On-the-spot On?

From article by Kelly M. House:

1)      “The proposals have drawn criticism from Golden Gate regulars such as Tom Nuckton.

The University of California San Francisco Medical Center doctor regularly visits the botanical gardens to decompress after long hospital shifts and write in his notebook. He said if there were a fee to visit the gardens, he’d just find somewhere else to relax. “

This may be a picky English major thing but I do not agree with the way she has split these paragraphs.  The first paragraph references a park regular Tom Nuckton.  It almost seems as though the reader should know who he is.  This brings to my mind the whole, “When in doubt, cut it out” saying.  The sentence does not need to identify Nuckton instead just concluding after the word “regulars.”  Also, the way it is, it takes the reader a few seconds to realize that Nuckton and “The University of California San Francisco Medical Center doctor” are the same person.  If the name had been left out of the first paragraph as I suggested and moved to this paragraph it would be much clearer.

To me it seems more likely that people would be more likely to read Matthew Baker’s article:

2)      “Steve Zadig’s auto racing career had never been higher, but his passion for the sport had never been lower.”

Now this is interesting.  Someone who is good at something and hates it intrigued me and I’m guessing many other readers as well.  Immediately, I was curious as to why a fellow who is prospering would hate what he was doing.  Then we find out Zadig is “a man who perfects his patent on clean wave energy Monday through Friday” but is harmful to the environment on the weekend.  The rest of the paragraphs fall nicely to support what this man did to clean his conscience (no pun intended).  The only thing I thought was missing was an interview with some of his fellow racers commenting about the switch.  This would enhance the credibility of Baker’s claims.  (This is one thing House did very well is include statements from numerous people who are affected by the issue she writes about.)

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