Here is the first assignment for our finalists:

Write about an individual athlete

Which athlete to choose? It's totally up to the finalists. You can choose any professional athlete, amateur athlete or even an under-the-radar athlete few have heard of. The job will be to make it a compelling read regardless of which athlete you choose.

Why so vague? The initial assignments are intentionally open-ended to give the finalists the freedom to take them in whichever direction they think will work best. In later rounds, the topics will be more specific and some will have a specific basketball theme.

The format? Also completely up to the finalists: a feature, analysis, an opinion piece ... a little bit of everything? It's all up to the authors.

Deadline? Pieces must be posted on finalists' own blog no later than 9 a.m. PT/Noon ET this Friday.

Length? If you want a guideline, maybe shoot for about 750-800 words. But that's not a hard requirement at all. 500 words might work well, as could 1,200. But for someone who really isn't sure what to aim for, 750-800 words should  be sufficient.

Couple other quick answers:

What's the purpose of this assignment? The assignments are meant to provide some common ground for comparison purposes. This way, all of the finalists will have something that has a similar theme, even if they take very different approaches to it.

Can the finalists write additional pieces? Most definitely. The finalists can write as much as they want, but the assignments ensure they will at least all have one comparable piece on which to base votes from round to round.

What do the judges do now? We will be evaluating the finalists' work on the first assignment and providing some comments and votes later this week. Our combined vote will count for half of this week's final total, and the users' combined votes will count for the other half.

Good luck to our 16 finalists.

-Tom