In fifth grade Mirin became the first girl to join her elementary school’s all-boys basketball team. The boys didn’t like it, they didn’t pass her the ball, they guarded her tougher than usual, even pushing her to the ground and sending her to the Emergency Room once. But she loved the challenge, so she kept coming back. She’s still coming back. Hoops led her to writing. Writing leads her back to hoops.
Now she’s a senior staff writer for The Ringer, writing long-form, human-interest sports features. She’s the New York Times best-selling author of the book, Giannis: The Improbable Rise of an NBA Champion, based off her profile of Giannis Antetokounmpo and his youngest brother, Alex Antetokounmpo. The book was released August 10, 2021 by Hachette Books, and debuted at No. 3 on the NYT Best-seller list. It is also a Los Angeles Times Bestseller, Wall Street Journal Bestseller, USA Today Bestseller, Publishers Weekly Bestseller. Jemele Hill called it a “gorgeous portrayal.” Shea Serrano called it “unputdownable.” The New York Times Book Review, which published an excerpt of the book when it was released, said: “Giannis…captures an endearing portrait of Antetokounmpo by using his family as its primary through-line as he made his way to the N.B.A. and the United States. The framing makes for a more compelling journey than what would normally be expected of a parade of tough coaches, on-court rivals and personal uncertainty.”
Mirin’s work, which has been included in the Best American Sports Writing books, focuses more on the person rather than the player. As a 2020 and 2023 Dan Jenkins medal nominee, a prestigious honor in sports journalism, she writes long form stories about people who happen to play sports, telling the interesting and compelling backstories that shape some of our most complex, most dominant, heroes. She’s profiled some of the world’s most prolific athletes across all sports, including DeMar DeRozan, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Davante Adams (three times, first in 2018, then 2021, then 2023), as well as Puka Nacua, Bijan Robinson, Breanna Stewart, Bryce Young, Coco Gauff, and LaMelo Ball (first in 2018 in Prienai, Lithuania, and then in Australia in 2019 to profile LaMelo again).
She gets to the heart of a person’s story, including the emotional comeback from addiction and shame of once-superstar Greg Oden, as well as her profile of Gigi Bryant, writing a story that centered her as a talented player, exploring who she was as a girl, friend, and teammate, as well as her profile of Bronny James, and the pressure and expectations he experienced at USC while waiting to see if he would jump to the NBA and live up to the impossibly high legacy of his father. She’s also profiled Austin Reaves (twice, first in 2021 and then in 2023), Isiah Pacheco, Amen Thompson and Ausar Thompson, Scoot Henderson, Kara Lawson, Brandon Ingram, Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez, Yunus Musah, Ja Morant, Patrick Beverley, Kara Lawson, Jabari Smith Jr., Keegan Murray, Jae’Sean Tate, Courtney Dauwalter, Michael Porter Jr., Immanuel Quickley, Evan Mobley, Marcus Smart , Tyler Herro, Mikaela Shiffrin, Sabrina Ionescu, Derrick White, Sylvia Fowles, and Destiny Littleton. She profiled the late Angels pitcher Tyler Skaggs, talking to his mother and wife about his overdose and who he was as a human being, the life he lived.
Her stories, according to Folio Magazine, which named her a “Top Woman in Media” in 2019, “capture the grit, emotion and physical hardships that comes with athletes.” Among her favorite stories are those about people who are not “famous.” She wrote about the murder of Indigenous women through a profile of distance runner Rosalie Fish; the suicide of a 13-year-old football player named James Ransom, and the questions it raised about CTE, mental health and youth sports; as well as brain trauma and CTE in U.S. Women’s Soccer, and the prejudice that a Black transgender runner named Andraya Yearwood faces to compete. She also profiled Roberto Aguayo, the greatest college kicker who suddenly couldn’t make a kick once he reached the NFL.
Previously she was a staff writer for Bleacher Report’s B/R Mag from 2017-2020 and freelanced for ESPN.com (espnW). She got her start writing sports features at the Orange County Register from 2013-17 after graduating from Occidental College in 2013 with a degree in English and Comparative Literary Studies. Before transferring to Occidental, she played basketball her freshman year at Lewis & Clark College.
Her work has been honored by the Pro Basketball Writers Association, the Associated Press Sports Editors, the U.S. Basketball Writers Association, the Football Writers Association of America, and the Los Angeles Press Club. Her work has been featured in the “Best American Sports Writing” book series, as well as on the websites Longreads and Longform. She won first place in the 2024 Pro Basketball Writers Association magazine-length feature for her story on Greg Oden. She was awarded the 2021 Rising Star award by the U.S. Basketball Writers Association. She was named 2021 Sports Book Author of the Year by The Big Lead. She was also a 2020 and 2023 Dan Jenkins medal finalist.
She regularly speaks about sports feature writing, journalism and storytelling at universities across the country, including Columbia, UC Berkeley, Penn, Boston University, University of Texas at Austin, Northwestern, University of Missouri, University of Virginia, Middlebury College and more. Please ask her to come speak!
Photo credit: Hana Asano
Please feel free to reach out:
Email: mirinfader@gmail.com or mirinf@spotify.com
Twitter: @MirinFader
Instagram: @MirinFader
Substack: https://mirinfader.substack.com/
Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/mirinfader
Mirin Fader 