Richard J. Schaap (1931–2001), better known as Dick Schaap, was a 20th century American sportswriter, sports broadcaster, and the author or co-author of 33 books. He was known for his elegant prose and had a reputation as something of an intellectual; many columns consisted of broad sports essays, or "thought pieces."
Schaap was born in Brooklyn and raised in Freeport, New York on Long Island. He began writing as a high school student. At age fourteen he began writing a sports column for the weekly Freeport Leader, but the following year moved to the Nassau Daily Review-Star daily under future Pulitzer Prize-winner Jimmy Breslin. He would later follow Breslin to the Long Island Press and New York Herald Tribune.
He attended Cornell University and was editor-in-chief of the student paper, the Cornell Daily Sun, during which time he defended a professor before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). After graduating in 1955 he received a Grantland Rice fellowship at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and authored his thesis on the recruitment of basketball players. After completing school, he began work as assistant sports editor of Newsweek magazine.
In 1964, Schaap began a thrice-weekly column covering current events. In the following years he wrote several books, including the 1968 best-seller Instant Replay co-authored with American football star Jerry Kramer of the Green Bay Packers. He was ghostwriter for I Can't Wait Until Tomorrow ... 'Cause I Get Better-Looking Every Day, the 1969 autobiography of New York Jet Joe Namath. These led to a stint as co-host of The Joe Namath Show on television, which in turn led to his hiring as sports anchor for WNBC in New York City in 1971. In 1973 he became editor of Sport Magazine until its demise.
After spending the 1970s with the NBC as an NBC Nightly News and Today Show correspondent, he moved to ABC World News Tonight and 20/20 at ABC in the 1980s. He earned five Emmy Awards, for profiles of Sid Caesar and Tom Waddell, two for sports reporting, and for writing. He was also a theatre critic, leading him to quip that he was the only person ever both to vote for the Tony Awards and for the Heisman Trophy.
In 1989 he began hosting The Sports Reporters on the ESPN cable television network. He also hosted Schaap One on One on ESPN Classic and a syndicated ESPN Radio show called The Sporting Life with Dick Schaap, in which he discussed the week's developments in sports with his son Jeremy , who is also an ESPN sportswriter.
Schaap died December 21, 2001 at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan after complications from what was supposed to have been routine joint-replacement surgery.
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