This article should be required reading in every sports journalism class.

Jack McCallum always has been a favorite, and not just because he actually saw my birdie on 12 at Augusta National. His recent Sports Illustrated profile of Gregg Popovich was terrific.

Turns out there was more to the story.

McCallum faced quite a challenge since the San Antonio coach doesn’t like to talk about himself. He made it known to McCallum that he wouldn’t be doing any interviews.

McCallum and SI decided the story would be done with or without Popovich’s cooperation. At JackMcCallum.net, he gives an excellent behind-the-scenes about his reporting for the story, and how he eventually got some time with Popovich.

McCallum writes:

(Spurs PR man) Tom James was not thrilled that I was doing the story. On the one hand, he knows that Popovich deserves the attention, and, as a p.r. man, it is his job to get attention–positive if possible–to the Spurs. On the other hand, he was the one who had to tell Pop: “McCallum is coming anyway.” But he’s a pro and he knows the deal. This isn’t China. You can write stories about people even if they don’t want them written. “Pop will be difficult,” said Tom, “but you’re welcome to come and I’ll help you in any way I can.”

My hope, of course, was that Pop would change his mind and talk, but one had to prepare in case he didn’t. That means talking to more people about him than usual, which presents opportunities that can more than compensate for a silent subject. Fortunately, Pop’s influence is far-reaching. There were many candidates.

McCallum did a ton of interviews. Still, he wanted to get something from “Pop.”

Pop’s reticence in talking about himself is genuine. Some people tell you they don’t want to talk about themselves, but they really do. That’s not Pop. But I believe that time management has almost as much to do with it. The Spurs, with Pop at the top of the organizational flow chart, are nothing if not time-management-conscious. As Pop sees it, every minute that he’s talking about himself is one minute away from the mission, which is preparation and, ultimately, winning.

“What about if I just checked some facts with you?” I said, playing somewhat of a trump card. A guy like Pop has to respond to fact checking. Hopefully, it was an Academy thing.

“Okay,” said Pop. “That’ll be okay.” And then he was gone.

Over the next couple of days, I reminded Tom about the fact-checking session and finally Tom told me, “Okay, Pop said he’ll do it before the game.”

Here’s how it went:

I asked a question about leadership and discipline just to get things rolling, and soon we were back at his days as a small-college coach at Pomona-Pitzer in the 1970s. I had a list of questions (something I do rarely these days but wanted to be ready in this case), but this wasn’t going to be his once-upon-a-time life story. In instances when interview time is at a premium, the journalist is better off getting a lot of material on one subject than only a little bit on several different ones. That’s my philosophy anyway.

And that’s pretty much how it went. I heard several things I had never heard before about  his time at Pomona, including his enduring friendship with a distinguished scholar named Dr. Steven Koblik. I knew that would be a followup possibility.

Soon, Pop was gone, having given me only 20 minutes or so. But they were good minutes, and you can get a lot done in 20 good minutes.

Kudos to Jack for some fine reporting. Thanks for showing my sports journalism students how to get it done.