For twenty-five years, The Best American Sports Writing has built a solid reputation by showcasing the greatest sports journalism of the past year, culled from hundreds of national, regional, and specialty print and digital publications. Wright Thompson, a senior writer for ESPN.com and ESPN: The Magazine, proves more than up to the task by curating this truly exceptional collection. The only shared trait among all these diverse stories is the extraordinarily high caliber of writing, but collectively they tap into the pure passion that can only come from sports.