• “Gregg Popovich’s Portable Program” by J. A. Adande. An analysis of how the Spurs’ culture has led to success, and why it is now the model that other teams–especially small-market teams–are attempting to emulate.
• “21 Shades of Gray” by Chris Ballard. A long and detailed character study of Tim Duncan, which ran as a cover story for Sports Illustrated.
• “The San Antonio Spurs Aren’t Boring” by Kevin Arnovitz. A detailed analysis of the Spurs “motion weak” offense, and why it is both so effective and so overlooked by NBA fans.
• John Hollinger, who I generally dislike for crimes against meaningful statistics, had a pretty great Per-Diem column on the Spurs’ season. You have to pay ESPN to read it, unless you manage to find it mirrored somewhere or something.
• “Kawhi Leonard not awed by finishing fourth in Rookie of the Year voting.” More specifically, he said, “I wasn’t really looking at the rankings. It’s an individual honor. Congratulations to whoever won it.” That is either the driest humor out of a rookie since, well, Tim Duncan, or Leonard is in fact a machine built to be a San Antonio Spur. Noteworthy also is that, of the top 12 vote-getters for ROY, Leonard is the only one still playing. Congrats to whoever won that individual award, indeed.

Some rare good sports reporting from the usual suspects. For statistically defensible analysis, though, the gold standard remains The Wages of Wins, with important statistical backup from NerdNumbers, The NBA Geek, and Baskteball-Reference.com

(Click to enlarge.)

He passed it through the entire Lakers team. All five of them, frozen like statues.

If your only goal is to receive an MFA, and you either do not care about or consider it of secondary importance where you go and what kind of experience you have, then sure, you can probably maximize the statistical likelihood of MFA program X accepting you by leaning toward realism in your writing sample. But if what you want is to spend a few years working on your writing in the company of supportive teachers and receptive peers, then you do yourself a disservice by misrepresenting the kind of writing you plan to focus on. If hardcore space opera is what you want to write, finagling an acceptance to an MFA program where you will be told that exploding spaceships are a waste of the workshop’s time is a pyrrhic victory.

I applied to MFA programs with a portfolio that consisted entirely of genre fiction, and made it clear in my personal statement that I intended to continue perpetrating genre at any program that accepted me. My theory was that, as a person primarily interested in being a science fiction writer, I wanted to be rejected by any program with a culture unsupportive of that goal. I was rejected by 4/5 of the programs I applied to, but accepted by the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Iowa, I came to learn, is actively expanding the varieties of fiction they champion. I’m the only pure SF writer in my class, but this semester they have Kevin Brockmeier teaching Iowa’s first-ever graduate workshop specifically devoted to science fiction and fantasy. We are discussing stories by authors like Theodora Goss, Arthur C. Clarke, and J. G. Ballard, and everyone is trying their hands at some variety of fabulism. (And if Kevin hadn’t chosen to do a class on SF, the other visiting professor, Andrew Sean Greer, says he would have.) More personally, I was just awarded a fellowship for my second year, on the basis of the stories I wrote my first semester: one hard SF story, one fantasy story. I’m having a wonderful experience, and I feel valued both as a student and as part of a project to diversify my program’s literary culture. That’s a project I couldn’t have been selected for if I hadn’t signaled my writing intentions in my application.

So, to summarize, my advice for genre writers looking to get MFAs is this: if what you are looking for is a good experience, rather than just a degree, don’t try to juke the system. Write the kind of stories you want to write. Write them as well as you can. Then let the MFA faculties do their jobs and decide whether or not you are a good fit for their program. That way you can be confident that any program which accepts you is interested in supporting the kind of fiction you are passionate about.

I would like my Facebook friends to comment on this status, sharing how you met me. But I want you to LIE. That’s right, just make it up. After you comment, copy this to your status, so I can do the same.

There were plenty of fun responses. These were my favorites.

Sarah Miller

How she met me:

We bumped into the street, our glasses fell off, I accidentally grabbed yours, you accidentally grabbed mine …. little did I know that your glasses in fact housed a sentient mini-computer with decided opinions about how I ought to be living my life.

How I met her:

It’s amazing that you noticed me at all. You had been leading your tours through the cavern for the barest flash of an instant, just a decade or two. “These structures formed over millions of years,” you buzzed. “This chamber was undisturbed for millennia.” When no one else was with you, you sat silent playing your light over my face. You were nearly a child when my eyes opened, and an old wrinkled thing by the time they closed. You will surely be dead when I open them again, but we shared a moment.

Kat Howard

How she met me:

 I don’t usually chase down people in the street, it’s simply that I’m very picky about my coffee. And I told you the cup was mine, and you didn’t listen, and my head was aching, and.

Well. I’m sorry about the stitches, but the scar should be very interesting.

How I met her:

The requisition order clearly called for part #A0-73462, a self lubricating ball bearing. That you were delivered instead was not my fault, and it was a grave injustice when they severed my linkages to The Superstructure. Left bereft, I had no choice but to fall in with your anarchic league.

Dan Pinney

How he met me:

I admit, I was taken in. That Fischer dude, he is a smooth character.

So he told me, over the phone, he had a thing he had to sell, on the QT. Weird tech. I didn’t know what it was, and honestly I still don’t. I gave him ten bills for it, exchange made under the table, in a bar in Houston. I probably had too much to drink that night, but, well, you know.

So he got the money, I got something that I think, given the research I’ve done, was probably some part of the innards of a microwave or some damn thing. Him, well, you hear his name dropped on the nightly news from time to time, usually when they’re talking about some sort of green technology thing. Only green I think about when I think about him, of course, is those ten bills.

I tell you, the man is good.

How I met him:

You were showing off, of course. Broke into the hookah bar with your friends and stole a pipe and an unlabeled box of shisha that you really shouldn’t have touched. You took it back to the shed behind your parents garage, warmed the coals on a hot plate. But the smoke made you feel lightheaded in a way it never had before, and when you blew a smoke ring to impress Melanie from down the street, I came tumbling out still glistening from my bath. I hate this place with its enormous dullards and empty sky. You will know no peace until you find a way to return me to my home!

Megan Kurashige

How she met me:

Oh. My. God. You know that mad scientist bloke who lives up the road? Well, I can’t expect you to believe it, but he has got the most miraculous theater built into the basement of his house. Not the basement proper, but this room, this palatial, expansive place that you can only get to through an absolute warren of tunnels. You walk and you walk and you carry on walking through the dark with only a torch in your hand (no, silly, not a REAL torch, an electric one). And you keep on walking until your nose bumps up against the heavy red of a velvet curtain, and then you have a choice. Pull it aside. Or, leave it shut. Because you know what’s on the other side, don’t you? (Oh, of course you don’t.) Nothing. There’s exactly nothing there, not til you make the choice. And then, when you do, it’s whatever the mad scientist sees fit to put there, for you, in that exact moment.

How I met her:

I had heard for years about the cosmetologist, who hasn’t? But it wasn’t until the accident, when it seemed there was nothing left worth wrapping fingers around and holding fast to that I sought you out. I chased whispers into basements and down alleys and over rooftops until I found you. You tilted me back in your chair and painted a new face on me, the face of someone else, someone who still knew how to value things in this world. I never looked out through my own eyes again.

Dana Huber

How she met me:

Church– you were the only person to realize my ‘speaking in tongues’ was actually an epileptic attack. Thank god you called the ambulance!

How I met her:

>run VirusScan

**Scanning**

**Virus Detected.**

>delete virus

**Virus Removal Failed. See Log File.***

>open log file

# 2008-06-29 - [VirusScan] - Kill signal received

# 2008-06-29 - [???} - Message: Hey, stop it.

# 2008-06-29 - [???} - Message: This filesystem and I are just getting acquainted.

# 2008-06-29 - [???} - Message: Whatever happened to basic hospitality?

Ferrett Steinmetz

How he met me:

We have never met. You do not actually know I exist. In fact, you will never read these words and retain them to memory, for the moment you read them the link between short-term memory and long-term memory will be temporarily severed.

I do occasionally appear in your dreams, or in Facebook statuses, or in glowing IMs on your computer to issue commands I’d like carried out. Sometimes they’re simple: EAT MISO SOUP. Sometimes they’re more complex emotional urges, and you wonder why you’re so attracted to that girl even though you know she’s wrong for you.

I have my own agenda. You can only hope it’s good for you, in those remaining seconds before your short-term memory cuts out and the focused blindsight I’ve induced in seeing my name in other circles kicks in again and you go on your merry way, oblivious.

By the way. You’re welcome for that writing workshop. I have plans for you there, too.

How I met him:

I was the only one who knew from the beginning it wasn’t me you wanted. After all, I was just the intern on the ship, tagging along on a seafloor mapping project for course credit. But it had become clear weeks ago that I was going to be allowed to do little more than turn winches on and off, change filters, and sit in a chair for hours making sure there were no feed interruptions. So when your zodiac bumped against the hull and your crew climbed onto the deck with your guns to take the ship, I knew it wasn’t me you were after. But when you changed the ship’s heading toward the undersea cable and explained that the internet was a more valuable hostage than any hold full off eggheads, I could tell that my bosses were almost hurt it wasn’t them you were after either. I fell in love with you a little bit for that.

I have to object to “hypotheticals” about ticking-time-bomb, massive-death, torture-will-definitely-work scenarios.

Though the situations are impossible, they’re not really hypothetical in that people want to use them to make torture legal.

It’s like posing the question, “If destroying the Mona Lisa was the only way to prevent a terrorist from eating 2,000 innocent American babies, would that be justified?”, and then pushing for legislation or executive orders on the propriety of destroying priceless works of art.

And besides the ridiculousness of the scenario, I’m just offended by the idea that folks want a law to cover their ass, just in case they might want to torture!

If there really -were- some crazy ticking time-bomb scenario, where someone is convinced the only way to avert tragedy is to torture someone, they can go ahead and break the law to torture. If they’re that certain it’s that important, they can have the courage of their convictions and face the consequences. If they can prove the circumstances were so extraordinary, they’re not actually going to get in much, if any, trouble. And if they were wrong, they should rightfully be punished for disregarding the rule of law, human rights, and tenets of a free, civilized society.

The first point, that ticking bomb scenarios don’t really exist, is one commonly made by those opposed to torture. The second point, that even if they did it wouldn’t be a reason not to legislate against torture, is novel and compelling. Well said, “Hmph.”