The SportsThink Review #123
May 2, 2025: Reprint, Karate, Chess
The SportsThink Review highlights my favorite sport-related content. Most things I share are recently published, but some are not; the only rule is that I’ve read or encountered them recently. Some are relevant to my day job as a professor teaching courses on the business, history, and philosophy of sports. Others are just plain interesting, relevant to my lifelong obsession with the games we play. I also occasionally share articles and assorted musings on Twitter.
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Howdy folks, happy Friday. I had a handful of readers tell me that they didn’t get last week’s newsletter, so I’m hoping that issue is resolved now. Here’s a link in case you missed it, I thought it was pretty good. It’s been a busy week wrapping up the semester, but I did enjoy a couple profiles on two very different characters. Sports-ish on both.
Bad Dojo: Tiger Schulmann Didn’t Get to Be America’s No. 1 Karate Kingpin Without Busting a Few Faces (David Gauvey Herbery, Esquire)
Massive and well-written profile of the former karate champ turned entrepreneur, will admit I wasn’t familiar with Schulmann before reading this. What makes this so compelling is the strange dichotomy of Schulmann himself—a family man who cries at Father's Day cards yet leads a business culture rewarding aggression and intimidation. As the UFC era emerges, we see him evolve his business into something more professional, though never fully shedding his combative instincts.
The Freestylist (Florian Putz, Der Spiegel)
Not quite as massive as above, but another lengthy profile on another very interesting character. The contradictions of Magnus Carlsen—arguably the greatest chess player in history who now calls himself "semi-retired" at 34. The Norwegian prodigy who became a grandmaster at 13 and world champion at 22 has evolved into something of a chess rebel and reformer. The Sid Vicious of the king’s gambit. He’s currently battling FIDE (the World Chess Federation) and has become an evangelist for freestyle chess, a version of the game where preparation is basically impossible.
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See you next time,
Tolga