03-14-2025, 10:03 AM -
We lost a good one.
John Feinstein, a Washington Post sportswriter who became the best-selling author of more than 40 books, including “A Season on the Brink,” an inside look at volatile Indiana University men’s basketball coach Bob Knight, died March 13 at his brother’s home in McLean, Virginia. He was 69.
His brother, Robert Feinstein, confirmed the death and said the cause may have been a heart attack.
Mr. Feinstein (pronounced Fine-steen) joined The Post in 1977 as a night police reporter but soon distinguished himself on the sports beat. He covered a wide range of subjects and developed a talent for deep sourcing that fed personality-driven and dramatic narratives about athletes, coaches and management. One of the most popular sports authors of his era, he also became a frequent commentator on NPR, ESPN and the Golf Channel and had radio programs on Sirius XM.
He wrote books about baseball, football, tennis, golf and the Olympics, as well as novels for young readers, but he was perhaps best known for his coverage of college basketball. With an indefatigable work ethic, Mr. Feinstein filed a day before his death a column for The Post on Michigan State men’s basketball coach Tom Izzo.
In 1985, Mr. Feinstein took a leave of absence from The Post to follow the Indiana Hoosiers and their coach, Knight, for the season. Knight, who had already won the first two of his three national championships, was at the height of his career.
When “A Season on the Brink” appeared in 1986, it was immediately recognized as a breakthrough in sports writing. Instead of deifying a successful coach, Mr. Feinstein portrayed Knight in all his complexities, which combined a sensitivity toward his players with a violent, uncontrollable temper often marked by obscenity-laced tirades.
“Knight was an almost Shakespearean character: brilliant, thoughtful and tragically flawed,” Mr. Feinstein wrote in a 2023 column after Knight’s death.
The book, often cited among a pantheon of unblinkered sports books such as Jim Bouton’s irreverent “Ball Four,” spent 17 weeks as a No. 1 bestseller and was later made into a TV movie starring Brian Dennehy.
Mr. Feinstein seldom wrote about superstars, preferring to explore the struggles of obscure, even marginal athletes. In 1995’s “A Good Walk Spoiled” — the title comes from Mark Twain’s description of golf — Mr. Feinstein alluded to such top golfers as Greg Norman, Tom Watson and Jack Nicklaus, but his primary focus was on little-known players trying to maintain their places on the PGA Tour.
In “The Last Amateurs” (2000), “Where Nobody Knows Your Name” (2014) and “The Ancient Eight” (2024), he told the stories of, respectively, college basketball players, baseball bush leaguers and Ivy League football players who were devoted to their sports, despite having little chance of becoming stars.
“I’ve always been … someone who thinks that the unknown fighting for his life is a better story than the millionaire fighting for his next million,” Mr. Feinstein wrote in his introduction to “A Good Walk Spoiled.” “I’ve always been fascinated by the struggle of sports.”
Mr. Feinstein helped his high school swim team win the New York City championship, and he competed in swimming at Duke University as a freshman. After breaking his foot, he decided to join the school newspaper. Eventually he became sports editor and contributed stories on college basketball to The Post, which named him an intern after graduating in 1977.
He impressed the sports editor but, because there was no job opening in the section, he was hired to cover police and courts in Prince George’s County. Bob Woodward, who helped unravel the Watergate conspiracy and was then an editor in the Metro section, became his mentor.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituarie...ator-dies/
John Feinstein, a Washington Post sportswriter who became the best-selling author of more than 40 books, including “A Season on the Brink,” an inside look at volatile Indiana University men’s basketball coach Bob Knight, died March 13 at his brother’s home in McLean, Virginia. He was 69.
His brother, Robert Feinstein, confirmed the death and said the cause may have been a heart attack.
Mr. Feinstein (pronounced Fine-steen) joined The Post in 1977 as a night police reporter but soon distinguished himself on the sports beat. He covered a wide range of subjects and developed a talent for deep sourcing that fed personality-driven and dramatic narratives about athletes, coaches and management. One of the most popular sports authors of his era, he also became a frequent commentator on NPR, ESPN and the Golf Channel and had radio programs on Sirius XM.
He wrote books about baseball, football, tennis, golf and the Olympics, as well as novels for young readers, but he was perhaps best known for his coverage of college basketball. With an indefatigable work ethic, Mr. Feinstein filed a day before his death a column for The Post on Michigan State men’s basketball coach Tom Izzo.
In 1985, Mr. Feinstein took a leave of absence from The Post to follow the Indiana Hoosiers and their coach, Knight, for the season. Knight, who had already won the first two of his three national championships, was at the height of his career.
When “A Season on the Brink” appeared in 1986, it was immediately recognized as a breakthrough in sports writing. Instead of deifying a successful coach, Mr. Feinstein portrayed Knight in all his complexities, which combined a sensitivity toward his players with a violent, uncontrollable temper often marked by obscenity-laced tirades.
“Knight was an almost Shakespearean character: brilliant, thoughtful and tragically flawed,” Mr. Feinstein wrote in a 2023 column after Knight’s death.
The book, often cited among a pantheon of unblinkered sports books such as Jim Bouton’s irreverent “Ball Four,” spent 17 weeks as a No. 1 bestseller and was later made into a TV movie starring Brian Dennehy.
Mr. Feinstein seldom wrote about superstars, preferring to explore the struggles of obscure, even marginal athletes. In 1995’s “A Good Walk Spoiled” — the title comes from Mark Twain’s description of golf — Mr. Feinstein alluded to such top golfers as Greg Norman, Tom Watson and Jack Nicklaus, but his primary focus was on little-known players trying to maintain their places on the PGA Tour.
In “The Last Amateurs” (2000), “Where Nobody Knows Your Name” (2014) and “The Ancient Eight” (2024), he told the stories of, respectively, college basketball players, baseball bush leaguers and Ivy League football players who were devoted to their sports, despite having little chance of becoming stars.
“I’ve always been … someone who thinks that the unknown fighting for his life is a better story than the millionaire fighting for his next million,” Mr. Feinstein wrote in his introduction to “A Good Walk Spoiled.” “I’ve always been fascinated by the struggle of sports.”
Mr. Feinstein helped his high school swim team win the New York City championship, and he competed in swimming at Duke University as a freshman. After breaking his foot, he decided to join the school newspaper. Eventually he became sports editor and contributed stories on college basketball to The Post, which named him an intern after graduating in 1977.
He impressed the sports editor but, because there was no job opening in the section, he was hired to cover police and courts in Prince George’s County. Bob Woodward, who helped unravel the Watergate conspiracy and was then an editor in the Metro section, became his mentor.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituarie...ator-dies/
