Our deepest data set is sport

Sure, smart men can't jump, but they sure can blow the cover on rampant stupidity (or, euphemistically, "lack of innovation") in professional sports. This exchange between Bill Simmons and Malcolm Gladwell on ESPN is delightfully all over the map, but prompted in part by Gladwell's recent study of the full court press.

Add to this the pleasure of watching recent Michael Lewis profile subjects Shane Battier and Michael Oher perform, and you have yourself a veritable sport-think jamboree.

What we need next is a Gladwell-Lewis-John Lee Anderson hybrid to launch out beyond the American sporting landscape into the third world, to tell us about sport and society there. Someone besides Evan Osnos, that is.