A sports journal run by poets?  Slightly silly name aside, this is a development I’ve been dreaming of for years.  Sure, there are upscale sports blogs - Grantland, Deadspin (arguable, and admittedly gross, but essentially upscale or at least upscalely skepto-liberal) - but none that I know of that define themselves by poetry.  Poets, and poetic writers, reveal to us the beauty that we would otherwise miss. At all levels, sports are an expression of beauty and grace.  But while a tacit acknowledgment of this beauty may undergird the existence of the Luxe Sports Blog, too often the content of the Luxe Sports Blog is caught up in analyzing the business and media of sports, not the play itself.  It’s much easier to write an eloquent, evocative, significant analysis to Richard Sherman’s postgame interview, and what it says about race and sports media, than it is to write something meaningful about the game itself.  It’s just easier to write about text than about action.  (You could say that the same tension exists in writing about pop music - that it’s too easy to just write about the lyrics, and take the music for granted.) But from the first issue, it seems that Some Call It Ballin' might actually keep its eyes primarily on the game, and look at the other issues in sports only when they are directly involved in our reading of the game.  (For instance, Gabrielle Calvocoressi’s piece is about the impossibility of watching the Sochi Olympics without thinking of the political and social injustices right outside the stadium; a piece about football and CTE would be successful along the same lines, whereas a piece that merely analyzes the NFL’s legal and financial response to CTE revelations would be somewhat beside the point.)  Of course, it’s important to talk about the institutions, and the financial and legal and social and moral problems that plague athletics at all levels (and, let’s not forget, always have tainted sports).  But it’s important to remember why we love sports, why we love watching them and playing them; and who better than a bunch of poets to remind us?