My top longreads of 2011

I've written before about Instapaper and longreads and my reading habits haven't changed. I love Instapaper still and strongly recommend it to anyone interested in reading more than just USA Today soundbites. Now is the time of year when everyone is putting out their top longreads of the year so I figured I would share mine:

• Blindsided: The Jerry Joseph Basketball Scandal -- Reads like a great short story.
• The Shocking True Tale Of The Mad Genius Who Invented Sea-Monkeys -- More than lounging sea-monkeys, read about weapons patents and neo-Nazis.
• Sheila Bair’s Bank Shot -- "They should have let Bear Stearns fail," Sheila Bair said.
• SPIEGEL Interview with Mikhail Gorbachev -- "Careful: It is you that is using the word 'dictator.' I supported Putin during his presidency, and I still support him in many ways today."
• Churchill Imagines How the South Won the Civil War -- I love the long articles over on HISTORYnet. "Stuart's long absence left him blind as to the enemy's movements at the most critical stage of the campaign."
• The Hero No One Knew -- About Walter Payton, Sweetness. "Walter would call me all the time saying he was about to kill himself," says Holmes. "He was tired. He was angry. Nobody loved him. He wanted to be dead."
• The Defense That Went to Fat Camp -- Music to my amateur football coach ears. "One of Moffitt's favorite metrics is relative strength—a measure of how much work a player can do per pound of body weight."
• An annotated version of Gay Talese's classic Esquire profile of Joe DiMaggio -- I discovered these classic Esquire articles this year, and this is the best of the bunch.
• Monday Night Lights: How Jon Gruden became America’s football coach -- I look at Gruden differently now that I know how hard he works to prepare for each game.
• Inside the Secret Service -- "The Secret Service is an elite travel agency of sorts, maintaining relationships with hotels across the country and negotiating rates throughout the year."