On the start of the high school football season in Odessa, Texas. An adaptation published alongside the release of Bissinger’s 1990 book of the same name, which led to the movie and the show.

Her suicide made headlines around the world after classmates were indicted on felony charges related to bullying, but the real story wasn’t that simple.

At age 22, the author went undercover at his old high school. An excerpt of the book that became the film.

Mr. Lindwall was the only high school teacher who understood him. Then Mr. Lindwall went to jail, and it was his turn to try to understand.

Sixteen years after graduating, an alumnus heads back to his old stomping grounds in Cleveland.

How two love-struck, type-A high school students almost got away with murder.

Navigating life as a brilliant teenage girl.

The profile of a 34-year-old woman named Charity Johnson who tricked people all over the country into believing she was still in high school.

An essay on a fatal car crash in the author’s youth.

The science behind why high school sucks.

An obsessive marine biologist gambles his savings, family, and sanity on a quest to be the first to capture a live giant squid.

A trip to a lobster festival leads to an examination of the culinary and ethical dimensions of cooking a live, possibly sentient, creature.

Stalking the disappearing bluefin tuna, the world’s most valuable wild animal.

A trip to Scotland and an investigation of enduring belief.

On the mysterious and moderately intelligent giant Pacific octopus.

A profile of a celebrity whale.

In 1992, a Chinese freighter tipped violently in a storm dumping a load of plastic floating infant toys—7,200 red beavers, 7,200 green frogs, 7,200 blue turtles, and 7,200 yellow ducks—to the open sea. This is their story.

In February 2010, a killer whale named Tilikum dragged his SeaWorld trainer into the pool and drowned her. It was the third time the orca had been involved in a death during his 27 years in captivity. This is his story.

The story of the loneliest whale in the world.

The complicated post-baseball days of Joe DiMaggio.

Basketball’s iconoclast is now a broke recluse at 37.

Five years after they leave the league, 60 percent of NBA players have nothing left. In the NFL, it’s closer to 80 percent after just two years. A breakdown of the economics of retirement.

Terrell Owens at 38: unemployed, nearly bankrupt after losing his shirt in a electronic-bingo entertainment complex development plan gone bust, father of four children (one of which he has never met), frequent bowler.

Before he was a Twitter savant, Jose Canseco was a juiced-up terror.

Former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling needed funding for his ambitious video-game startup. Rhode Island politicians needed jobs and a vision for how to transform the state’s beleaguered economy. The story of a $75 million bet gone bust.

The crumbling of an American icon.

On Stephon Marbury’s (not totally sad!) NBA exile in China.

Baseball legend Lenny Dykstra’s on-field brilliance and private-life disasters, from drunk driving to failed investment and publishing ventures.

A profile of Jordan at 50.

Along for the ride with a boatload of refugees risking their lives.

The haunted past of Amy Bishop, a University of Alabama neurobiologist who shot six colleagues during a staff meeting.

Heartbreak at the edge of the earth.

“Oh, my God. This is going to be a huge one.”

“Shark Week” • “Difficult Women” • “Private Practice”

“Who would expect the Embassy of Cambodia? Nobody. Nobody could have expected it, or be expecting it. It’s a surprise, to us all. The Embassy of Cambodia!”

Why medical bills are killing us. [sub req’d]

David Letterman weathers a sex and extortion scandal.

Johnny Carson, profiled at the top of his game.

An out-of-character conversation.

A profile of Kimmel published just after he got the late-night job.

A writer for Conan O’Brien on how The Tonight Show really ended and on how his boss got screwed

Steve Allen, the original host of The Tonight Show, in his cranky, later years.