American pastimes

the long version

Walter Wellesley "Red" Smith was the most widely read sportswriter of the last century and the first to win the Pulitzer Prize for commentary. From the 1940s to the 1980s, his nationally syndicated columns for the New York Herald Tribune and later for The New York Times traversed the world of sports with literary panache and wry humor. Now, writer and editor Daniel Okrent presents the best of Smith's inimitable columns ---miniature masterpieces that remain the gold standard in sportswriting.