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3 GREAT STORIES: Best of 2016 (so far), written edition

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Every week, I will shine the spotlight on some of the best storytelling in the business and offer my comments. “3 Great Stories of the Week” will post every Monday at 8 AM.

We are halfway through 2016, which means the continuation of an annual tradition: the “Best Of (so far)” editions of my 3 Great Stories segment.

I will post my three favorite audio/video stories of the year so far next week. This week, my three favorite written pieces from January through June, along with what I wrote about them back then, with minor edits for clarity:

Brotherhood (3/23/16, Bleacher Report): Early on in “Brotherhood”, Howard Beck’s infinitely engrossing long-form story about the friendship between two basketball superstars, one of those stars makes a poignant statement.

“In our sport, or sports in general, everyone wants instant oatmeal,” says LeBron James. “Put it in the microwave, hit 30 seconds, you got a meal. Sometimes, no matter how great you are, it doesn’t happen like that.”

Now replace “sports” with “journalism”. In this era, many audiences — and news bosses — demand “instant oatmeal” from journalists, seeking and investing in clickbait and easy answers over more layered, complicated work.

Stories like this prove what one can get by waiting for a splendid meal.

Beck presents a fascinating portrait of two players — James and Carmelo Anthony — whose friendship and rivalry have provided a powerful undercurrent to the NBA’s past dozen years. This piece made headlines for a different “instant oatmeal” quote, where James muses how he would love to, one day, join forces with Anthony. But that quote comes at the end. The rest is a beautiful blend of smile-worthy memories, did-you-know-that stories, and revealing quotes from two of the league’s best.

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3 GREAT STORIES: The all-New York Times edition

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Every week, I shine the spotlight on some of the best storytelling in the business and offer my comments. “3 Great Stories of the Week” will post every Monday at 8 AM.

It isn’t easy to figure out which foods contain sugar (5/21/16, New York Times): I found myself taken this week by the New York Times.

I think it’s easy to overlook the consistently strong and thorough reporting provided by the third-largest newspaper in the country. I do not consider myself a loyal Times reader, but I regularly find an article or two every week that increases my knowledge or shifts my perspective on a given subject.

This past week, I read three.

In this example, Margot Sanger-Katz of the Times’ Upshot series discusses the new FDA nutrition labels and their increased emphasis on “added sugar”. She breaks down the many sneaky and unhealthy ingredients that often find their way into seemingly nutritious products, and she even provides two lists of ingredients that, in her words, “really just mean added sugar”. This is a deceptively simple presentation, providing insights and takeaways in a compact package about a dietary issue that affects all of us.

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