League of Fans

By Ken Reed

NFL executives, and football lovers everywhere, continue to hope that at some point a magic helmet will be created that makes taking blows to the head in football safe.

The problem is, nobody can conceive of how you can put a helmet inside the human skull to protect the brain that’s floating […]

By Ken Reed

Andrew Maraniss’ first book, Strong Inside: Perry Wallace and the Collision of Race and Sports in the South , was an in-depth, impactful look at the trials and tribulations of the first African-American basketball player in the SEC.

His second book, released in November, tells the tale of the first […]

By Ken Reed

Despite the fact long-time track coach Alberto Salazar was banned by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency for encouraging his athletes to use performance-enhancing drugs. And despite the fact that former Nike Oregon Project runners — including Mary Cain and Amy Yoder Begley — have accused Salazar of abusive coaching techniques, including […]

By Ken Reed

He gave players freedom and made the game of baseball better for all stakeholders.

Marvin Miller, the former players union head who negotiated the right to free agency for players, as well as salary and grievance arbitration opportunities, was elected to baseball’s Hall of Fame on Sunday by the veterans committee.

“These […]

Young athletes’ bodies are the casualties of this $19 billion industry

By Ken Reed

I’ve been writing about the dangers of the professionalization of youth sports for more than a decade (e.g., single-sport specialization at a young age, overuse injuries, anxiety and depression in young athletes, entrepreneurs trying to make a living […]

By Ken Reed

There have been some unsettling developments in BaseballWorld recently.

First, we got a peek at Major League Baseball’s new uniforms, including the iconic New York Yankees jerseys, that will be sporting the Nike swoosh on the front. Yankees jerseys have remained virtually the same for about a hundred years. Nevertheless, starting […]

By Ken Reed

There were a couple incidents from this past week’s football action that have garnered a lot of media and fan attention: Myles Garrett’s bonehead use of Mason Rudolph’s helmet as a weapon, and the terrible hip injury to Alabama’s star quarterback Tua Tagovailoa.

First, the Garrett situation. Twitterverse is afire with […]

Trey Johnson Claims NCAA Violates Minimum-Wage Laws

By Ken Reed

Trey Johnson, a former defensive back at Villanova and now a Canadian Football League player, has filed a class-action lawsuit against the NCAA, accusing the organization of violating minimum-wage laws by refusing to pay athletes like employees.

Johnson’s lawsuit claims athletes’ hours are tracked […]

By Ken Reed

Alberto Salazar is a former world-class distance runner and coach.

If the allegations brought by multiple female athletes claiming he physically, mentally and emotionally abused them while under his direction are true, he’s also a pig.

Thanks to the courage of elite athletes (and whistleblowers) Kara Goucher and Mary Cain, Salazar and […]