Does this stuff work, or is just wankery? Note that I believe that highbrow sports writing works very well in magazine and book form. But is any sports fan ever going to pick this over USA Today's meat and potatoes sports section?[S]ocial scientists who have studied group performance under pressure say that often it is decentralized groups (like the Yankees) that prove more resilient than strongly connected ones (like the Red Sox); they are better able to weather outside criticism and internal quarrels.
Evidence from personality profiles and from studies of military, corporate and space flight crews suggests that looser ties between group members can be a strength, if the team includes individuals who can generate collective emotion when needed. And the Yankees have several of them.
08 March 2005
And...
Does highbrow work for a sports section in a newspaper? An example from the front page of the Times:
