April 21 – May 4, 2024
Welcome to issue four hundred and thirty-nine of the Sports Doing Good newsletter. This week’s 10 stories include:

1. How a diabetes diagnosis turned around A’s closer Mason Miller’s career (The Athletic)
2. The Popularity of Marathons; Participation is up — as are finish times. (New York Times)
3. Grant Hill confident in Team USA roster, touts defensive talent (ESPN)
4. Sue Bird Is Glad the World Is Finally Catching Up (GQ)
5. Fifty years later, Henry Aaron’s legacy lives on in Atlanta and beyond (Washington Post)
6. They had never won in 120 years. Until now. (Religion of Sports/The Word)
7. First Stadium Built for a National Women’s Soccer League Team Opens in Kansas City, Missouri (Nice News)
8. At Just 19, Runner with Down’s Syndrome Makes History as the Youngest Impaired Person to Finish the London Marathon (Good News Network)
9. Lindsey Harding set to be interviewed by Charlotte Hornets for head coaching role, per reports (CNN)
10. From the court to catwalk shows, basketball stars are scoring big in the fashion world (CNN)


10+
Campeones para todos – Champions for everyone (Laureus)
https://www.laureus.com/news/campeones-para-todos-champions-for-everyone
Sport and resilience: Empowering children through movement (Sport and Dev)
https://www.sportanddev.org/latest/news/sport-and-resilience-empowering-children-through-movement
What Happened To Michael Carter-Williams (by Michael Carter-Williams) (The Players’ Tribune)
https://www.theplayerstribune.com/posts/michael-carter-williams-nba-basketball
NBA Africa launches Triple-Double Startup Accelerator (Beyond Sport)
https://beyondsport.org/articles/nba-africa-launches-the-triple-double-accelerator/
2024 #Whitecard Campaign: Focus on the “ATHLETES: GAME ON FOR PEACE” International Dialogue (Peace and Sport)
https://www.peace-sport.org/news/launching-of-the-whitecard-campaign/


We present again our “Featured Video” offering(s). With the explosion of video content out there highlighting the good in sport, we want to showcase such content for your enjoyment and learning. This will be an ongoing effort. And now we add podcasts!

Caitlin Clark stops by Weekend Update to discuss women’s sports and the WNBA draft. (NBC/Peacock)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cuf29fvlfb0
Created Equal: Why kids need free play more than ever (WDET)
https://wdet.org/2024/04/12/why-kids-need-free-play-more-than-ever/
How to score $200M: Angel City’s playbook for women’s soccer (Masters of Scale)
https://mastersofscale.com/how-to-score-200m-angel-citys-playbook-for-womens-soccer/
The First Effect (Deloitte)
https://www.deloitte.com/global/en/about/ioc/the-first-effect.html


Introduction
If there is one sporting event I can say I will never try, it’s running a marathon (as well as a triathlon, since I don’t know how to swim!) All of us at some time have watched a sporting event and wondered what it would be like to do said activity. We are motivated partly by the challenge, and sometimes the sheer wonder of it all (skydiving anyone?). For me, that doesn’t happen with the marathon, or any type of long-distance running, no matter how cool it looks to be wrapped in tin foil at the end of the race.

Another part of the marathon experience that I will miss out on by not running is the inevitable rise that the runners, world champions and first-timers, get with hundreds of thousands of fans cheering them on. I have been in that group several times and consider it one of the best sporting experiences in my life. The great tradition of runners having their name on their shirt gives us all a chance to personalize our cheer, “Way to go Darcy! You got this Ben!” And we find ourselves not rooting for one winner, but rather, thousands and thousands and thousands of them.

We have two stories this week that involve marathons, one that speaks to the growth of the activity worldwide, as well as the inspiring story of 19-year-old Lloyd Martin, who recently became the youngest person ever to finish the London Marathon with Down Syndrome. Both stories also got me thinking about the idea of “it takes a village,” and how it applies to running, especially marathons. Running groups have become popular (as they say, misery loves company. ?) Friends and families travel to different cities to support their loved ones, or runners pull in friends they have not seen in years to hopefully get the unparalleled experience of seeing your college classmate amongst thousands and cheering wildly for them for 3 seconds before they continue on to their ultimate goal.

So, great work you marathon runners amongst our readers. You are admired and your stories will continue to be welcome in the Sports Doing Good newsletter. And for the New York Marathon runners, I’ll see you in November!

Please continue to send along your stories. You are both our audience and the best source of stories. Our Twitter handle is @sportsdoinggood, and you can find us at www.facebook.com/sportsdoinggood and on Instagram.

If you think others would like to receive the newsletter, please feel free to forward it on or have them contact us directly at sab@sportsdoinggood.com. (If you do not want to receive the newsletter anymore you can use the Unsubscribe button at the end of the email).

So, enjoy. And have a good week.

How a diabetes diagnosis turned around A’s closer Mason Miller’s career (The Athletic)
https://theathletic.com/5410939/2024/04/19/mason-miller-oakland-athletics-diabetes/?.tsrc=1317

The Popularity of Marathons; Participation is up — as are finish times. (New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/16/briefing/boston-marathon-finish-times.html

Grant Hill confident in Team USA roster, touts defensive talent (ESPN)
https://www.espn.com/olympics/story/_/id/39961916/grant-hill-confident-team-usa-roster-touts-defensive-talent

Sue Bird Is Glad the World Is Finally Catching Up (GQ)
https://www.gq.com/story/sue-bird-documentary-profile

Fifty years later, Henry Aaron’s legacy lives on in Atlanta and beyond (Washington Post)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2024/04/08/henry-aaron-home-run-50th-anniversary/

They had never won in 120 years. Until now. (Religion of Sports/The Word)
https://religionofsports.substack.com/p/they-had-never-won-in-120-years-until

First Stadium Built for a National Women’s Soccer League Team Opens in Kansas City, Missouri (Nice News)
https://nicenews.com/sports/first-stadium-national-womens-soccer-league-team/

At Just 19, Runner with Down’s Syndrome Makes History as the Youngest Impaired Person to Finish the London Marathon (Good News Network)
https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/at-just-19-runner-with-downs-syndrome-makes-history-as-the-youngest-impaired-person-to-finish-the-london-marathon/

Lindsey Harding set to be interviewed by Charlotte Hornets for head coaching role, per reports (CNN)
https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/09/sport/lindsey-harding-interview-charlotte-hornets-stockton-kings-spt-intl/index.html

From the court to catwalk shows, basketball stars are scoring big in the fashion world (CNN)
https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/29/style/nba-basketball-stars-fashion-style/index.html


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Our goal is to have Sports Doing Good be a portal housing original content and excerpts from and links to the increasing number of articles, websites, video, and other media that showcase the good in sports and society. We aim to celebrate those concepts, activities, events, and individuals by highlighting them for a wider audience. Much of the news today, whether sports- related or not, is incredibly negative and increasingly polarizing, biased, and quite annoying. We are trying to refocus some of the discussion on the good, with a focus on sports.

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Contact Information
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Sarbjit “Sab” Singh
sab@sportsdoinggood.com
516-287-7141
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