THE BEST CHAPTER

As a storyteller it’s pretty easy to view your life as chapters in a book. For me the title of some of those chapters come quickly to mind: Growing Up, High School, Baseball, San Diego State, The Real World, Married with Children, Sports Illustrated, ABC News, CBS Sports, Real Sports, CBS News, 60 Minutes and 60 Minutes Sports. And now as one page turns to another…I’m thrilled to announce what I fully believe will be the best chapter of my professional life: Anchor and Executive Producer for The Athletic.

For those who have enjoyed my reporting over the years The Athletic Video will become the exclusive home for all my work - investigative, enterprise, interviews, and otherwise. That’s the anchor side of the equation. As one of three executive producers I plan to put all my storytelling skills and experience into play to help shape the voice and vision of the video platform – set to launch in the spring of 2019. It’s a job, at this stage of my life, that perfectly suits my frame of mind and desire to give back to the profession I hold so dear: creating content; hiring the best in the business and giving them the freedom, flexibility and financial backing to create stories that cut through the digital din, all the while integrating The Athletic’s extraordinary array of writers into the mix.

Joining me on this journey will be executive producers Alan B. Goldberg and Victor Frank. Between the three of us we have more than 100 years of network television experience. Goldberg, most recently of NBC News, is the man behind many of my best stories at “60 Minutes Sports.” He has two Peabody and five News Emmys to his credit and counts 18 years as the lead producer for Barbara Walters at ABC News among his stellar credentials. On the other side, Vic Frank and I shared nearly a decade together at CBS Sports. He is a fabulous feature and live-game producer, having won 13 Emmys, including several coordinating the network’s coverage of the Tour de France, where we teamed up for five years.

Why The Athletic?

Simple. Over our many hours of discussions with co-founders Alex Mather and Adam Hansmann we were drawn to their vision and intelligence; their commitment to old-school storytelling combined with a new-age belief in the importance of using data and analytics to best identify and, first and foremost, serve your audience. Without going into too much detail, it’s safe to say our plans for video are as robust as they are ambitious. All driven by a single, sacred goal: Tell Great Stories.

I’m very proud of what I’ve accomplished in my career. But I can honestly say I’ve never been more excited than to be offered the opportunity to help build something from the ground up. With that in mind Alan, Vic and I want to make clear our door is wide open to people with a passion and hunger for storytelling that will engage our subscribers at every level of sport and live up to our exacting standards.

So there you have it. After 30 years at the highest levels of network television I’m moving full-time into the digital world.

I hope you will follow us on this journey. Because if I can promise you one thing I can promise you this: it’s going to be something to see.