Thomas Boswell Wins 2025 BBWAA Career Excellence Award

Thomas Boswell, who for 52 years at the Washington Post as a baseball beat writer and later a columnist became one of the most notable and recognizable names in sports writing, has been elected the 2025 winner of the BBWAA Career Excellence Award. He will be honored with the award that is presented annually to a sportswriter “for meritorious contributions to baseball writing” during the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum’s induction weekend July 25-28 in Cooperstown, N.Y.

Of the 394 ballots, including two blanks, cast by BBWAA members with 10 or more consecutive years’ service, Boswell was named on 167 in becoming the 76th winner of the award since its inception in 1962. Finishing second with 158 votes was Paul Hoynes, who is into his fifth decade as a baseball beat writer in Cleveland. Bruce Jenkins, a baseball writer and columnist for almost half a century for the San Francisco Chronicle, received 67 votes. Candidates were chosen by a three-member, BBWAA-appointed committee and announced during the All-Star Game meeting July 16 in Arlington, Texas. Voting was conducted in November.

Boswell has already been enshrined in the National Sports Media Association Hall of Fame, the Washington D.C. Sports Hall of Fame and the Society of Professional Journalists D.C. Pro Chapter Hall of Fame. He began his career at the Post in 1969. Boswell covered the 1975 World Series as a national baseball writer, a new concept at the paper, and went on to cover every World Series game that followed until 2020, when he sat out due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Boswell moved to the Baltimore Orioles beat in 1980 and worked as a columnist from 1984 until his retirement in 2021.

In the early 1980s, before advanced metrics were commonplace, Boswell invented the Total Average statistic, an early attempt to quantify offensive contribution by valuing walks and extra-base hits. Along the way he covered tennis, boxing, and the Olympics, but baseball was his sweet spot. Among Tom’s many books are Why Time Begins on Opening Day, The Heart of the Order and How Life Imitates the World Series.

He wrote of the Washington Nationals winning the National League pennant in 2019, a full 50 years after his career began: “I went down to the packed Nationals Park infield and just slowly looked around, a full 360. No revelations, just a memory.”

Previous BBWAA Career Excellence Award Recipients:

2024 Gerry Fraley; 2023 John Lowe; 2022 Tim Kurkjian; 2021 Dick Kaegel; 2020 Nick Cafardo; 2019 Jayson Stark; 2018 Sheldon Ocker; 2017 Claire Smith; 2016 Dan Shaughnessy; 2015 Tom Gage; 2014 Roger Angell; 2013 Paul Hagen; 2012 Bob Elliott; 2011 Bill Conlin; 2010 Bill Madden; 2009 Nick Peters; 2008 Larry Whiteside; 2006 Rick Hummel; 2005 Tracy Ringolsby; 2004 Peter Gammons; 2003 Murray Chass; 2002 Hal McCoy; 2001 Joe Falls; 2000 Ross Newhan; 1999 Hal Lebovitz; 1998 Bob Stevens; 1997 Sam Lacy; 1996 Charley Feeney; 1995 Joseph Durso; 1993 Wendell Smith; 1992 Leonard Koppett, Bus Saidt; 1991 Ritter Collett; 1990 Phil Collier; 1989 Jerome Holtzman; 1988 Bob Hunter, Ray Kelly; 1987 Jim Murray; 1986 Jack Lang; 1985 Earl Lawson; 1984 Joe McGuff; 1983 Ken Smith; 1982 Si Burick; 1981 Bob Addie, Allen Lewis; 1980 Joe Reichler, Milton Richman; 1979 Bob Broeg, Tommy Holmes; 1978 Tim Murnane, Dick Young; 1977 Gordon Cobbledick, Edgar Munzel; 1976 Harold Kaese, Red Smith; 1975 Tom Meany, Shirley Povich; 1974 John Carmichael, James Isaminger; 1973 Warren Brown, John Drebinger, John F. Kieran; 1972 Dan Daniel, Fred Lieb, J. Roy Stockton; 1971 Frank Graham; 1970 Heywood C. Broun; 1969 Sid Mercer; 1968 H.G. Salsinger; 1967 Damon Runyon; 1966 Grantland Rice; 1965 Charles Dryden; 1964 Hugh Fullerton; 1963 Ring Lardner; 1962 J.G. Taylor Spink.