ESPN’s Kurkjian will receive Career Excellence Award

NEW YORK (AP) — Tim Kurkjian of ESPN has been voted the Baseball Writers’ Association of America’s Career Excellence Award and will be presented with the honor during the Hall of Fame induction weekend in July.

Kurkjian received 211 votes among 375 ballots cast by BBWAA members with 10 consecutive years of service to win the honor, which was known as the J.G. Taylor Spink Award until his name was removed by the BBWAA in February due to research into racism by the former publisher of The Sporting News.

The late Marty Noble, who wrote for The Record in New Jersey and Newsday in New York, got 89 votes and Baseball America founder Allan Simpson received 71.

Kurkjian, who turns 65 on Friday, is a graduate of Walter Johnson High — the school was named for the baseball Hall of Famer —- in Bethesda, Maryland, and the University of Maryland. He was hired by The Washington Star in 1979, covered the Texas Rangers for the Dallas Morning News and the Baltimore Orioles for The Sun for four years each.

“Baseball is the only language we spoke in my family growing up,” Kurkjian said recently. “My dad was a really good player, my brothers were great college players, this is all we talked about in my house. And I went to Walter Johnson High School, named after the greatest pitcher of all time.”

He moved to Sports Illustrated as senior baseball writer for seven years, then joined ESPN in 1998. He has been a columnist for ESPN.com and a reporter, analyst and host for “Baseball Tonight,” earning a pair of Emmy Awards.

Kurkijian has written three books: “America’s Game” (2000), “Is This a Great Game or What?” (2007) and “I’m Fascinated by Sacrifice Flies” (2017).