Claire Smith broke barriers in baseball coverage
By A’nyia Clemons, N.C. A&T
Baseball pioneer and Hall of Fame sportswriter Claire Smith broke barriers as the first woman to cover a Major League Baseball beat full-time. She covered the New York Yankees starting in 1982 for the Hartford Courant, and she later was a national baseball writer for the New York Times and the Philadelphia Inquirer. In 2007, Smith joined ESPN as a coordinating editor of the company’s Major League Baseball coverage.
She built a trailblazing 40-year career marked by authoritative reporting and tireless advocacy for diversity in sports journalism. In 2016, Smith became the first woman to receive the Career Excellence Award from the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, gaining entry into the writers’ wing of the National Baseball Hall of Fame. She also earned honors from the Jackie Robinson Foundation and the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum.
A mentor to many, she championed opportunities for African American journalists and women in media, establishing the Bernice A. Smith Scholarship at Temple University. After retiring from journalism, she joined Temple as an assistant professor in 2021. Smith’s legacy continues to inspire a new generation of journalists who value inclusion, integrity, and the power of the written word.
A’nyia Clemons is a junior multimedia journalism student from Greenville, N.C.