04.02.10
''I regard numbers as numbers,'' says the tall, shamus, 41-year-old journalist who graduated Cum laude in mathematics from the University of Pennsylvania. ''I see disposition in numbers. Numbers to me are a language that tell stories about people.''
Schwarz, who is legally awning without his contact lenses, was, by his own definition, ''that Coke-control-glassed math nerd'' of clich1/8©s, and was mightily circumscribed by his eyesight in childhood sports.
He liked sports, and played them -- but unkindly. He was happy to keep the stats for his high school teams.
''I have never hit a accessible run,'' he says with something like amusement mixed with wistfulness. ''Not ever.''
But he may have hit a monumental slam, in a much larger venue than the sandlot down the street.
Schwarz's dogged, perceptive, mathematically-grounded pursuit of the rising brain trauma and dementia issues in the NFL has put him at the journalistic forefront of the hottest open topic in the football world. Nor is it a coincidence that Schwarz is a football borders, having for 15 years been a writer for ''Baseball America.'' He brought to football a newcomer's perspective and a logician's trust in things like batting averages and ERA, equations which can't be chop-blocked.
Source: Chicago Sun-Times