Former executive editor and a senior writer for Sports Illustrated, L. Jon Wertheim is one of the most accomplished sports journalists in America. He's also the New York Times bestselling author of Scorecasting: The Hidden Influences Behind How Sports Are Played and Games Are Won, which uses economic principles to explain sports, and This Is Your Brain on Sports: The Science of Underdogs, the Value of Rivalry, and What We Can Learn from the T-Shirt Cannon, which, through the prism of behavioral economics, neuroscience, and psychology, reveals the hidden influences and surprising cues that inspire and derail us—on the field...
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L. Jon Wertheim
Renowned Sports Journalist, Executive Editor, Sports Illustrated
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Bio
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L. Jon Wertheim, the executive editor and a senior writer for Sports Illustrated, is one of the most accomplished sports journalists in America. His work has been cited in The Best American Sports Writing anthology numerous times, as well as in The Best American Crime Writing. He is the author of seven highly praised books: Strokes of Genius: Federer, Nadal, and the Greatest Match Ever Played (2009, Houghton MifflinHarcourt); Blood in the Cage: Mixed Martial Arts, Pat Miletich, and the Furious Rise of the UFC (2009, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt); Running the Table: The Legend of Kid Delicious, the Last Great American Pool Hustler (2008, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt); Transition Game: How Hoosiers Went Hip-Hop (2006, Riverhead Trade); Venus Envy: A Sensational Season Inside the Women’s Tennis Tour (2001, HarperCollins); and Foul Lines: A Pro Basketball Novel co-written with Jack McCallum (2006, Touchstone). His seventh book, Scorecasting: The Hidden Influences Behind How Sports Are Played and Games Are Won—co-written with University of Chicago finance professor Tobias Moskowitz—uses economic principles to explain sports. It came out in January 2011 and was a New York Times best seller. He is currently working on a book with sportscaster Al Michaels.
Wertheim joined SI in 1996 and quickly became one of the magazine’s most authoritative voices on tennis, the NBA, sports business and law and social issues. He has written some of the magazine’s most memorable pieces. One of the chief investigative writers and reporters for SI, Wertheim has explored a wide range of subjects, from high school hazing to performance-enhancing drugs and steroids in sports. His weekly Tennis Mailbag on SI.com is considered a must read among tennis aficionados. He also speaks about sports business issues on college campuses and for corporate audiences.
A native of Bloomington, Ind., where his late father was a distinguished English professor at Indiana University, Wertheim cites past and present SI writers Frank Deford, Curry Kirkpatrick, Jack McCallum and Steve Rushin as sportswriting inspirations. He is also an admirer of John Updike and David Foster Wallace, as well as Martin Amis, Simon Barnes and John McPhee.
Wertheim is 1993 graduate of Yale University and received a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1997. He resides in New York City with his wife, Ellie, a divorce mediator and family lawyer. The couple has a son and daughter.
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Topics
Topics
Business Lessons from the Multi-Billion Dollar Sports World
Videos
Videos
Jon Wertheim on the Dan Patrick Show Full Interview | 6/16/21
Sports Illustrated's Jon Wertheim: Why Tennis Fans Love to Hate Novak Djokovic | The Rich Eisen Show
Books
This Is Your Brain on Sports: The Science of Underdogs, the Value of Rivalry, and What We Can Learn from the T-Shirt Cannon
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