The Sporting News is a website and former magazine publication owned by Sporting News Holdings, which is a U.S.-based sports media company formed in December 2020 by a private investor consortium. It was originally established in 1886 as a print magazine. It became the dominant American publication covering baseball, acquiring the nickname "The Bible of Baseball".[1]
From 2002 to February 2022, it was known simply as Sporting News. In December 2012, The Sporting News ended print publication and shifted to a digital-only publication. It currently has editions in the United States, Canada, Australia, and Japan.
March 17, 1886:The Sporting News (TSN), founded in St. Louis[2] by Alfred H. Spink, a director of the St. Louis Browns baseball team, publishes its first edition. The weekly newspaper sells for 5 cents. Baseball, horse racing and professional wrestling received the most coverage in the first issue. Meanwhile, the sporting weeklies Clipper and Sporting Life were based in New York and Philadelphia. By World War I, TSN would be the only national baseball newspaper.
1901: The American League, another rival to baseball's National League, begins playing. TSN was a vocal supporter of the new league and its founder, Ban Johnson. Both parties advocated cleaning up the sport, in particular ridding it of liquor sales, gambling and assaults on umpires.
1903:TSN editor Arthur Flanner helps draft the National Agreement, a document that brought a truce between the AL and NL and helped bring about the modern World Series.
1904: New York photographer Charles Conlon begins taking portraits of major league players as they pass through the city's three ballparks: the Polo Grounds, Yankee Stadium and Ebbets Field. His images, many of which were featured in TSN, have become treasured symbols of baseball's past.
1936:TSN names its first major league Sporting News Player of the Year Award, Carl Hubbell of the New York Giants. It is the oldest and most prestigious award given to the single player in MLB who had the most outstanding season. To this day, it remains voted on by MLB players.
1942: After decades of being intertwined with baseball, TSN adds in-season football coverage.
1946:TSN expands its football coverage with an eight-page tabloid publication titled The Quarterback. The tab is later renamed the All-Sports News as coverage of other sports is added, including professional and college basketball and hockey.
1962: J.G. Taylor Spink dies. His son C.C. Johnson Spink takes over the publication. In 1962, after Spink's death, the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) instituted the J. G. Taylor Spink Award as the highest award given to its members. Spink was also the first recipient.
1967:TSN publishes its first full-color photo, a cover image of Orioles star Frank Robinson.
1977: The Spink family sells TSN to Times Mirror in 1977.[3]
1991:The Sporting News transitions to a glossy, full-color all-sports magazine.
1996:The Sporting News comes online, serving as a sports content provider for AOL. The following year, it launches sportingnews.com.
2000: Tribune Company sells TSN to Vulcan Inc., headed by tech billionaire Paul Allen. The following year, the company acquired the One on One Sports radio network, renaming it Sporting News Radio.
2002: The magazine drops the definite article from its name and becomes just Sporting News (SN). Subsequent covers reflect the change.
2006: Vulcan sells SN to Advance Media, which places the publication under the supervision of American City Business Journals (ACBJ).
2007:Sporting News begins its move from St. Louis, where it had been based since its founding, to ACBJ's headquarters in Charlotte, N.C. The publication leaves St. Louis for good in 2008, when it also became a bi-weekly publication.
Transition to digital publication
In 2011, Sporting News announced a deal to take over editorial control of AOL's sports website FanHouse.[4] In December 2012, after 126 years, Sporting News published its final issue as a print publication, and shifted to becoming a digital-only publication.[5]
The following March, ACBJ contributed Sporting News into a joint venture with the U.S. assets of sports data company Perform Group, known as Perform Sporting News Limited and doing business as Sporting News Media. Perform owned 65% of Sporting News Media. Sporting News would join Perform Group's other domestic properties, such as its video syndication unit ePlayer and its soccer website Goal.com.[6] The deal excluded the magazine's Sporting News Yearbooks unit and NASCAR Illustrated.[7] Almost immediately after the venture was established, Sporting News laid off 13 staff writers.[8] Perform Group acquired the remainder of Sporting News Media in 2015.[6]
Under Perform's ownership, Sporting News shifted to a more tabloid-like editorial direction.[6] The site introduced a new logo and website design in 2016.[9] Following Perform's acquisition of ACBJ's remaining stake, it began to align itself more closely with the company's other units, including replacing Associated Press articles with Perform's own Omnisport wire service for articles and video content (which began to constitute a sizable portion of the site's overall content).[6]Sporting News also began to introduce new localized versions in other markets, with a focus on countries where it had launched its sports streaming service DAZN. These sites are, in turn, used to promote the DAZN service.[6] Perform Media president Juan Delgado explained that the company was trying to preserve the heritage of the Sporting News brand by still publishing original content, while also publishing content oriented towards social media to appeal to younger users.[6]
Later history
In September 2018, Perform Group spun out its consumer properties, including Sporting News and DAZN, into a new company known as DAZN Group. The remaining sports data business became Perform Content, and was sold in 2019 to Vista Equity Partners and merged with STATS LLC.[10][11]
In the summer of 2020, Lindenwood University of St. Charles, Missouri, acquired the archives collection of The Sporting News from ACBJ.[12] The collection was described as consisting of "10,000+ books on baseball, football, hockey, basketball, NCAA, and other sports."[12]
In December 2020, DAZN Group sold Sporting News to a private investment consortium, which became Sporting News Holdings.[13]
From 1968 to 2007, the magazine selected one or more individuals as Sportsman of the Year. On four occasions, the award was shared by two recipients. Twice, in 1993 and 2000, the award went to a pair of sportsmen within the same organization. In 1999, the honor was given to a whole team. No winner was chosen in 1987.
In 2008, the award was replaced by two awards: "Pro Athlete of the Year" and "College Athlete of the Year". These in turn were replaced by a singular "Athlete of the Year" award starting in 2011.[14]
TSN sponsors its own annual Team, Player, Pitcher, Rookie, Reliever, Comeback Player, Manager, and Executive of the Year awards. Many fans once held the newspaper's baseball awards at equal or higher esteem than those of the Baseball Writers' Association of America.[23] Prior to 2005, the SN Comeback Player Award was generally recognized as the principal award of its type, as MLB did not give such an award until that year.
Also, between 1975 and 2005, Sporting News conducted an annual poll and named a national champion for Division I-A (now Division I FBS). It is regarded as a "major selector" in NCAA official records books.[26]
Notable staff
Thomas G. Osenton, president and chief operating officer of Sporting News Publishing Company and publisher of The Sporting News weekly
Bob Ferguson, journalist and author of Who's Who In Canadian Sport[27]
Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra was an American professional baseball catcher who later took on the roles of manager and coach. He played 19 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB), all but the last for the New York Yankees. He was an 18-time All-Star and won 10 World Series championships as a player—more than any other player in MLB history. Berra had a career batting average of .285, while hitting 358 home runs and 1,430 runs batted in. He is one of only six players to win the American League Most Valuable Player Award three times. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest catchers in baseball history and was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1972.
David Mark Winfield is an American former Major League Baseball (MLB) right fielder. He is the special assistant to the executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association. Over his 22-year career, he played for six teams: the San Diego Padres, New York Yankees, California Angels, Toronto Blue Jays, Minnesota Twins, and Cleveland Indians. He had the winning hit in the 1992 World Series with the Blue Jays over the Atlanta Braves.
Derek Sanderson Jeter, nicknamed "the Captain", is an American former professional baseball shortstop, businessman, and baseball executive. As a player, Jeter spent his entire 20-year Major League Baseball (MLB) career with the New York Yankees. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility in 2020; he received 396 of 397 possible votes, the second-highest percentage in MLB history and the highest by a position player. He was the chief executive officer (CEO) and part owner of the league's Miami Marlins from September 2017 to February 2022.
Roger Eugene Maris was an American professional baseball right fielder who played 12 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB). He is best known for setting a new MLB single-season home run record with 61 home runs in 1961.
George Kenneth Griffey Sr. is an American former professional baseball outfielder. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) from 1973 through 1991, most notably as a member of the Cincinnati Reds team that won three division titles and two World Series championships between 1973 and 1976. He also played for the New York Yankees, Atlanta Braves, and Seattle Mariners.
The Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) is a professional association for journalists writing about Major League Baseball for daily newspapers, magazines, and qualifying websites. The organization was founded in 1908 and is known for its annual awards and voting on membership in the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Joseph Paul Torre Jr. is an American professional baseball executive and former player, manager, and television color commentator. He has served as a special assistant to the Commissioner of Baseball since 2020. He previously served in the capacity of Major League Baseball's (MLB) chief baseball officer from 2011 to 2020. Torre ranks fifth all-time in MLB history with 2,326 wins as a manager. With 2,342 hits during his playing career, Torre is the only major leaguer to achieve both 2,000 hits as a player and 2,000 wins as a manager. From 1996 to 2007, he was the manager of the New York Yankees, and guided the team to six American League (AL) pennants and four World Series championships.
The The Sporting News Rookie of the Year Award is an annual Major League Baseball (MLB) award established in 1946 by The Sporting News. For the first three years (1946–1948) and again in 1950, there was a single award. In 1949 and since 1951, the award has been given to a rookie from both the American League and National League. In 1961 and from 1963 through 2003, The Sporting News split the rookie award into two separate categories, Rookie Pitcher of the Year and Rookie Player of the Year. In 2004 those two awards were discontinued, in favor of a single award, one for each league.
The Major League Baseball Comeback Player of the Year Award is presented by Major League Baseball (MLB) to the player who is judged to have "re-emerged on the baseball field during a given season." The award was developed in 2005, as part of a sponsorship agreement between MLB and Viagra. In 2005 and 2006 representatives from MLB and MLB.com selected six candidates each from the American (AL) and National Leagues (NL) and one winner for each league was selected via an online poll on MLB.com. Since then, the winners have been selected by a panel of MLB beat reporters. Under the current voting structure, first place votes are worth five points, second place votes worth three, and third place votes worth one with the award going to the player with the most points overall. Past winners have often overcome injury or personal problems en route to their award-winning season.
This is a list of award winners and league leaders for the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball.
Casimir James Konstanty was an American relief pitcher in Major League Baseball and National League Most Valuable Player of 1950. He played for the Cincinnati Reds (1944), Boston Braves (1946), Philadelphia Phillies (1948–1954), New York Yankees (1954–1956) and St. Louis Cardinals (1956). Konstanty batted and threw right-handed, stood 6 feet 1 inch (1.85 m) tall and weighed 202 pounds (92 kg).
Frederick George Lieb was an American sportswriter and baseball historian. Lieb published his memoirs in 1977, which documented his nearly 70 years as a baseball reporter. He received the J. G. Taylor Spink Award from the Baseball Writers' Association of America in 1972. Born in 1888 in Philadelphia, Lieb died at age 92 in Houston.
Daniel Shulman is a Canadian sportscaster with Sportsnet as well as the American network ESPN.
Alfred Henry Spink was a Canadian-born American baseball writer and club organizer based mainly in St. Louis, Missouri. In 1886, he established a weekly newspaper, The Sporting News (TSN), that emerged from World War I as the only national baseball newspaper or magazine.
The 1945 Major League Baseball All-Star Game was cancelled on April 24 after the Major League Baseball (MLB) season began on April 17. The July 10 game was cancelled due to wartime travel restrictions in World War II. 1945 is the first of two years since 1933, when the first official All-Star Game was played, that an All-Star Game was cancelled and All-Stars were not officially selected.
John George Taylor Spink was the publisher of The Sporting News from 1914 until his death in 1962. He inherited the weekly American baseball newspaper from his father Charles Spink, younger brother of its founder Alfred H. Spink. In 1962, the Baseball Writers' Association of America established an annual J. G. Taylor Spink Award and named him the first recipient; Spink's name was removed from the award in February 2021 due to his history of supporting segregated baseball.
Colonel Buster Mills was an American outfielder, coach, scout and interim manager in Major League Baseball. A native of Ranger, Texas, in his playing days, he stood 5 ft 11+1⁄2 in (1.82 m) (181.6 cm) tall, weighed 195 pounds (88.5 kg), and threw and batted righthanded.
The city of St. Louis, Missouri, in the United States is home to more than a dozen professional, semi-professional, and collegiate sports teams. The Sporting News rated St. Louis the nation's "Best Sports City" in 2000 and the Wall Street Journal named it the best sports city in 2015.
Elections to the National Baseball Hall of Fame for 2021 proceeded according to rules most recently amended in 2016. As in the past, the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) voted by mail to select from a ballot of recently retired players. The results were announced on January 26, 2021, with no players receiving enough votes to be inducted.
Richard James Kaegel is an American sportswriter. As a beat writer, he covered the St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Royals of Major League Baseball, and also served as the editor-in-chief for The Sporting News.
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