Excellent read here, and very identifiable. The shoutout is very much appreciated.
Like you, I struggled for a long time with finding an audience outside of the core few. I'm sure if I wrote about contemporary wrestling, I'd probably get more of an audience, but I'd be doing something that a billion others are already doing, treading the same water and relitigating the same tired takes, and it's not something I'm as passionate about. I'd just be soullessly creating content for the sake of content. Don't get me wrong; there's modern stuff out there I really like, but I have the most fun writing about the past. Rekindling nostalgia and discovering matches, wrestlers, and stories that I missed out on. Being able to unlock core memories for people or put them on the path to discovering a different take on the artform. That's the stuff that gets the keys moving.
Trent Green didn't necessarily drive me to hit "Subscribe", but the way everything was written. I really do enjoy reading your articles because they take me back to a period where I did watch and follow football with regularity, and they're written with passion, hence the title.
Thank you very much buddy. The shoutout is well deserved.
What you say is largely the point of this whole exercise. The choice to switch to modern stuff in search of bigger numbers and more interaction surely would've been extremely easy for you, and once it's made, it's hard to un-ring the bell. Just like all of us, it takes fortitude, even if an intrinsic understanding exists that writing about the past makes you happier, to continue to do it, because the extrinsic reward for your effort is smaller than it could otherwise be. It's tough to stare into the face of that and continue to walk your own path.
With your stuff in particular, I've never watched anything from 1990. I'd love to, but I was just born too late. Your stuff allows me to seek out things that I feel like I'd truly enjoy (like that Jushin Liger match we spoke about), therefore making my life better. If you even did the same exercise, but going through 2024, I'm not sure if you'd be adding anything to my life. Maybe I'd still subscribe, but maybe I wouldn't. You'd lose myself (a dedicated reader), but you'd probably gain five or ten less engaged ones for the trouble. Is that worth it? Evidently not to you or I, because we haven't made the switch.
I enjoy being able to add context to your memories. Thank you so much for reading!
Love this! Thanks for sharing your journey as a writer!
Sports gambling has certainly been on an unparalleled rise since at least 2021, when I first heard the word parley outside of French class or Pirates of the Caribbean. And wouldn’t you know it, it was in a Jr.B hockey locker room.
I think someone more knowledgeable in gender studies than I should take a look at what one might call the convergence of the masculine affinity for risk-taking and the masculine urge to be right about sports. You will, of course, find in that overlap sports gambling (and Jr. B hockey players).
That said, I’ve seen content of similar veins to ours succeed on YouTube — the most similar being hockey YouTuber Pinholes Graham with “Playoffs Past” and “Yesteryear” series of videos. I think the major difference is the medium. Perhaps people would rather read ‘news’ and watch ‘stories’. Or perhaps the YouTube algorithm has the reach that allows that type of content can catch on. Who knows.
But you hit the nail on the head talking about the fire to write. It’s a passion. There’s catharsis in the mere articulation of vision. It’s why we do it.
A fellow Canadian I see. I capped out at Jr. C (I was a defenceman), so you've got me well beat on that front, but I didn't much like hockey anyway. I like this much better.
I'm not sure about any specific masculine urge to be correct, but I am sure that males are much more inclined to take risks than females, which is why most of all gambling problems exist in males. I've never met a female sports gambler outside of a commercial, which is perhaps why my stuff seems to catch on a bit better with females than a lot of sports content out there.
I have seen some stuff about sports' past on YouTube succeeding. However, it's still an uphill battle that requires much more effort for the same reward that those talking about the present get. For instance, we all love THG, so this is the furthest thing in the world from a shot at him, but even he's shied away from making as many videos about the past as he used to for that exact reason. The effort to reward ratio is much smaller if you choose to talk about the past. To make a great video/article about sports' past you must accept that and give it your all anyway, especially true if you're speaking of a human who never was a star, like Trent Green or Tomas Vokoun.
This is where the fire comes in. If you don't have it, trying to run uphill like we do when there's a clear option to just run downhill instead (at the cost of a little quality) by talking about the present or future will become less and less fun everyday until you decide to stop doing it altogether. That's why intrinsic motivation is key in this line of endeavor, because if your motivation is the numbers you're going to run out quickly.
Thanks for mentioning my work, Robbie. I enjoyed learning about you and why you write. I found your analysis on whether to write about current or past topics for football both interesting and personally relatable. For me, I didn't start my pro wrestling substack intending to write about topics from the past as a primary focus. It just kind of evolved that way, and in the process, it has turned into a journal of sorts for me in a lot of ways. I find I'm reliving my own past in a sense and sharing memories of things and people that I enjoyed watching or being around. That's a good thing. Keep up the great work! I believe you will find many readers in coming months outside the football specific interest who seek high quality, personality-profile centric narrative sports-writing.
This topic really resonated with me -- I'm working on a super-longform travel-log type piece about the Oakland A's attempting to move to Las Vegas and one of the central themes is how the theoretically pure community aspect of sports have been corrupted by a rush for dopamine or dollars. One of my favorite parts of being sports-obsessive is the common language it creates (we can both appreciate Trent Green even though neither of us know him personally), and gambling necessarily breaks that down into something more individualized. Everyone in a stadium will have an emotional response to a goal being scored, but you're the only one who cares if it causes you to hit your four-leg parlay, and if you care about that more than the goal itself, you're missing out.
One of the other benefits I've felt from zagging away from what drives clicks is that the work doesn't feel disposable. Pouring hours into a Daily Fantasy Sleeper Picks Week 3 post could probably get a lot of views today and tomorrow, but would be stale and ignored by Monday (until archaeologists like me come looking for it in ten years). The people who really care about this stuff are still going to care about it in the long-term, and just because the bigger audience hasn't found it yet doesn't mean that they never will.
You make a really good point about the gambling overriding the sense of community in the sports fandom. Everybody creates these individualistic outcomes for themselves, parlays or fantasy players or whatever, and peels themselves away from the shared goal of winning or scoring or whatever the case may be. Much like the rest of society, the pursuit of dollars (and the advertising money trying to get people to pursue dollars) are pulling people away from these commonly appreciable community outcomes, in our case winning sports games and reminiscing about common memories.
It's true that evergreen stories feel so much better to make than things that are immediately going to be out of date. I know that feeling too and I don't like it. It feels like all my effort has been somewhat wasted, even though lots of people read it. That's when the numbers come but truly don't feel rewarding.
I'm happy to shout you out. Surely it won't be the last you get from me!
Thanks for the shoutout! Your stuff is great and a big part of the appeal for me is the lack of focus on gambling. I can see how my stuff could be useful for gambling purposes, but I think my motivation is more understanding the modern game and exploring areas I don't see other writers covering.
Also, since I didn't start paying attention to the NFL until I needed something to fill my time during the 2012 NHL lockout, I really appreciate the focus you put on players from before then. Most of it is completely new to me, which is very cool.
No doubt Aaron! That's why I definitively separated your stuff from most covering the present/future. Because it is useful for understanding what may happen in the future, it definitely goes into the 'useful for gamblers' category, at least potentially useful, but it's also quality because it isn't designed to parrot the same old takes over and over like so many content churners out there do. The Jake Oettinger one comes to mind. You gave me a new perspective on him that wasn't coming from anywhere else.
My favourite era of NFL is after we got nice looking TV broadcasts (1996 or 7 or so), but before we got the massive rule changes benefitting offence that happened in 2011. It's very little coincidence that most of my material comes from that time period. I sincerely hope that my stuff gives you some knowledge about that awesome period and the cool stories contained within.
It very much does! I'll reveal my complete ignorance here and say I'd never heard of Trent Green before reading your series on him, but it's been fantastic. I've really enjoyed it!
As the unapologetic Chiefs fan that I am, articles about anyone involved with the team (especially from the 90s on), will catch my eye. I’ve always said Trent Green was criminally underrated (when he played and historically), so seeing his name in the title of an article made me curious.
And so I was introduced to the ever-entertaining Robbie Marriage. We sometimes differ in opinion (respectfully) and, for a while, I was spending far too much time arguing with Robbie (again, respect was exercised on both sides) in article comments about Patrick Mahomes and the state of the Chiefs offense (sorry, Robbie, US spelling variation for me). So much energy was put into these comments that Chiefs Chronicles was suffering. Mostly because I would spend time researching my arguments and then, foolishly, type them out on my phone (like I’m doing now). Slow work. I’ve honestly thought of publishing our arguments (with your permission and sharing the byline) in a future column.
It was cool to read about how you came to be a Substack writer (and I hear the Beatles sing “Substack writaaaaaaah!”). When it comes down to motivation to write, I can see you’ve (as usual) put a lot more thought into the journey than I have. Reading through your thought process was very interesting. You are definitely a much more methodical thinker than I am.
The shoutouts were appreciated, although I would like to point out that I don’t write exclusively on the present/future. There are stories from my past as a Chiefs fan mixed in there (like you, my writing style is “why say in 300 words what you can say in 3000?”), and my first Chiefs Chronicles/Remix was exclusively about the Chiefs 2012 season. While not a fun topic, expanding on what I’d previously written about my past experience (that sounds weird- no, I was not a Chiefs player in a past life😂) was a blast and I plan on doing it again. I have at least one idea for a stand-alone article in that vein in the works.
All that being said, I need to wrap this all up. Like you spoke of, I’m getting ready for a big test. Mine is medical- I’m in San Francisco, heading to the UCSF Movement Disorder Center. Wooooo!
I wanted this to be longer, but I’m out of time. Keep up the good work, Robbie.
I remind myself of that Mark Twain quote: "I apologize for the length of this letter. If I had had more time, it would have been shorter." You remind me of that too Gary. I could really chop at the fat, cut 1000 words off of every one of these, and really impress the literature audience, but it feels much more personal this way.
I love our arguments about the Chiefs offence (British English all day baby). The general public doesn't know that those arguments are still not finished. If including this paragraph is tantamount to asking my permission, then you can have it. I haven't read my side of those comments since I published them (although I've read yours a few times), so they may need some retrofitting to be able to be included in a post, but I'd be willing to do that for you. Nothing is more gratifying as a writer than my stuff being quality enough that somebody engages on a level deep enough to feel the need to put effort into a response. I think the like button is better for business, but receiving comments is where my bread is buttered.
You're right that I was slightly reductive casting you exclusively in the present role. Your stuff feels quite personal. It's definitive that you've owned your voice as a Chiefs homer speaking about the Chiefs. I have respect for that, because I know from experience that I cannot do it. I limit my discussion of the Jaguars to pretty much nothing on here because I have no ability to maintain my objectivity talking about them, which makes me uncomfortable and messes badly with my writing process. We'll see if this ever gets better, but there's a serious chance there will never be a Jaguars article on here ever again.
Maybe I'm biased as a denison of the past, but I loved your article on the 2012 Chiefs season. I think I told you that it's the best thing I've ever seen you do, and if I didn't I'm telling you now. I would love if you'd dip into that realm more. I'm happy to hear you have another on the way.
Thank you very much for the thoughtful comment my friend, and if you'd like it to be longer feel free to come back and add more. You know the space you're in. More words are always encouraged here.
Ooh! I forgot one more thing and, since it’s in my defense (US spelling again), I’m taking a moment to put it out there.
In the context of what you discussed, while my stuff IS mostly about current events, I believe that it stands out from all the other articles about the Chiefs for one reason: my voice. It’s my differentiator.
Reading a Chiefs Chronicles is a lot like talking to me- you know it’ll be about the Chiefs but there’s going to be a ton of unexpected craziness, digressions of digressions of digressions (those can be nearly infinite), and I’m rarely completely serious. Through all that, my passion for the team and for the writing (I hope) shines through.
Excellent read here, and very identifiable. The shoutout is very much appreciated.
Like you, I struggled for a long time with finding an audience outside of the core few. I'm sure if I wrote about contemporary wrestling, I'd probably get more of an audience, but I'd be doing something that a billion others are already doing, treading the same water and relitigating the same tired takes, and it's not something I'm as passionate about. I'd just be soullessly creating content for the sake of content. Don't get me wrong; there's modern stuff out there I really like, but I have the most fun writing about the past. Rekindling nostalgia and discovering matches, wrestlers, and stories that I missed out on. Being able to unlock core memories for people or put them on the path to discovering a different take on the artform. That's the stuff that gets the keys moving.
Trent Green didn't necessarily drive me to hit "Subscribe", but the way everything was written. I really do enjoy reading your articles because they take me back to a period where I did watch and follow football with regularity, and they're written with passion, hence the title.
Keep up the awesome work.
Thank you very much buddy. The shoutout is well deserved.
What you say is largely the point of this whole exercise. The choice to switch to modern stuff in search of bigger numbers and more interaction surely would've been extremely easy for you, and once it's made, it's hard to un-ring the bell. Just like all of us, it takes fortitude, even if an intrinsic understanding exists that writing about the past makes you happier, to continue to do it, because the extrinsic reward for your effort is smaller than it could otherwise be. It's tough to stare into the face of that and continue to walk your own path.
With your stuff in particular, I've never watched anything from 1990. I'd love to, but I was just born too late. Your stuff allows me to seek out things that I feel like I'd truly enjoy (like that Jushin Liger match we spoke about), therefore making my life better. If you even did the same exercise, but going through 2024, I'm not sure if you'd be adding anything to my life. Maybe I'd still subscribe, but maybe I wouldn't. You'd lose myself (a dedicated reader), but you'd probably gain five or ten less engaged ones for the trouble. Is that worth it? Evidently not to you or I, because we haven't made the switch.
I enjoy being able to add context to your memories. Thank you so much for reading!
Love this! Thanks for sharing your journey as a writer!
Sports gambling has certainly been on an unparalleled rise since at least 2021, when I first heard the word parley outside of French class or Pirates of the Caribbean. And wouldn’t you know it, it was in a Jr.B hockey locker room.
I think someone more knowledgeable in gender studies than I should take a look at what one might call the convergence of the masculine affinity for risk-taking and the masculine urge to be right about sports. You will, of course, find in that overlap sports gambling (and Jr. B hockey players).
That said, I’ve seen content of similar veins to ours succeed on YouTube — the most similar being hockey YouTuber Pinholes Graham with “Playoffs Past” and “Yesteryear” series of videos. I think the major difference is the medium. Perhaps people would rather read ‘news’ and watch ‘stories’. Or perhaps the YouTube algorithm has the reach that allows that type of content can catch on. Who knows.
But you hit the nail on the head talking about the fire to write. It’s a passion. There’s catharsis in the mere articulation of vision. It’s why we do it.
A fellow Canadian I see. I capped out at Jr. C (I was a defenceman), so you've got me well beat on that front, but I didn't much like hockey anyway. I like this much better.
I'm not sure about any specific masculine urge to be correct, but I am sure that males are much more inclined to take risks than females, which is why most of all gambling problems exist in males. I've never met a female sports gambler outside of a commercial, which is perhaps why my stuff seems to catch on a bit better with females than a lot of sports content out there.
I have seen some stuff about sports' past on YouTube succeeding. However, it's still an uphill battle that requires much more effort for the same reward that those talking about the present get. For instance, we all love THG, so this is the furthest thing in the world from a shot at him, but even he's shied away from making as many videos about the past as he used to for that exact reason. The effort to reward ratio is much smaller if you choose to talk about the past. To make a great video/article about sports' past you must accept that and give it your all anyway, especially true if you're speaking of a human who never was a star, like Trent Green or Tomas Vokoun.
This is where the fire comes in. If you don't have it, trying to run uphill like we do when there's a clear option to just run downhill instead (at the cost of a little quality) by talking about the present or future will become less and less fun everyday until you decide to stop doing it altogether. That's why intrinsic motivation is key in this line of endeavor, because if your motivation is the numbers you're going to run out quickly.
Thanks for mentioning my work, Robbie. I enjoyed learning about you and why you write. I found your analysis on whether to write about current or past topics for football both interesting and personally relatable. For me, I didn't start my pro wrestling substack intending to write about topics from the past as a primary focus. It just kind of evolved that way, and in the process, it has turned into a journal of sorts for me in a lot of ways. I find I'm reliving my own past in a sense and sharing memories of things and people that I enjoyed watching or being around. That's a good thing. Keep up the great work! I believe you will find many readers in coming months outside the football specific interest who seek high quality, personality-profile centric narrative sports-writing.
I hope you're right my brother!
I like your journal my friend. Keep at it and you'll find your audience too!
This topic really resonated with me -- I'm working on a super-longform travel-log type piece about the Oakland A's attempting to move to Las Vegas and one of the central themes is how the theoretically pure community aspect of sports have been corrupted by a rush for dopamine or dollars. One of my favorite parts of being sports-obsessive is the common language it creates (we can both appreciate Trent Green even though neither of us know him personally), and gambling necessarily breaks that down into something more individualized. Everyone in a stadium will have an emotional response to a goal being scored, but you're the only one who cares if it causes you to hit your four-leg parlay, and if you care about that more than the goal itself, you're missing out.
One of the other benefits I've felt from zagging away from what drives clicks is that the work doesn't feel disposable. Pouring hours into a Daily Fantasy Sleeper Picks Week 3 post could probably get a lot of views today and tomorrow, but would be stale and ignored by Monday (until archaeologists like me come looking for it in ten years). The people who really care about this stuff are still going to care about it in the long-term, and just because the bigger audience hasn't found it yet doesn't mean that they never will.
Thanks for the shout out, keep up the good work!
You make a really good point about the gambling overriding the sense of community in the sports fandom. Everybody creates these individualistic outcomes for themselves, parlays or fantasy players or whatever, and peels themselves away from the shared goal of winning or scoring or whatever the case may be. Much like the rest of society, the pursuit of dollars (and the advertising money trying to get people to pursue dollars) are pulling people away from these commonly appreciable community outcomes, in our case winning sports games and reminiscing about common memories.
It's true that evergreen stories feel so much better to make than things that are immediately going to be out of date. I know that feeling too and I don't like it. It feels like all my effort has been somewhat wasted, even though lots of people read it. That's when the numbers come but truly don't feel rewarding.
I'm happy to shout you out. Surely it won't be the last you get from me!
Thanks for the shoutout! Your stuff is great and a big part of the appeal for me is the lack of focus on gambling. I can see how my stuff could be useful for gambling purposes, but I think my motivation is more understanding the modern game and exploring areas I don't see other writers covering.
Also, since I didn't start paying attention to the NFL until I needed something to fill my time during the 2012 NHL lockout, I really appreciate the focus you put on players from before then. Most of it is completely new to me, which is very cool.
No doubt Aaron! That's why I definitively separated your stuff from most covering the present/future. Because it is useful for understanding what may happen in the future, it definitely goes into the 'useful for gamblers' category, at least potentially useful, but it's also quality because it isn't designed to parrot the same old takes over and over like so many content churners out there do. The Jake Oettinger one comes to mind. You gave me a new perspective on him that wasn't coming from anywhere else.
My favourite era of NFL is after we got nice looking TV broadcasts (1996 or 7 or so), but before we got the massive rule changes benefitting offence that happened in 2011. It's very little coincidence that most of my material comes from that time period. I sincerely hope that my stuff gives you some knowledge about that awesome period and the cool stories contained within.
It very much does! I'll reveal my complete ignorance here and say I'd never heard of Trent Green before reading your series on him, but it's been fantastic. I've really enjoyed it!
Trent Green brought me here. Yeah, I said it.
As the unapologetic Chiefs fan that I am, articles about anyone involved with the team (especially from the 90s on), will catch my eye. I’ve always said Trent Green was criminally underrated (when he played and historically), so seeing his name in the title of an article made me curious.
And so I was introduced to the ever-entertaining Robbie Marriage. We sometimes differ in opinion (respectfully) and, for a while, I was spending far too much time arguing with Robbie (again, respect was exercised on both sides) in article comments about Patrick Mahomes and the state of the Chiefs offense (sorry, Robbie, US spelling variation for me). So much energy was put into these comments that Chiefs Chronicles was suffering. Mostly because I would spend time researching my arguments and then, foolishly, type them out on my phone (like I’m doing now). Slow work. I’ve honestly thought of publishing our arguments (with your permission and sharing the byline) in a future column.
It was cool to read about how you came to be a Substack writer (and I hear the Beatles sing “Substack writaaaaaaah!”). When it comes down to motivation to write, I can see you’ve (as usual) put a lot more thought into the journey than I have. Reading through your thought process was very interesting. You are definitely a much more methodical thinker than I am.
The shoutouts were appreciated, although I would like to point out that I don’t write exclusively on the present/future. There are stories from my past as a Chiefs fan mixed in there (like you, my writing style is “why say in 300 words what you can say in 3000?”), and my first Chiefs Chronicles/Remix was exclusively about the Chiefs 2012 season. While not a fun topic, expanding on what I’d previously written about my past experience (that sounds weird- no, I was not a Chiefs player in a past life😂) was a blast and I plan on doing it again. I have at least one idea for a stand-alone article in that vein in the works.
All that being said, I need to wrap this all up. Like you spoke of, I’m getting ready for a big test. Mine is medical- I’m in San Francisco, heading to the UCSF Movement Disorder Center. Wooooo!
I wanted this to be longer, but I’m out of time. Keep up the good work, Robbie.
I remind myself of that Mark Twain quote: "I apologize for the length of this letter. If I had had more time, it would have been shorter." You remind me of that too Gary. I could really chop at the fat, cut 1000 words off of every one of these, and really impress the literature audience, but it feels much more personal this way.
I love our arguments about the Chiefs offence (British English all day baby). The general public doesn't know that those arguments are still not finished. If including this paragraph is tantamount to asking my permission, then you can have it. I haven't read my side of those comments since I published them (although I've read yours a few times), so they may need some retrofitting to be able to be included in a post, but I'd be willing to do that for you. Nothing is more gratifying as a writer than my stuff being quality enough that somebody engages on a level deep enough to feel the need to put effort into a response. I think the like button is better for business, but receiving comments is where my bread is buttered.
You're right that I was slightly reductive casting you exclusively in the present role. Your stuff feels quite personal. It's definitive that you've owned your voice as a Chiefs homer speaking about the Chiefs. I have respect for that, because I know from experience that I cannot do it. I limit my discussion of the Jaguars to pretty much nothing on here because I have no ability to maintain my objectivity talking about them, which makes me uncomfortable and messes badly with my writing process. We'll see if this ever gets better, but there's a serious chance there will never be a Jaguars article on here ever again.
Maybe I'm biased as a denison of the past, but I loved your article on the 2012 Chiefs season. I think I told you that it's the best thing I've ever seen you do, and if I didn't I'm telling you now. I would love if you'd dip into that realm more. I'm happy to hear you have another on the way.
Thank you very much for the thoughtful comment my friend, and if you'd like it to be longer feel free to come back and add more. You know the space you're in. More words are always encouraged here.
Ooh! I forgot one more thing and, since it’s in my defense (US spelling again), I’m taking a moment to put it out there.
In the context of what you discussed, while my stuff IS mostly about current events, I believe that it stands out from all the other articles about the Chiefs for one reason: my voice. It’s my differentiator.
Reading a Chiefs Chronicles is a lot like talking to me- you know it’ll be about the Chiefs but there’s going to be a ton of unexpected craziness, digressions of digressions of digressions (those can be nearly infinite), and I’m rarely completely serious. Through all that, my passion for the team and for the writing (I hope) shines through.
Ok. I’m really behind schedule. Off again!