elite youth athletes in, in across North America today, right? As you get you get identified at a really young age, even beyond North America, but it identified at a really yeah young age, and then all you do is play that sport all the time for 20 years, and you don't really have any friends left who aren't hockey friends or baseball friends or soccer friends or whatever it is, and you that that is your entire identity, and and so I think
00:27:51
Speaker
He ended up going into hockey after and becoming a professional scout and has since moved away from that. And I think I've sensed more and more of that relief, even as I've started, uh, even as I had started the book research process, because that all consuming nature and weight and, and identity being centered in, you know, what's relatively simple game is a lot to carry.
The Value of Lesser-known Stories
00:28:18
Speaker
Yeah. And when you were having. ah conversations i don't know with ah you know with him and you always say you he's often go back to people and and ah in talking with people. and it's ah what What was the most you know challenging thing for you just as the as the reporter and researcher, you know be it making cold calls or going back to people? you know what What did you find is the some some of the more challenges unique to to your process or youre this this book?
00:28:49
Speaker
Yeah, yeah you know I think one of the things that I fell victim to was chasing more famous names and thinking that they were the key to the story. Patrick Kane is one that that stands out for me where he you know is one of the great American players of all time and you know three times Stanley Cup winner. and and a TVSA superstar internationally, all of these things. And he was Blake's roommate when they were in high school at the National Teen Development Program. And I really, I think, put so much weight for me into that level of interview, right? Oh, look at this access that I get to an NHL superstar who's willing to talk to me. And and he didn't have very much to say.
00:29:40
Speaker
and and And that was such a blow and it happened a few times elsewhere where I had gotten head coaches, I had gotten you know yeah ESPN type figures or or others like that. And they added very little to to the book that I was trying to write, the research that I was trying to do, and finding instead that two or three coaches before who had been fired and was disgruntled and was willing to ah you know be a little more gloves off and say, sure, they stabbed me in the back. I'll tell you whatever you want to ask. i'm bouncing around in the back of a bus, you know going across South Dakota coaching some junior B team. you know Those were the great stories, but it really took so long for me to learn that that it's frankly irrelevant how
00:30:35
Speaker
successful or what a big name you are in this process because if you're not that valuable as a source, you're not maybe you're still in the game and you're not willing to give quotes or um maybe it's just your personality where you you know you live and breathe this sport and stepping back and talking about it in a little more poetic or raw way, whatever the case may be, just isn't a muscle that you have. I chased this one trainer yeah forever. It was a long time trainer for one of the programs that Blake was involved with and I finally got a hold of him. I'll never forget it. I was in a bookstore picking out a
00:31:15
Speaker
five-year-old birthday gift that my daughter could take to a birthday party. And and this guy who had been chasing for weeks finally calls me and says, whatever, I'm going to hit record on my app and and I'm going to take this call. And I hung up after about five minutes because it it was just, there was nothing to be had there.
Balancing Writing with Life
00:31:34
Speaker
And and I don't know if it was because he had been around other players who had also succeeded or he just, you know, was a guy born to full towels. I don't know what it was, but that was such a blow, right? And and you spend so much time trying to schedule, especially for me not having as much luxury about... my own daytime schedule, ah trying to do that and and getting them on the phone and and just, ah you know, just romancing the stone. Yeah, the it's the worst when you think you got someone good and then they just, like you they're maybe born to full towels.
00:32:11
Speaker
yeah Like, oh damn, like it seemed like that person would be like the one who would like, he would know. Sure, he's seen it all. Yeah. When, ah you know, given that you have like ah a you know day job and a family, i I know a lot of people who do this kind of work, they don't necessarily have the luxury to be like, just doing the book. all the time etc and you've been able to you know fold your reporting in your research in your writing around the very full life so like what was the kind of the shape of your days like when you're in the midst of it.
00:32:45
Speaker
Yeah, you know, I think some of it was trying to buy myself time to then use later and be flexible. And so I worked East Coast hours for a little while. I'm i'm on the West Coast so ah now, but I was working East Coast hours for some of it. And so I'd get up at five and I'd work from five to seven so that I could do what was essentially a lunch hour interview, right? And be able to hop off or or spend you know time in the middle of the day re-reading newspaper articles or watching game film or re-reading my own notes, whatever it was, and that I found was helpful and also just helpful as a motivation. like Listen, you wake up at 4.30, you work from 5 to 7,
00:33:31
Speaker
You know, you you really bought that time back for yourself. You better damn well use it. And so that was motivating for me too, in addition to just ah good time management. And then the writing was always at night. I'm obviously listening to your podcast forever. I've heard a million people who are. 500 words before the crack of dawn or whatever it is that their their system that is not me It doesn't matter how much how much tom wolf if I read I'm not gonna write early in the morning but you know, I would I would put my kids down and they'd be down my eight o'clock and and disappear downstairs and I'd write from 8 to 11 and and then I then I'd be absolutely hosed because I was so
00:34:13
Speaker
you know jacked on the on the writing that i couldn't turn my brain off and i'd be going a million miles an hour i remember reading this great michael lewis story about. ah He almost missed missed the birth of one of his kids because he was but writing a book on deadline trying to get it done before first child was born and you know. writing at night and then knocking himself out with a few glasses of cheap red wine so that he could sleep and and Turn his writer's brain off and I really felt that but so, you know, there was some sleep deprivation for sure but I found that that 8 to 11 p.m. Window was my sweet spot to to write and then I think the other part of fitting in because i I've recorded all of my interviews on on an app and
00:35:02
Speaker
I'd tape a call and then they're housed in the app and I could re-listen to them. So I would actually listen on my commute in preparation for riding that night. I'm headed home, I'm moving between meetings, whatever it was and I'd pop it in as I'm driving around. and re-listen to that, and there's a cruelty to that. I loathe the sound of my own voice, ironic, as I'm doing a podcast right now. I know. Me too, dude. Me too. Well, listen to you as a trip, because I listen to my podcast on time and a half, and so I've been conditioned to that sound of your voice for years now, but yeah, that was so helpful. Okay, I know I'm gonna be writing about
00:35:48
Speaker
You know, 1999 and the creation of this USA hockey program, I'm going to go back and I'm going to listen to that Jordan Leopold ah interview on the drive home and remember it and refresh myself with those details. And then, so when eight o'clock comes, it's all top of mind and I can bang, bang, bang and knock out whatever is at me that day. Yeah, the that's something I wish i I might still do that. That's something I wish I've done more because you have just like so many hours of tape, some of which you haven't even listened to. You don't even know where some of the information even is anymore. And you just like listen to it and you just let it like infuse your brain and it's like, okay. like
00:36:30
Speaker
Yeah, like, oh, there's this detail here. And I've read my manuscript 6000 times. So I basically can recite that by heart. And it's like, oh, you got this new detail, you're like, I know exactly where to go in it. And you just like, you know, take a little bit of that paint and you'll you know layer in a little more color. And it's just like, but yeah it's the redundancy, building those redundancies in is a great way to just ensure that all that work you've done doesn't go to waste. Yeah, and and that you're not reading it too, right? Because same, you know, I had read my manuscript so many times, I i tried all the tricks, I put it in a different font, I'd print it out, it looked the same to me. And and then reading the transcript, I transcribed some interviews and it had the same effect, but the listening was a real help because it was, you know, it was just sliding into
00:37:18
Speaker
two like a hot tub um of weird jumbled memories and then then, okay, I could actually regurgitate some of it in a way that might make sense. Yeah. And I love hearing you, the way you structured your days with these really tight windows, to be it to watch game film, me read stuff or write. And, you know, a lot of people, I think, um maybe underestimate the amount of work they can get done in a tight window, if that's all you got and you can really focus. Like I bet, you know, I always sometimes tell people just to set a timer for as little as like 10 to 20 minutes.
00:37:53
Speaker
so yeah you Just do that and you'll be surprised what you can get done and then that momentum builds on itself. So is was that something you've always been good at or just something that you really coached yourself to do especially for this just given the shape of your life? ah it Both. both um I had to do that for a long time, you know especially in the professional space and you know really being a time limited on why how I can respond to things and and you know um writing under a deadline, not in a reporting sense, but in a professional sense. um but But that is accelerated in a big way.
00:38:32
Speaker
you know with with family life um and with kids in particular and and so I took that on and applied it in a very rigorous way and it served me very well because every once in a while I feel okay I had good momentum on Friday or Thursday and I'm gonna roll in into Saturday and I'm a dedicated chunk to my day and you know that's when I ended up goofing off and I'd read you know too many pages of somebody else's book and I'd i'd get too lost and you know in their stylistic attributes attributes or I'd have stuck on me a single sentence that probably didn't even belong in there at all and I'd i'd spend an hour trying to to
Writing Techniques and Scene Construction
00:39:15
Speaker
fix it. So it it really served me well to to have been forced to be regimented in that way.
00:39:22
Speaker
and I think if I had a deadline for the book, it would have even you know it would have even been more accelerated in you know kind of a healthy fashion. And just as you've put down a lot of words and you know it started to you just develop as as a writer and everything, but you know who has given you or what is some advice that you've stumbled across, be it in a book or from you know just as someone you respect that ah yeah that has really helped you you know propel you forward to finish this book and hopefully be able to sort of take this one and light light the cigarette of the next book? Sure, sure. so
00:40:02
Speaker
Well, you know, early on, I remember speaking of Glenn Stout, talking to Glenn Stout, and that was that was a really cool moment in and of itself. And I remember him telling me, you know, that when you go into describe a scene, and a sports scene in particular, because these games, game after game, start to sound exactly the same, and it's it's a crazy almost hypocrisy, where on the one hand, the only reason this guy deserves a book is because of what he did in the sport he played. And on the other hand, when you get to writing it, you hear from people, they don't actually want to hear as much about the sport. They don't want to they want to reread about games. They want to read about the guy and the human nature that ended up being complicated and compelling and and everything else. and But I remember Glenn telling me,
00:40:53
Speaker
the need to put yourself in multiple angles when you're retelling sports scenes in particular. Player, opposing player, referee or coach. fan and media and thinking about that in that way was such a useful was such a useful part of an exercise for me and then I could then say okay that makes sense because if I do this all
00:41:25
Speaker
from this thick blade of Blake Jeffery on, and it's going to be like watching a GoPro, which is the most boring video in the world. you know it's It's got to be more than that. It's got to be somebody from ah somebody sitting in the stands and and thinking about it from a fan standpoint or an opponent or you know any of those those positions that I just rattled off. And then another one, I don't want to give away your milk for free, Brendan, but you know, it's some of the advice that you gave me and the
00:42:01
Speaker
Getting away from Blake was such a danger zone and and finding ways to insert him back into the narrative. I mean, even thinking about this conversation and and kicking the book open, I remember I have, there's a section when I'm essentially covering American <unk> rocki from the late 90s to the mid 2000s and he ends up joining this program in the mid 2000s. There's a big chunk of time which is really important and is relevant but doesn't mention him. And going back and being able to include a sentence about, you know, like Jeff Brown was 12 years old at the time and
00:42:42
Speaker
these kinds of games were out of even his ability to envision, but everything that happened influenced everything that happened after, including the trajectory he ended up on. I wrote it better than that, but that's the essence of it. yeah And you know that was advice from you that I thought was so powerful in finding ways to bring him back in and to Tetris this thing back together in a way that reminded people of of why a story about him could carry these other tales.
00:43:15
Speaker
I love how you brought up a the Glenn's way of like triangulating a scene from all those different angles. and ah you know Something I've wanted to do more with people on the show too is to try to maybe ah pick out a scene from the book and like how and kind of deconstruct it and how you built it. So I don't know if there's a scene that pops up in your head in the book that where you were able to deploy a lot of those ah Techniques to be able to really round out something so if if something stands out to you I'd love to hear how you you know went about it and used all those different resources to make something that was really evocative.
00:43:50
Speaker
Yeah, I'll tell you exactly what I mean. it's It's a scene where he where Blake gets injured, and he those who haven't read the book, first of all, go read the book. But um second of all, ah second of all it's you know it is such a pinnacle scene, and this is everything he's worked for. and and and Worked for or not. This is really the life he's ever known snatched away from him because of a freak accident and I interviewed teammates I interviewed coaches and but really hopefully the
00:44:25
Speaker
Montreal Canadiens beat reporter for the Montreal Gazette which the English language daily in Montreal was at that game but as a fan and so and then end up covering it because he was He was in the stands and so he told me this story through both. Okay, I got fan and I have reporter bang bang all-in-one because The guy's a 30 year beat reporter and and he's a master of, ah you know, differentiating those perspectives himself. And then his parents were in in attendance as well in a bizarre twist of fate. he's um He's got brothers, they were playing collegiate hockey too. And they happened to fly up to Montreal on their way to Boston, seeing one kid before seeing another and in a very like parents at Little League tournament kind of way, which is funny because he's playing pro hockey at the time. So I get to hear their perspective and then I talked to the trainer who originally examined him and then the surgeon who examined him and also watched the game footage to understand what he was dealing with before before opening him up.
Book Promotion and Editorial Independence
00:45:33
Speaker
And that was such, I i remember writing the scene, to it oh both opens and kind of closes the book and then going back
00:45:47
Speaker
and trying to more intensely apply that triage perspective in this in the second recounting because my interviews had been so rich and because that camera one, camera two ah perspective lent itself in so many ways to a moment that he couldn't remember because the guy the guy who was playing a hockey game and woke up you know essentially two days later in a hospital. there's in the movie pixar movie ratatoule one of my favorite movies
00:46:19
Speaker
there's a deleted scenes with ah with commentary from the director brad bird and it's one of the great great attributes of that particular commentary because he's really explaining as much as there was a good scene why it needed to go and it was and I bring that up because I wonder if there was just something that that you wrote and reported in this book that it just didn't you loved it but it just ultimately it it had to go as much as you invested in it you know what I mean
00:46:53
Speaker
Oh, I know what you mean, and it's not one thing, it's 20,000 things. They cut 20,000 words from, you know, look what they did to my boy, you know. ah it it was It was awful. I turned in my first draft, even the draft that you and I worked on together, and they said, no, no, no, no, no. None of this works. You got it. I'll take it all out. And some of it they were right about, and some of it they were really wrong about. And I have since been validated in kind of fighting to keep um portions of it because
00:47:30
Speaker
I knew they were wrong and and i had fortunately I had talked to you or I had talked to you know ah other ah one other close friend who was involved in the process and they said, you know, this is you at your best and and this is this is great writing that is important to the story. And so I was able to kind of defend that but man, I sacrificed a lot of of pros to get there and um my last one, on the last, The last cut that that I will never forget is the the what they call the water bottle game, which is in the early 80s. There's a massive fight between Wisconsin and North Dakota. Somebody got sprayed with a water bottle and ended up being in this brawl, and they there were fights with the cops in the stands. and ah it was For me, one, it's just a cool story, but two, a reminder of how far we
00:48:26
Speaker
have moved away from ah kind of rough and tumble collegiate athletics to a world and where you know these these nineteen year old kids got a camera crew following around in every movie that broadcasts the world and and all that. and yeah These guys are brawling in the beer garden. and and you know they They sent him home. It was just, you know, it was a little more wild west at the time. The taking an out part was so hard because my non-player angle in that story and in telling that scene, there was a guy named Robin Dringa who, he was a 13-year-old stick boy at the time, having to be neighbors with the coach and, you know, was sitting on the bench. It was like a bat boy would in a dugout in baseball. And so he ends up in this brawl. There's grown men fighting around him, all wearing skates. and spilling over in the stands and they're fighting the fans. He told me this story in this amazing and compelling and fun way and then ended up going on to be co-captain on a national championship winning team at Wisconsin. One of my favorite interviews of the whole process and then he passed away from cancer before the book was published.
00:49:37
Speaker
really young, I think he was 53 and ah left behind a fairly young family and I had to leave his storytelling on the cutting room floor and at where yes, you know, ultimately it was right, you know, that it it didn't serve and the needs of the narrative at that time but, you know, there was a real cost to it and i I've shared the book with his widow and She shared it with his kids, and I was so privileged to have been able to tell this th story and tell that, and and I shared with her the portions that had been cut, but she's the only one who's seen them, and and and that was just such a loss.
00:50:21
Speaker
Yeah, and some of the the book promo and marketing you're doing is it kind of in conjunction with Blake as well. And and that is that strikes me as certainly unique in that usually you don't see like the the writer and like the central figure like you know just together on the scene. Usually afterwards, you're just like, Tracy Kidder once said he saw one of his central figures in a book, and he's just like ah a he saw that in public. He's like, what are you doing? like Get back in my book. like Get back there where you belong. and uh but yeah but you're you know you and blake are kind of like uh you know co-pilot on this and and co for the event not that this is yeah that's totally you know what i mean so what what's that dynamic uh like for you uh bizarre has been absolutely bizarre i mean i am sitting next to the guy
00:51:10
Speaker
telling a story, having told a story about what he didn't become, right? I mean, what he failed to achieve and not because of lack of hard work, it's a freak injury, but either way, it's it's um something that really it was taken away from him, and ah it is so strange to sit next to a guy and and then say that, talk about his thoughts of suicide, talk about all of this, I mean, incredibly dark times in his life, and having him sitting next to me like, don't forget, ah you know buy a copy for your your cousin or whatever, right? It is bizarre. And and then, too, I think,
00:51:54
Speaker
the part for me as a writer that it's been mistaken that we co-wrote the book and we didn't. He offered a ton of access and opened a ton of doors for me, answered my questions but also introduced me to people that you know, would have been much harder to chase down, that type of thing. And, you know, since I think there's been a more apppt to a greater appetite to have us on jointly or do joint book signings and that type of thing, ah which is great for for the book and sales and promotion and all that, but it's still a little like, hey, this was...
00:52:30
Speaker
I did the work. You you know you took some phone calls with me. I did the work. so that's ah That's a little raw, but but he's on the flip side even when yeah we've had interviewers that really are more interested in talking to him than to me. He's brought it back to the book and he is he's kind of been a shameless plugger in that type of thing. So that's really cool. and then and you know I've had some funny moments too where ah we did a joint book signing and he brought his kids and they had
00:53:06
Speaker
They were selling the book at the bookstore. He could buy the book. And then they had you know jot cards where he could just sign his autograph too if people wanted that. And his kids are using them to doodle on, the drawn pictures and things like that. and And I said to his daughter, I go, a lot of people know your daddy. And she goes, yeah, he's famous. And I said, yes, he is. And then she turns to me and she goes, are you famous? And I said, well, I think I am today.
00:53:40
Speaker
um So that's that's been a trip too, right? And and you know talking to to the people around him who are you are interested in the book because it's about the person that's sitting next to me. You know, nowadays, and yeah athletes, by and large, you know, they have the power to really control their own stories. And that's like, whether it's producing documentaries that feature them, it's, it's like, yeah, maybe they'll give you one little like nose picker detail. But by and large, it's, it's to make them look great, be it the last dancer,
00:54:16
Speaker
whatever Tom Brady's doing lately or ah or whatever. And so how important is it for for for us and even just for you as a reader and a writer to like to be a biographer of someone that is divorced from yeah there you know their capacity to editorial ah ah editorially control that message? Yeah, I mean, I haven't been on the other side of it, and nobody asked me to produce The Last Dance, and I'm sure whoever did got paid quite well what ah you know what a phenomenon that was. But I felt that retaining that truth control was so important. And you know Blake and I went back and forth on a ah couple of different stories, and what to include, and how to frame things. and And he wasn't wild about some of the stories that I had
00:55:10
Speaker
chosen to include. and ah My favorite was a portrait of a coach of his, which was less than flattering. and He ended up wanting me to connect with the coach, and I got more from his story and ended up being such a ah better part of the book because he was uncomfortable with it. but i i mean I do think retaining that editorial independence is is so critical.
Recommended Reads and Reflections
00:55:33
Speaker
Although I will say it's true for both the subject, and in my instance, it's true for the publisher who had a very different vision and wanted me to shoehorn in certain topics ah that i I felt would be inappropriate. Things like ah discussion of CTE and stuff like that, which is you know definitely deserves all the research and attention it's getting, but ah is not relevant to a guy who took a skate to the head. We're just talking about very different head injuries. and so
00:56:03
Speaker
I felt myself retaining that editorial independence in two directions, and and I felt that both were equally important. Very nice. Well, Sam, as you know, I love to bring these conversations down for a landing by asking the guests for a recommendation of some kind. Just anything you're excited about. So I would just like to pose that to you as we bring this airliner down for a landing. landing Yeah. um You know, ah it's not... Well, I guess the nonfiction one, because we're on the Creative Nonfiction Podcast, that I would recommend is this book called Shadow Divers. I don't know if you've ever heard of this, but no it was, I believe, it's self-published, and it is ah Shadow Drivers, the true adventures of two Americans who risked everything to solve one of the last mysteries of World War II.
00:56:56
Speaker
and I came out in 2004 and I'd never heard of it. I don't know ah who the author is, um not a not a name you know in the community or anything and it ended up being exactly what it says. i you know Label on the can is correct, right? that these divers, these recreational divers, ah discovered this unbelievable World War II mystery in the North Atlantic and they did it in the most rinky-dink way. And I, you know, talking about, I don't care about diving, just like I don't care about stock car racing. And this book was was cool. It was something else. It was cool in kind of a treasure hunting way. It was cool in a in the in the writing and in the
00:57:41
Speaker
you know the ah depth of characters for the guys who were ah involved in the discovery and reclamation and and in the history as well. So that was yeah that was a surprise, but ah definitely a diamond in the rock for sure. What's cool about books like that is that they they take you to a place that you've never been before. They build a world. and Totally. Yeah, like I always kind of use it as as an example, the novel Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin that came out like a year or two ago. And it's basically about gaming and gamers and game developers. and
00:58:20
Speaker
ah and And it's not in it's fiction but and the two main characters that the at the forefront of it. like i didn't find them very I just didn't enjoy their presence on the page. he kind of just I found them irritating. But the world that she built in this novel was fascinating enough where I couldn't wait to get back to it. So that's always a great element of any book. And nonfiction can do that in particular. It takes you to this subculture. For sure. no It's almost childlike for me. right where and As a kid, when you really start getting into into reading and understanding what that transportation to another world and another setting and another time, whatever it is, you know a book can do for you. and You lose that as you you get older and you're a reader and are a writer. and and you know I've been through the laundry cycle of publishing and all that.
00:59:13
Speaker
yeah But every once in a while, stumbling on these that you know that have earned that transport for you is a pretty special ah special reminder. Oh, fantastic. Well, Sam, I'm so glad we were able to do this. you We've had a lot of conversations on the phone in the past, and it's nice to get this one on tape, so to speak, to celebrate you know your wonderful book about Blake. So you know thanks for coming on the show, man. No, thank you. And and I don't know if you're going to include this or or not, but for anybody listening, our collaboration could not have been better. And I'm just so deeply grateful for you making this book possible. and I remember you writing to me about feeling like, you know in your own writing, feeling like you were on the five yard line and really you were pinned up against your own goal line. And and I thought, oh, no way for me, right? then No way. because
01:00:06
Speaker
I just need postage and someone's going to give me a Pulitzer. I just need to know where to send it. um and Of course, that ended up not being true. and Eight drafts later, you know there I was finally shipping off a manuscript, but I don't say this casually, facetiously. It would not have been possible without you and your expertise and and ah you know the the collaborative friendship that we built because um you absolutely wrecked my first draft. ah You weren't particularly kind to the later ones either, but it was everything that I needed. And and you know the book that that is sitting next to me is a testament to that.
Host's Gratitude and Personal Reflections
01:00:44
Speaker
Awesome. Well, that's very kind of you to say, but I was always amazed at how fervently and enthusiastically you dove into those edits and those drafts. And like you did, it it's just like you threw yourself at it. And, uh, that's something I've, I've, uh, long admired about your approach to it. It was just like, you took it, you digested it and you fucking ran with it. Yeah, well, you know, better highly coachable player. That's what they always said about me.
01:01:18
Speaker
Awesome, thanks to Sam and thanks to you CNF'ers for for listening and making the show possible I make it for you. I'm setting up one-on-ones for the patreon crew Depending on tiers you there's a ah frequency of one-to-ones and You might want to consider it patreon dot.com slash CNF bot ah for the Patreon crew listeners who have made it this far. At the start of every month, I get that little influx of monies as a result of you, and I just want to say thank you. It's been about two weeks since I submitted my second draft of a prefontaine book to my big book editor, and I've just been kind of floating along, feeling kind of lousy about it. I've been wasting more time than I care to admit.
01:02:09
Speaker
I applied to an entry-level reporting job as an arts and culture reporter, which seems pretty cool, which is always kind of a bummer and to be applying to an entry-level job when you're on the cusp of turning 44. And then yeah the only jobs in journalism these days so seem to be either entry-level or buyout. What a career. ah My days are kind of like picking flowers. i I sample a little of this and pluck from over there. Oh wait, maybe I should go over there. The kitchen is looking a mess. Better clean it. I'm hungry for the 5,000th time today. Better go eat and then feel shame for eating because I know. i
01:02:47
Speaker
Should lose about 10 to 15 LBs at 5'9", 200 pounds. I'm a little thick and I'm built like SpongeBob. We did yet another great O'Mara clean out wow where we go room by room and get rid of shit. We do this at least once a year. I looked at my podcast reading shelf and it's just, you know, it was overflowing. Good problem to have, but overflowing and overwhelming. And, uh, my God, dozens of books that I just have no time to get to. I couldn't get to them when I, when they got to me. Some books dated back all the way to 2018.
01:03:31
Speaker
So I just declared, and this word is kind of hard for me to say, it's something I coined, bookruptcy. Instead of bankruptcy, bookruptcy. If the book was from 2021 or earlier, I got rid of it to the tune of about 75 books. I can sell maybe half of those and get get a little bit of cash just for for fun. ah The remainder went to a network of little free libraries in my community, and admittedly, the the bookshelf now seems manageable for now. As a result of the Great AmeriCleanout, we usually consume a steady amount of boozy goodness ah to make it more bearable and just a little bit more fun.
01:04:09
Speaker
I had about 10 beers over the course of the day, I'm not bragging, ah five IPAs and of elevated alcohol content, and about five coronas, you know, because you've got to rehydrate. I woke the next morning and forgot that I was supposed to donate blood. ah So I shot up out of bed at like 10 to 7 in the morning, so I chugged a liter of water and got down to the blood center just in time.
Health Scare and Lifestyle Changes
01:04:33
Speaker
And the person who, you know, took ah my initial iron readings and then my blood pressure, it read 146 over 93, and she very earnestly looked at me, looked at me in the eye and asked if I was feeling okay. I was like, I feel fine.
01:04:50
Speaker
ah book panics, but otherwise fine. out you know I wasn't even hungover. You would think I would be, but I was such a had all those beers over the course of about 10 hours, so it wasn't like you got that flush of feeling like garbage or being hammered, but still, it took its toll on the body. And that is, that is very binge drinky. Even if you're not getting hammered, that's still a lot of alcohol to put into a body. and And if you go to any reputable medical website, it'll tell you that blood pressure ah reading of that nature is, it's a like stage two, it's at the end. It's at the end of the bell curve where ah there's cause for concern, if not medication, if not multiple medications, as the Mayo Clinic suggested. Now, I'm not even in terrible shape. I'm an active guy in his mid-40s. I could spare to lose 10 to 15 pounds of fat.
01:05:51
Speaker
Probably be hard because I'm at that kind of weight range where it's really hard to even lose one pound because I'm not like I'm not like obese Though BMI would probably Sam obese. I Don't know anymore. I could sweat a bit more on the day-to-day You know, I had a cousin a few years ago who at 36 died from a stroke and maybe he had high blood pressure among other things and I had an uncle who never drank, who definitely had high blood pressure. He was pretty high strong. I consider myself pretty high strong, too. And he dropped dead in the shower and at like age 67, maybe 69. I think it was 69. Either way, in his 60s. And i it might appear that I'm trending toward that direction. And if I'm not careful, I could maybe drop dead at any second.
01:06:48
Speaker
And I go back to donate blood in eight weeks. I do this every eight weeks. I consider it did the introverts community service. And i I will not binge drink as he did the day before. I probably will scale way back on alcohol if not abstaining altogether. I have no problem doing that. I sometimes go months on end without without alcohol at all. And I always, I always thank myself on a Saturday morning, you know, waking up at, say, six or six thirty, like, wow, I, I don't have that gross mouth feel of having had too many things to drink the night before. I don't have that weird foggy, grogginess upon. I wake up sharp and kind of re-energize. I'm like, wow, that's, tomorrow me never regrets not drinking.
01:07:36
Speaker
almost never, like almost unilaterally never. And so I'll try to you know drop ah ah drop a few pounds, maybe in eight weeks I can maybe drop like four to five, that would be nice. And that might be good for my heart, or my elevated cholesterol. And as a long time vegan, my body just generates cholesterol, like it's going out of business. It's like, here you go buddy, have some more cholesterol. I'm gonna try no caffeine after noon, try to watch the salt. You don't need a lot of processed stuff, but I i am heavy-handed with salt. I like salt. You know, the usual stuff. ah You know, maybe my ah blood pressure reading will come back into a range that isn't a harbinger of for a truncated life.
01:08:22
Speaker
and yeah And you want me to keep going and speaking into this PR40 microphone.
Conclusion and Call to Action
01:08:29
Speaker
Am I right? Right? So take a deep breath, man. And if you can't do, interview. See ya.
01:08:58
Speaker
you