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The SportsThink Weekly Read highlights my favorite sport-related article of the week. On the last Friday of each month, I send out the Monthly Review, a longer digest of readings and other content of interest. Most articles are recently published, but some are not; the only rule is that I’ve read them within the past week (or the past month, in the case of the Monthly Review). 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 life-long obsession with the games we play. The newsletter is free, but comes with two requests. 1. I’m always open to suggestions, so send me the good stuff that you read! 2. If you enjoy the newsletter, please share it with other folks who might enjoy it as well. Finally, I try to focus on non-paywalled writing, but if you find yourself unable to access anything, just hit reply to the email and I’ll do my best to get you a copy. Thanks for reading!
The Weekly Read
The Craziest Sports Story of 2021 Is FC Sheriff, by Grant Wahl, via the Fútbol with Grant Wahl Newsletter. This is a doozy and the title is, somehow, an understatement. I shared a couple bits and pieces in previous newsletters about the Cinderella story of FC Sheriff of Tiraspol in Moldova, but Wahl’s travelogue of his visit to the (technically) non-existent country is wild. Yes, soccer is known for corruption, but this is a team that is the crown jewel of a money laundering empire. Furthermore, the team:
plays in a domestic league that is borderline professional and best known for match fixing and betting scandals
beat Real Madrid, in Madrid
is named (like all the other big businesses in Tiraspol) after the owner’s fascination with Westerns.
Seriously, just read it, even if you have no interest in soccer. Absolutely worth your time.
As always, thank you for reading and sharing.
See you next week,
Tolga