Los Angeles’ most faceless and fanless team has landed a superstar. The NFL is a failsafe league. All of its television rights are national — as well as massive — and the roster construction is limited by a hard salary cap. The Los Angeles Chargers may not be hurting financially, but they are a third-rate…
From the outside, it looked as though Adam Alter was gliding along. At 28, he had earned a doctorate in psychology from Princeton and soon afterward landed a job as a tenure-track professor at the N.Y.U. Stern School of Business. But he felt stuck. Preparing to teach while simultaneously doing research became overwhelming, especially after…
For decades, the Copyright Office has been a small and sleepy office within the Library of Congress. Each year, the agency’s 450 employees register roughly half a million copyrights, the ownership rights for creative works, based on a two-centuries-old law. In recent months, however, the office has suddenly found itself in the spotlight. Lobbyists for…
Wading into Baseball Hall of Fame debates is like diving into a pool full of eels, if the eels were up their own ass (personally, not physically, which eels might be able to do). Everyone’s got their own benchmarks, everyone hates your benchmarks, and never the twain shall meet. At the end of the day,…
The opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympics promises to be spectacular: On the glittering waters of the Seine, a flotilla of barges will carry about 10,000 athletes to the foot of the Eiffel Tower, as nearly half a million spectators line the four-mile route to cheer on the event of the century. Good luck,…
These are dark days for journalism, once considered the “Fourth Estate” of American democracy, so named because of journalism’s role in advocating for citizens, framing political and social issues, and holding the government to account on behalf of its people. These days, it seems there are two kinds of journalists, those who have been laid…
When the 2024 Oscar nominations were announced this morning, the snubs of the two most prominent women involved in “Barbie” — the director, Greta Gerwig, and the lead actress, Margot Robbie — became the breakout story. The top-grossing film of 2023, passing the $1 billion mark worldwide, is based on the imagined life and times…
Either Deandre Ayton fell and bumped his head somewhere in Portland, or he’s the most ridiculous guy in the city. Apparently, after five and a half years in the NBA, Ayton feels he no longer needs to prove himself. Ayton let this slip while speaking with Mark Medina of Basketball Intelligence. It had to be…
We’ve all been there. You set a goal to exercise regularly, but when the moment comes to get moving, your mind unleashes a torrent of excuses: I’m tired. It’s cold outside. I don’t want to spend money on a class. These mental blocks may explain why it’s so hard to keep a New Year’s resolution…
Most of my life, I have found tennis very easy and yet very hard to watch. It’s easy in that it’s a beautiful sport to gaze upon, the players’ ballet-like movements and the steady rhythm of the sound of the ball hitting the racket and then the court over and over can lull one into…
