50 Years, 50 Sports, 50 States

In the grand tradition of 50-50 sporting propositions, we're commemorating our golden anniversary with a 50-week celebration of sports in America. Each issue from now until July 5, 2004, will include a section focusing on one of the 50 states: an essay on its sports history and culture and a feature about a game or event particular to that state—think rodeos, ski races and mountain biking (with some meat-and-potato sports in the stew too). We'll also be polling residents to get their take on their state's top athletes, greatest moments and biggest sports villains. The series kicks off with the very big sports state of Rhode Island, which this week hosts a regatta, Tennis Hall of Fame inductions and a grass-court tournament. "Finding an event to cover in a different sport, in a different state, each week for 50 weeks is like planning the ultimate sports vacation," says assistant managing editor Craig Neff, a 24-year veteran of SI and SI FOR KIDS, who plotted the itinerary. "But it's also like solving Rubik's Cube."

Alexander Wolff
This week's story on sailing in the Ocean State (page 34) gave senior writer Alexander Wolff his first real taste of sports in and around Rhode Island's Narragansett Bay. "I'd expected blazers and ascots," says Wolff, who lives in Cornwall, Vt., "but in fact the sporting life is pretty down-to-earth. I actually can't think of a state that packs more contrasts into its allotted space. Remember, this is where the X Games started. Of course, when I stayed at the Holiday Inn Express in Starkville, Miss., a few months ago, they didn't serve an afternoon high tea—which they did at my B&B on the Hill in Newport."

Peter Farrelly
Peter Farrelly, who contributed the essay on basketball at his alma mater, Providence College (page 39), is a dyed-in-the-wool Rhode Islander. He and younger brother Bobby are the writer-director team behind such cheerfully disturbing comedies as Kingpin, There's Something about Mary and Dumb and Dumber. The hero of Peter's first novel, The Comedy Writer, is a screenwriter from the Farrellys' hometown of Cumberland; his second novel, Outside Providence, pays homage to his old college. Sports suffuses the Farrellys' next feature film, Stuck on You, about conjoined twins (played by Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear) who excel at hockey, football and baseball. "The twins play tennis, but only one makes the team," Farrelly says. "The other has to tag along."