icon caret-left icon caret-right instagram pinterest linkedin facebook twitter goodreads question-circle facebook circle twitter circle linkedin circle instagram circle goodreads circle pinterest circle

Blog

Big Mac

OK, we cannot be too surprised to hear that Mark McGwire did performance-enhancing drugs, especially during The Great Home Race of 1998.
I covered that season for Baseball Weekly and got as caught as anybody in the hoopla. Still, I remembered how McGwire was a rookie with the Oakland Athletics. Certainly a big guy, but  Read More 
Be the first to comment

Junior hockey

My youth hockey teams always lost to the Canadian squads growing up. I mean we lost bad -- 10-0, 15-1. You get the picture. Even my younger brothers' teams, which were far better than mine, lost regularly to the big guns north of the border.
Now I love Canada. I married a Canadian.
Still, it was great to see  Read More 
Be the first to comment

Maraniss blurb

David Maraniss, author of Clemente and When Pride Still Mattered, just gave High Heat a big thumbs-up.
"High Heat is a great idea, brilliantly executed. Tim Wendel, one of my favorite baseball writers, delivers this fastball with a winning mix of science, biography, and mythology."
Pub date for HH is March 9, 2010.

Be the first to comment

Great things

A top editor in NYC sends along this advice for the new year: "The hardest thing, amidst all the end-of-the-world hysteria, is remembering to do great things. Great things are more necessary than ever, given all the bullshit we get fed every second across the internets machine."
Be the first to comment

Ken Burns blurb

OK, no more whining about looking for cover endorsements. The first cover blurb is in and they don't get any bigger than Ken Burns. Thanks to Ken for taking the time to read High Heat and then write, "Tim Wendel has done it again. Like a batter bending away from a curveball that cuts  Read More 
Be the first to comment

Trolling for blurbs

I cannot think of anything more humbling than trolling for "blurbs" or cover endorsements for your book.
Yet that's where I find myself as we race toward the holidays and the new year.
With High Heat being printed  Read More 
Be the first to comment

"Bridge Job'

After watching Brad Lidge give away Game Four of the World Series, I got to thinking about Dennis Eckersley, the Hall of Fame closer for the Oakland A's.
I covered the ballclub when La Russa & Co. turned Eck into a closer, which he wasn't too happy about at first.
One evening, after Eckersley had  Read More 
1 Comments
Post a comment

Inside skinny

Intriguing look inside the editing process at Creative Nonfiction magazine. The editors there reveal what was added and what left out of three recent stories in the publication.
1 Comments
Post a comment

Blogging elsewhere

Keeping busy by doing several guest blogs in the past week. I know, I should be blogging more on my own site, but what can I say?
My five top sports novels went up on Jen Michalski's great High Five site. All right, James  Read More 
Be the first to comment

New semester at JHU

A new semester has begun at Johns Hopkins. I'm teaching two classes -- Nonfiction Technqiues and a Nonfiction Workshop.
Tom Wolfe, Joan Didion, Truman Capote and Hunter Thompson are a few of the writers we'll be in looking at, especially in NF Techniques.
The JHU site has been added to the menu above. Plenty  Read More 
Be the first to comment