Author Bio
• Birth—September 22, 1966
• Raised—Bloomington, Minnesota, USA
• Education—Marquette University
• Awards—National Sportswriter of the Year
• Currently—lives in western Connecticut
Steve Rushin is an American journalist, sportswriter, memoirist, and novelist. He was named the 2005 National Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association, and is a four-time finalist for the National Magazine Award.
Early life
Rushin grew up in Bloomington, Minnesota, the third in a family of five kids. He was steeped in sports and sports lore from an early age, watching baseball and football games at the town's Metropolitan Stadium while selling hot dogs and soda to Twins and Vikings fans. Even more, he comes from a long line of talented sports players, including three big-league baseball players from his mother's side.
♦ His great-great uncle, Jack Boyle, had a long career with the Phillies.
♦ His grandfather, Jimmy Boyle, played catcher for the New York Giants.
♦ His great-uncle, Buzz Boyle, was an outfielder for the Brooklyn Dodgers.
♦ His father, Don, was a blocking back for Johnny Majors at the University of Tennessee.
♦ His older brother, Jim, was a forward on the Providence hockey team that reached the Frozen Four in 1983.
Words and literacy were emphasized in his household: his mother was a teacher and was certain that her son's love of reading (books along with cereal boxes) and writing meant he would become a lawyer, while his businessman father had him look up words in the big red family dictionary and report back on their definitions.
Journalism
Rushin graduated from Marquette University and two weeks later went to work for Sports Illustrated. Within three years, at age 25, he was made a Senior Staff Writer, the youngest ever at SI. In 1994, Rushin wrote a major feature for the magazine's 40th anniversary issue, "How We Got There." Based on different facets of sports and sports history, the article reached 24 pages, longer than any other article published in a single SI issue. From 1998 Rushin penned the "Air & Space" column, eventually departing the magazine in early 2007. Three years later he returned as a contributing writer, and in 2011 wrote his column "Rushin Lit."
Rushin also contributed to Golf Digest and Time magazine. He has written numerous essays for The New York Times with memoirist and former Sports Illustrated colleague Franz Lidz.
Books
Rushin is the author of Pool Cool (1990, a billiards guide), Road Swing: One Fan's Journey Into the Soul of America's Sports (1998, a travelogue ), The Caddie Was a Reindeer (2004, a collection), The Pint Man (2010, a novel), The 34-Ton Bat: The Story of Baseball as Told Through Bobbleheads, Cracker Jacks, Jockstraps, Eye Black, and 375 Other Strange and Unforgettable Objects (2013, baseball history ), and Sting-Ray Afternoons (2017, a memoir).
Personal
Rushin and his wife, Rebecca Lobo, live with their four children in Western Connecticut. Lobo is a college basketball analyst and former basketball player. The couple met in a Manhattan bar one night after Rushin had written in Sports Illustrated about sleeping with 10,000 women one night—referring to a WNBA game he had been watching when he fell asleep. Rushin recalled their meeting:
She asked if I was the scribe who once mocked…women's professional basketball. Reluctantly, I said that I was. She asked how many games I'd actually attended. I hung my head and said, "None." And so Rebecca Lobo invited me to watch her team, the New York Liberty, play at Madison Square Garden.… It was—for me, anyway—love at first slight.
In May, 2007, he was the Commencement Day speaker at Marquette, where he was awarded a Doctor of Humane Letters for "his unique gift of documenting the human condition through his writing." He said to the graduating class:
Sometimes it pays to think inside a box. And so my daughter and I lay in that box and gazed out at the dozens upon dozens of tulips my wife planted in rows last fall. They bloomed this month, tilting ever so slightly the sun. And I thought how remarkable it is that in nature, life wants to grow towards the light.
(Author bio adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 7/31/2017.)