Two guys named Todd

One of the things I love most about Esquire magazine is the element of surprise. While I've come to expect an actor, athlete or beautiful woman on the cover (the editors know the formula alright), it's the inside features that often provide the more satisfying read and which resonate more deeply than the cover stories.

For instance, the April issue (sorry, I meant to write about this last month) has two great features on Todd Palin, a famous husband, and Todd Marinovich, a one-time famous football player.

Now, I'm the first to acknowledge that Sarah Palin has been treated as a punching bag, alternately scorned for her tone-deaf politics and satirized for her folksy ways and lack of intellectual depth. But that doesn't mean her husband is automatically a bad guy, maybe even a dude you wouldn't mind having a beer with. Check out Luke Dittrich's article and decide for yourself. Here's the lead-in:

His eighteen-year-old daughter is about to go into labor; his future son-in-law's mother was just busted for dealing OxyContin; his snowmachine still isn't ready for the two-thousand-mile Iron Dog race; little Trig needs to be changed; Willow needs to be picked up from school; his wife won't be home for hours; and now, for some reason, Wasilla PD is banging on the door. But fear not. He can handle this.

By the way, Todd is from Dillingham, where my younger sister lives. She says he's a decent guy.


Todd Marinovich, on the other hand, was raised almost from birth to be a professional football player by a near-maniacal dad, who had played for USC and had visions of greatness for his red-haired son. Todd excelled, for sure, in high school and college -- he also went to USC -- but he flamed out in the National Football League as a consequence of partying too hard.

Here's the intro to Mike Sager's excellent profile:

Twenty years ago, he was guaranteed to be one of the greatest quarterbacks ever to play the game of football. Engineered to be. He was drafted ahead of Brett Favre. Today he's a recovering junkie. This month he was arrested again. Scenes from the chaotic life of a boy never designed to be a man.

Splendid writing.