SportsLetter

SL Interview: "Run to the East" director Henry Lu

Director Henry Lu cut his creative teeth working for Wieden + Kennedy, the advertising agency best known for its groundbreaking Nike commercials.  But when he read an article about high school runners living on Native American reservations in the Southwest, he decided it was time to make a feature-length documentary film.

Distance running has long been a traditional pursuit among Indians in North America.  The lineage of elite runners extends from Deerfoot, the Seneca star from the 19th century; to Canada's Tom Longboat, the 1907 Boston Marathon winner; to Louis Tewanima, the Hopi silver medalist in the 10,000 at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics; to Billy Mills, the surprise winner in the 10,000 at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.

Today, the need for Native American youth to exercise has taken on added urgency.  Running, Lu notes, is an inexpensive, accessible way to help teens deal with the myriad physical and mental health challenges they face on the reservation, including high rates of Type 2 diabetes and suicide.  Running can also lead to a college scholarship, thus providing the means for kids to gain career and life direction.

In "Run to the East," Lu follows three Native American runners as they navigate school, sports, family and life on the reservation.  Their journey to gain the all-important college scholarship is at once inspiring and sobering.  The same can be said for Lu's heartfelt film.

SportsLetter spoke to Lu while he was in Los Angeles to screen the film at the 8th annual Red Nation Film Festival.
--David Davis

SL Interview: "Off the Rez" director Jonathan Hock

Director-producer Jonathan Hock has made a career out of creating must-watch documentary films.  "Through the Fire" (2005) told the story of high-school basketball phenom Sebastian Telfair as he decided between attending college and jumping to the NBA.  "The Streak" (2008) was about the Brandon High School wrestling program in Florida, which began its 2007-08 season with a 34-year, 439-match winning streak.  In "The Lost Son of Havana" (2009), Hock followed former pitching great Luis Tiant on his return to his homeland of Cuba.  Last year's "The Best That Never Was" profiled former football star Marcus Dupree for ESPN's "30 for 30" series.

His latest film, "Off the Rez," is equally compelling.  Hock profiles Shoni Schimmel, a Native American high school basketball player from the Umatilla Indian Reservation in Oregon.  Schimmel is a star in the making.  High school scouts raved about her – “the skills and court instinct to make everyone in the gym pay attention each time she touches the ball.  She's uncanny both with her scoring and passing ability and it's almost always with some flair.  The range on her perimeter shot is pretty much anything inside half court” – but the obstacles that she and other promising Native American athletes face are unique: a persistent cycle of failure highlighted by teen pregnancy, alcoholism and diminished expectations.  One such "victim" is Shoni's own mother, Ceci Moses, a fiery woman who was sidetracked from pursuing an athletic career because of pregnancy.

The film follows Schimmel as she leaves behind the security blanket of the reservation for her junior and senior years at Franklin High School in Portland.  Her coach is none other than her mother, Ceci, who is determined that the confines of the reservation will not stymie her daughter's collegiate hoop dreams.

Executive produced by Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos, "Off the Rez" premiered at the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival in April and recently aired on the TLC network.

SportsLetter spoke to Jonathan Hock from his offices in New York.
--David Davis

SL Interview: Writer Doug Merlino's part in a basketball social experiment

In 1986, when Doug Merlino was in the eighth grade, he took part in an experiment on and off the basketball court.  Two fathers of boys on youth teams in the Seattle area – one of whom was white, the other black – decided to merge the players into one integrated squad.  The adults hoped that the African-American youth would gain a chance at better educational opportunities and that the white kids would be exposed to an unfamiliar culture in their own backyard.

Merlino and his teammates from an exclusive private school soon found themselves playing alongside black kids from the central area of Seattle.  The boys bonded, and the team ultimately won a league championship.  After one season, they dispersed.

Two decades later, after starting his career as a journalist, Merlino decided to revisit his former teammates and discover what had happened to them in the intervening years.  The result is "The Hustle: One Team and Ten Lives in Black and White" (Bloomsbury ; Amazon), which recounts their youth basketball experience and assesses the well-meaning experiment that brought them together.  Part memoir and part sociological exploration of race, culture and class, "The Hustle" examines the true meaning of youth sports.

A freelance writer living in New York City, Merlino has contributed to Slate, Wired and Men's Journal. "The Hustle" is his first book.

SportsLetter spoke with Merlino from his home in New York City.

--David Davis

SL Interview: Filmmaker Gabriela Cowperthwaite on lacrosse in urban Denver

The sport of lacrosse has long been stereotyped as preppy and suburban -- code words for, "Lacrosse is almost exclusively white."  Indeed, while U.S. Lacrosse supports efforts to increase minority participation, through funding of the BRIDGE [Building Relationships to Initiate Diversity, Growth and Enrichment] and the First Stick programs, the sport continues to lag among minority youth.

ESPN.com recently reported that, "In 2009-10, less than 10 percent of the student-athletes playing NCAA lacrosse were black, according to the most recent NCAA Student-Athlete Race/Ethnicity Report.  That statistic carries over to both men's and women's lacrosse in Divisions I, II and III."

At the grassroots level, several individuals and groups have worked to improve the situation.  In Denver, a fledgling hotbed of lacrosse, elementary school teacher Erik Myhren decided to bring lacrosse to the city's public school system in 2008.  With a crew of volunteer coaches and equipment donated by U.S. Lacrosse, Myhren held tryouts and fielded a team of fifth-, sixth- and seventh-graders to challenge the region's established youth squads.

Filmmaker Gabriela Cowperthwaite, a Denver native, returned to her hometown to chronicle the first season of Myhren's program, known as City Lax.  Her documentary, also titled "City Lax," follows the kids as they learn the basics of the game, take on Denver's suburban powerhouses, and cope with the daily challenges of life in the inner city.

The film has made the festival circuit, winning the audience and best documentary awards at the Sonoma International Film Festival.  It has aired on ESPNU and is available on Video on Demand via Sportskool.

SportsLetter spoke with Gabriela Cowperthwaite after a recent screening of the film at her alma mater, Occidental College, in Los Angeles. 

--David Davis

SL Interview: Alan Schwarz of the New York Times chronicles concussions in football

In November of 2006, former NFL defensive back Andre Waters committed suicide.  Barely two months later, journalist Alan Schwarz reported in The New York Times that Waters had suffered from severe trauma-induced brain damage from a series of concussions suffered during his 12-year career with the Philadelphia Eagles and Arizona Cardinals.  In effect, Waters' brain was that of an 80-year-old suffering from dementia.

Thus began a series of groundbreaking articles about the connection between concussions and brain damage among NFL players. Schwarz' sobering, well-researched pieces led to U.S. Congressional hearings and forced the NFL to admit that concussions can lead to long-term cognitive impairment.  In addition, the NFL has implemented new rules about treating concussions among its active players and heavily fined players who deliver helmet-to-helmet hits.

Schwarz soon expanded his scope beyond the NFL.  Many of his stories have focused on concussions in youth sports and, in particular, youth football.  Some 1.4 million high schoolers play football and, as Schwarz notes, "They either do not know what a concussion is or they simply do not care.  Their code of silence, bred by football’s gladiator culture, allows them to play on and sometimes be hurt much worse -- sometimes fatally . . . At least 50 high school or younger football players in more than 20 states since 1997 have been killed or have sustained serious head injuries on the field."

In October, when Schwarz investigated the football helmet industry, he revealed that, "Helmets both new and used are not -- and have never been -- formally tested against the forces believed to cause concussions.  The industry, which receives no governmental or other independent oversight, requires helmets for players of all ages to withstand only the extremely high-level force that would otherwise fracture skulls.”

"The standard has not changed meaningfully since it was written in 1973, despite rising concussion rates in youth football and the growing awareness of how the injury can cause significantly short- and long-term problems with memory, depression and other cognitive functions, especially in children."

Before joining the New York Times, Schwarz was a staff writer at Baseball America and a columnist for ESPN.com.  He is the author of “The Numbers Game: Baseball's Lifelong Fascination with Statistics” (St. Martin's) and “Once Upon a Game: Baseball's Greatest Memories” (Houghton Mifflin). His writing has won numerous awards, including the prestigious George Polk Award (2009), honoring excellence in print journalism.

SportsLetter spoke to Schwarz from New York City by telephone.
--David Davis

SL Interview: George Dohrmann's new book on AAU youth basketball

A few weeks before Christmas in 2000, while working on a feature story about Southern California high school basketball phenom Tyson Chandler, Sports Illustrated staff writer George Dohrmann interviewed Joe Keller, Chandler's former youth coach.  After the publication of the article, Dohrmann stayed in contact with Keller, who was in the process of forming a basketball team of 10-year-olds in the San Bernardino area.  Keller believed that the star of the team, Demetrius Walker, would develop into a surefire lock for the NBA.

Dohrmann followed the fortunes of Keller, Walker and his teammates for the next eight years, or until the boys were high school seniors.  As they navigated the labyrinthine world of AAU basketball, Dohrmann was eye witness to a grassroots sub-culture populated by sneaker company marketing reps, college and high-school coaches, sports agents, media titans and the youths' own parents. 

Dohrmann notes that the AAU system has produced "nearly every great American-born basketball player of the last ten years – from Kevin Garnett to Kobe Bryant to Tracy McGrady to LeBron James." And yet, argues Dohrmann in his exhaustively reported book, "Play Their Hearts Out: A Coach, His Star Recruit, and the Youth Basketball Machine" (Ballantine Books ; Amazon), the vaunted AAU basketball machine has also degenerated into a sleazy cesspool of greed and waste. 

This groundbreaking, enlightening and passionate book should serve as a wake-up call for those parents, coaches and administrators who profess to care about youth sports.  Commented Los Angeles Times columnist Bill Dwyre about "Play Their Hearts Out": "A good book will leave you laughing or crying. I just read one that left me wanting to take a shower."

Dohrmann first reported on youth basketball in the mid-1990s for the Los Angeles Times, where Dwyre was his editor.  Dohrmann went on to win the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for beat reporting while working at the St. Paul Pioneer Press.  His investigative story unearthed academic fraud within the men's basketball program at the University of Minnesota.  He has worked at Sports Illustrated since 2000.

SportsLetter spoke to Dohrmann from his home in San Francisco.

–David Davis

SL Interview: Marshall Curry documents the youth go-kart racing circuit

First, there was "Hoop Dreams."  Then came "Spellbound."  Now comes "Racing Dreams," the latest documentary film to focus on youth, sports and competition.

In 2007, acclaimed director Marshall Curry followed the fortunes of three youngsters who compete at the highest ranks of the go-kart racing circuit.  The trio drive miniature racecars that can reach speeds of 70 miles per hour in a nationally sanctioned league called the World Karting Association.

As the documentary makes clear, karting is no kid's game.  Expensive and ultra-competitive, karting is viewed as a stepping-stone for professional racers on the NASCAR and Formula One circuits.  Among the drivers who began their careers in karting: Michael Schumacher, Jeff Gordon, Juan Pablo Montoya and Tony Stewart.

Like "Hoop Dreams" (1994), which profiled two high-school basketball prospects, "Racing Dreams" is more than just a documentary film about youth sports.  Intimate and sobering, "Racing Dreams" gives us a glimpse into the lives and thoughts of three youngsters on the verge of their teenage years. 

Director Curry's first feature-length documentary film, "Street Fight," was nominated for an Academy Award in 2005.  "Racing Dreams" won the Best Documentary Feature Award at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival.  Following a limited run in movie theaters nationwide this summer, "Racing Dreams" will be available on DVD this fall.

SportsLetter spoke to Curry via phone from his office in Brooklyn.
--David Davis

SL Interview: Sheila Robertson explores the challenges for female coaches

Women in sports have made enormous strides, particularly on the field of play.  Their athletic success, however, has not always translated to the coaching ranks.  In high schools and colleges in the U.S., many men lead female teams while very few women coach boys’ and men’s teams.  North of the border, according to the Coaching Association of Canada, there is an "overall lack of women coaching at the national team and Olympic levels."

Among the statistics uncovered by the Association: at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, "women accounted for 50% of Canada's medals, 53% of Top-8 finishes, but only 10.5% of coaches accredited by the Canadian Olympic Committee." At the 2006 Torino Olympic Games, "women accounted for 67% of Canada's medals, but only 14.7% of Canada's accredited coaches."

Ottawa-based writer-editor Sheila Robertson has long taken an interest in women's sports and coaching.  She started working for Team Canada in 1976, when the Olympic Games were held in Montreal, in the communications department.  She also took part in the 1980 Lake Placid Olympic Winter Games, acting as liaison between the media and the Canadian team, and she managed the Canada's media office at the 1996 Atlanta Games.

Robertson, in 1994, became the founding editor of Coaches Report, in which she profiled numerous coaches, and has edited manuals on long-term athlete development. In 2000, Robertson was asked to edit a start-up publication called the Canadian Journal for Women in Coaching.  In 2005, Coaches of Canada established the Sheila Robertson Award to recognize a national sports organization or multi-sport service organization "that demonstrates a consistent approach in valuing and recognizing the role of the coach within the organization, the media and the public."  Past award recipients include Athletics Canada, Skate Canada and the Canadian Yachting Association.

This year, with Canada acting as host of the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Winter Games, the editorial board of the Canadian Journal for Women in Coaching decided to celebrate the occasion by producing a greatest hits compilation of articles.  The result is "Taking the Lead: Strategies and Solutions from Female Coaches" (University of Alberta Press ; Amazon), a wide-ranging volume that examines multifarious issues, from juggling motherhood demands to dealing with harassment.  

Practical as well as provocative, the book urges sports leaders and administrators to re-examine the unique challenges that female coaches face and to reimagine the sports landscape with improved opportunities for women coaches.  (Two organizations – the Coaching Association of Canada and the Canadian Association for the Advancement of Women and Sport and Physical Activity – sponsored the publication of the book).

From Ottawa, Robertson spoke to SportsLetter by telephone.
– David Davis

Vancouver Athletes’ Election

Angela Ruggiero, of the USA ice hockey team, and Adam Pengilly, a British bobsledder, have been elected to the International Olympic Committee’s Athletes Commission by fellow Olympians at the Vancouver Olympic Winter Games. 

You can re-read Ruggiero’s 2006 SportsLetter interview here.

SL Interview: What does it takes to be a cheerleading champion?

"Blood, Sweat & Cheers" is a new documentary film that explores the culture of competitive cheerleading.  The movie follows Pop Warner cheerleaders from Burlington, Mass., as the girls in the junior midget division (ages 10 to 13) seek to win the national championship.  The team has finished second for three consecutive years; this will be the final opportunity for the oldest members on the squad to taste victory.

In "Blood, Sweat & Cheers" (Award Productions / Amazon), cheerleading is shown to be part-sport, part-competition. At the elite level of Pop Warner, teams vie in regional competitions to qualify for nationals.  Coaches spend hours breaking down tape so they can design and implement the most innovative and daring two-and-a-half-minute routines.  The girls endure hours of grueling practices in order to master elements of gymnastics, intricate tumbling, syncopated athleticism and teamwork.

Cheerleading, the film shows, is not for the faint of heart, with the more dangerous maneuvers involving daredevil leaps, throws and flips.  The film notes that a ninth-grader from a neighboring town died from injuries after falling while performing a stunt.  Indeed, in a recent story in the Los Angeles Times, journalist Melissa Rohlin wrote that "cheerleading injuries resulting in emergency room visits have increased almost sixfold since 1980, to nearly 30,000 in 2008, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission reported."

SportsLetter recently spoke with Laura Molta, the president of Molta Media and the producer of "Blood, Sweat & Cheers."

--David Davis