Haruki Murakami shares his experience running the Boston Marathon and reflects on why the race is a meaningful race to runners around the globe: http://nyr.kr/12uvnks

Illustration by Ed Nacional.

In preparation for attending Tuesday’s World Cup qualifier between Mexico and the United States, I was ordered to be discreet. The game was being played in Mexico City, at Estadio Azteca, in front of more than a hundred thousand Mexican soccer fans, so I shouldn’t wear red, white, and blue. My haircut, I was told by a Mexican acquaintance, was too American, so she recommended a hat. Walking into the stadium we saw a bus of American supporters being guarded by a line of police. My pants were hanging low, because belts were not allowed inside. “That way you can’t hit someone with it, and your fists are busy hiking your trousers up,“ a British expat living in Mexico City speculated…

Reeves Wiedeman on how to survive a soccer game at Estadio Azteca: http://nyr.kr/14rtxGK

Soccer fans at Azteca Stadium in Mexico City during a match between the U.S. and Mexico on Tuesday. Photo by Hector Vivas/LatinContent/Getty Images.

“After suffering through several years of misery and ignominy, it’s like old times for Tiger…” John Cassidy looks at five people who might’ve had a hand in Woods’s comeback: http://nyr.kr/16Ucywq

March Madness could cost you some serious bucks, and not just in the office bracket pool. Daniel Fromson explains: http://nyr.kr/10o0HDP

Nilkanth Patel on dunking—and being dunked on—in the age of YouTube, Twitter, and 24-hour sports networks: http://nyr.kr/YUmPUz

Me: Hi, Dr. Albert.

Marv Albert: A playoff atmosphere in here tonight!

Me: Well, it’s been a tough week. My mother came to visit me.

Marv Albert: From downtown!

Me: And, of course, she immediately asked if I was still sleeping with Sarah.

Marv Albert: Out of bounds!

Me: Exactly. It’s not her business.

Marv Albert: Unbelievable!

Me: And Sarah won’t even return my calls.

MarvAlbert: Rejected!

Me: I called her, like, twelve times last night.

Marv Albert: A dozen! Unanswered!

Me: I don’t know why I’m surprised. We haven’t been intimate in months.

Marv Albert: Stuck outside the perimeter!

Shouts & Murmurs - Jesse Eisenberg imagines American sportscaster Marv Albert as a therapist: http://nyr.kr/XRrl6d

As for the exaltation you talk about when watching Federer in his glory days, I am in total accord with you. Awe at the fact that a fellow human being is accomplishing such things, that we (as a species) are not only the worms we often appear to be but are also capable of achieving miraculous things—in tennis, in music, in poetry, in science—and that envy and admiration dissolve into a feeling of overwhelming joy. Yes, I agree with you entirely. And that is where the aesthetic and the ethical merge. I have no counter-argument, for I have often felt exactly the same way myself…

Click-through for an excerpt from “Here and Now: Letters (2008–2011)” a book of correspondence between J. M. Coetzee and Paul Auster, which has just been published: http://nyr.kr/YRgBl6

(Source: newyorker.com)

“The conventional wisdom, though, was that James needed to “grow up” as a player and a teammate in order to win games and the affection of fans. But James was compelled to grow up long ago, way back in his late teens—to become the savior of a unlucky franchise, a torchbearer for several multinational corporations, and the public face of an entire sport. Maybe what we’re remembering now is what sentimental sports fans have always known—that we like our athletes most when they play the game the way that we swear we’d do it if we had the chance. At twenty-eight, it seems, LeBron James is finally old enough to act like a kid.”

Continue reading Ian Crouch on LeBron James’s transformation: http://nyr.kr/XLBY8g

Photograph by David Santiago/AP.

(Source: newyorker.com)

Why has sports betting been deemed an especially toxic form of gambling? In this video, James Surowiecki looks at why we have laws that ban sports betting in most of the U.S., and explains why he sees those bans as illogical and irrational: http://nyr.kr/ZokjFT

(Source: newyorker.com)