Lawyers and athletes at the top of their game share some surprising similarities. Both, of course, must have passion and drive to succeed; both have unique skills that they have developed over years of practice; both must be masters not just of the rules, but also willing to take risks that are not in the official playbook. Great athletes, of course, started their practice very early in life, but haven’t we all met a 6-year-old who is a “born lawyer”?

Our cover story in this issue features SLS graduates who have married their passion for the law with their passion for sports. Their love of sport may fuel their work, but it’s their Stanford Law School education that is allowing them to thrive. Attorneys working in professional sports handle an array of challenging issues—ranging from antitrust matters, to labor and employment, to complex contracting. To a person, our graduates say that their training as lawyers, and at SLS, is a key to their ability to succeed.

Several other stories this fall similarly feature students and graduates who are combining a personal passion with their legal training to pursue surprising paths. A group of our students formed the Stanford Law and Visual Media Project to produce documentaries about contemporary legal topics—one of their films, American, was recently featured at the Chicago International Social Change Film Festival. Alum Daniel Lubetzky explains in these pages his unlikely path to founding and becoming the CEO of the company that produces KIND bars, which today you can see in every venue from Target to your local grocery store. And we feature a student-alum effort to assist recently released prisoners in their re-entry to society. Project ReMADE, founded by our recent graduate Angela McCray, trains former prisoners to launch businesses, teaching them accounting, business planning, and marketing. A crucial part of the effort is the mentoring relationship between the aspiring entrepreneurs and our own graduates who have already succeeded in that realm and are giving back.

Finally, for great examples of people with passion about their work and the drive to succeed, you need look no further than our own faculty. Our newest faculty are profiled in these pages, and they have risen to the top of the field by identifying important puzzles and using innovative approaches to work through them. We hope our students will learn from their example.