Hard to believe, all good things must come to an end.

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2018
#ExtendLafleur
10 More Wins

I was a long time subscriber from high school until about 10 years ago. It was clear they were in trouble when the annual subscription went from $54/yr to around $5…and I still cancelled.

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“How do you get to be president and you’re stupid?” Donald J Trump - 4/10/25
When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn't become a king. The palace turns into a circus. - Turkish Proverb

Where will I get a football shaped phone now?

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Yeah, I had it also for a lot of years. Just found out the first ever cover was of Milwaukee Stadium.

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2018
#ExtendLafleur
10 More Wins

The shit they used to give you when you renewed your subscription.

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2018
#ExtendLafleur
10 More Wins

I have all of the issues from say 1980-1987 in a box in my basement, and I have never been able to part with them. My kid used to look through them and read about all the sports stars of those days and get a kick out of that.

I too was a long-time subscriber. Even had my address changed when I went to U of I so they would show up there. After I quit, my wife, for a number of years, would buy me the annual swimsuit edition.

My brother may still subscribe. I need to check with him.

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"I honestly don't see a good bet on the board here."

My mom gave me a box of them that I had saved from the same time period. They were fun to flip though again, but I had to get rid of them. I remember being so excited when a new issue would arrive in the mail when I was a kid.

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I read it from about 4th grade. My parents used it to encourage me to read. In college I used to clip the photo every time they had a Chicago team and then tape it on my wall as a big mural. It certainly impressed the ladies

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Gee, when did it start going south for them?

Ladies did not go to your room.

Not surprising. No one cares about good writing anymore.

But we have Barstool, Pat McAfee deadspin and that is soooo awesome bro

At one point I subscribed to both SI and ESPN Thee Magazine. Now, I barely take the time to read anything.

Right?

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Elections have consequences.

Kate Upton really let herself go.

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RIP SI and Disney

Looks like the current publisher licenses the name, and missed a payment to the actual owner of the name, after being warned what would happen if they did miss the payment.

As a kid in the early/mid 70s, SI was the only window to the national sports scene beyond Saturday afternoon TV. We are talking before the highlight shows like George Michael's Sports Machine.

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

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I still subscribe to this day. The print edition is now monthly vs weekly. There still is a lot of good writing/journalism in the print edition.

Just for example a few years ago they had a piece on Pete Axthelm, it was outstanding. But to ETO’s point, who wants to read a well researched well written piece of journalism when you can fire up a Pat McAfee podcast with dudes mindlessly spouting off shit during the whole four hours.

Like I would re-read that Pete Axthelm piece tomorrow, nobody on the planet wants to re-watch a Skip Bayless first take show from three years ago.

Like many of you I also had a subscription during most of the 1980s. My grandma would buy the subscription for Xmas each year. It was an awesome gift that showed up all year. Used to read them all cover to cover. Print has been dying since the 2000s when I left the industry. People can get more info on sports than ever before on their phone for free.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

So all this is your fault?

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"I honestly don't see a good bet on the board here."

Lately I've been noticing a lot of Sports Illustrated click bait stories on my phone news feed. Stuff like "Cubs trade longtime Pitcher" and it's a guy who's been the minors for 3 years.

I can attest that print media is on its last legs - I’ve been in printing for 35+ years, since I was in high school. It’s been a good career though the last 5 years in particular have been a struggle. I’m a 3rd generation printer, there won’t be a 4th in my family.

very 60s-70's like...wait 2 weeks to read and look at nice photos of an event that occurred 2 weeks prior to starting to wait...etc. writing was on the wall with the explosion of cable tv in the 80s and the revolutionary internet in the 90s.

instead of reading about and looking at photos 3 weeks after the fact, why not hear commentary and watch re-plays on the day of. you can't stop progress. remember selling hundreds of tribs and sun-times on saturdays and early sunday ams - with 20 page sport sundays. no one wants print news anymore. not for the sports, not the coupons or the t.v. guide bingo games.

here's time magazine's circulation - circa 1945:



circa 2022:



usa has 200 million more people today than in 1945. time magazine has over 3 million less readers.

There is something good about long form commentary that doesn't focus on the day to day. But guys like Joe Posnanski don't write for SI any more.

I'm re-reading Posnanski's "The Baseball 100" which he originally published as 100 individual pieces in the Athletic in 100 days. It's an insane effort, nearly 800 pages. There is nobody willing to work for whatever SI has been paying to write 4000-6000 words of that quality every month.

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

Cursive had it a lot worse.

Perfect imitation
https://www.reddit.com/r/billsimmons/co ... _funniest/