Sunday, October 5, 2008

Sal Maiorana is awesome

Sal Maiorana, staff writer at the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, is the man. The guy does a ton of writing over at the paper's sports section. He covers the Buffalo Bills, writes a column and does pre-game match-ups on a pretty frequent basis.

What is unique about him, however, is how bad he is in a stylistic sense.

Just look at his story from the D&C last Monday. First, the lede.

To a man they stood in front of their dressing cubicles Sunday night wearing guarded smiles on their faces and reciting a mantra that you swore must have been on a centrally-located teleprompter somewhere in the locker room.

It's ok, despite hamfisted word choice and a pretty lengthy opening sentence. Who is "they?" Who is this "you?" I suppose it's implied by the headline that I've neglected to include, but he shows such a poor choice of words.

Later, in the same story, is his magnum opus.

But then the wise-beyond-his-years wide receiver caught himself, looked up at a group of reporters huddled around him, and in a moment of clarity when he must have recalled all the hard times the Bills have endured in recent years, he smiled broadly and said “But the finishing is the bottom line and learning how to win games in the end. Everyone kept fighting and we came up with the victory.”

Just soak in that 'graph for a while. It's simply beautiful. Totalling 64 words, the first sentence is a monster of comas, reading like something straight out of a first semester newswriting class.

Despite this, Sal is still the man, and allows me a breathe of relief. He proves that we all have a shot at getting away with being a writer.

For that, Sal's off the charts.

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