Chris Mortensen, an award-winning sportswriter who pioneered the position of the N.F.L. insider, reporting omnivorously for varied ESPN packages on trades, the draft, free-agent signings, accidents, retirements and scandals, died on (*72*) in Birmingham, Ala. He was 72.
His loss of life, at the house of his son, Alex, was introduced by ESPN, which didn’t give a trigger. In 2016, Mr. Mortensen underwent therapy for Stage 4 throat most cancers. He lived in Bella Vista, Ark., within the northwest nook of the state.
Until he stepped away from the community final 12 months, Mort, as he was recognized, allotted information on packages like “SportsCenter,” “Sunday N.F.L. Countdown” and “Monday N.F.L. Countdown,” in addition to on ESPN Radio.
He was not sports activities journalism’s first N.F.L. insider. Will McDonough most likely had that distinction, writing authoritatively for The Boston Globe and showing on N.F.L. pregame exhibits on CBS and NBC. Mr. Mortensen was adopted by a raft of rivals together with Peter King, at Sports Illustrated after which NBC; Jay Glazer, at Fox Sports; Mike Florio, at Pro Football Talk; and Adam Schefter, at the NFL Network.
In 2009, Mr. Schefter turned Mr. Mortensen’s associate at ESPN in reporting league information.
“When we were interviewing Adam Schefter, his biggest promoter at ESPN was Chris Mortensen,” John Walsh, a former govt editor at ESPN, stated in a telephone interview on Monday. Mr. Mortensen didn’t see Mr. Schefter as his potential substitute or as a menace, Mr. Walsh added.
“Mort was the quintessential team player,” he stated.
Mr. King recalled how he admired Mr. Mortensen’s prescient resolution within the mid-Nineteen Nineties to go to the fledgling Manning Passing Academy, which was began by Archie Manning, the previous New Orleans Saints quarterback, earlier than his sons Peyton and Eli entered the N.F.L. The summer time camp is for teenagers from eighth to twelfth grades.
“Every great future college quarterback went there, and year after year Mort was there on the ground floor,” Mr. King stated. “Our job was to know all the quarterbacks and get them to tell us things. Mort knew every quarterback from high school on. He was very smart about relationships.”
Mr. Mortensen and Mr. Schefter broke the information that Peyton Manning was signing with the Denver Broncos in 2012 after 13 seasons with the Indianapolis Colts. Four years later, early in his grueling monthslong most cancers therapy, a hospitalized Mr. Mortensen acquired a name from Mr. Manning saying that he was going to announce his retirement.
Writing for Sports Illustrated in 2017, Mr. King, who himself retired final week, recounted the dialog between the participant and the ailing journalist.
“Do you want to report it?” Mr. Manning requested.
“I think I would,” Mr. Mortensen replied. “It’d make me feel normal again.”
In 2016, Mr. Mortensen acquired the Dick McCann (now Bill Nunn) Award from the Professional Football Writers of America for distinguished protection of the sport. He acquired the award at the Pro Football Hall of Fame enshrinement ceremony.
One of his greatest tales turned out to be inaccurate. In early 2015, after the American Football Conference championship recreation between the Colts and New England Patriots, he posted a tweet and an internet article reporting that the N.F.L. was investigating the Patriots for underinflating 11 of the 12 recreation balls by two kilos per sq. inch.
He later clarified in a follow-up report by saying that the balls had been merely “significantly underinflated” however not essentially by two kilos p.s.i. (An underinflated ball is a better throw.)
But Mr. Mortensen left the unique tweet and on-line story uncorrected for six months, even after a league investigation confirmed that just one ball had been underinflated by as a lot as two kilos p.s.i. (He caught along with his declare that 11 balls had been concerned.) Then he deleted the tweet and the article.
He later acknowledged that the deletions have been a mistake.
Mr. Mortensen acquired loads of criticism, a few of it from Patriots followers, for his reporting in what got here to be often called “Deflategate.” The league investigation led to, amongst different issues, the suspension in 2015 of New England’s quarterback, Tom Brady, for 4 regular-season video games with out pay for not totally cooperating with the probe; a federal choose reversed the penalty.
Mr. Mortensen was much less involved concerning the criticism than he was concerning the loss of life threats he acquired. “Even after I got cancer, I got some death wishes,” he advised The Ringer, the sports activities and popular culture web site and podcasting community, in 2016.
Christian Anthony Mortensen was born on Nov. 7, 1951, in Torrance, Calif. He attended El Camino College, a two-year faculty, beginning in 1969. During that 12 months he was employed to jot down about sports activities for The Daily Breeze, additionally in Torrance.
He stayed there till 1983, when he moved to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the place he lined the Atlanta Braves and Falcons and the N.F.L. extra broadly.
In 1987, he gained a George Polk Award, one among journalism’s prime prizes, for a 12 months of investigative reporting on a scandal involving brokers in faculty sports activities. He was the primary sportswriter to win a Polk since Red Smith acquired that honor in 1950.
Mr. Mortensen left the Journal-Constitution in 1989 to affix The National Sports Daily, the place he labored for about two years as a reporter and a columnist earlier than the publication went out of enterprise in 1991. He additionally frolicked in 1990 as a reporter on the CBS Sports pregame present “The N.F.L. Today” after Mr. McDonough left for NBC.
Mr. Mortensen joined ESPN in 1991, a time when the community was turning into more and more reliant on N.F.L. information and programming. He turned one among ESPN’s signature reporters, displaying up on community broadcasts all through the week with nuggets of reports that confirmed how deeply he was wired into group and league resolution makers.
Seth Markman, ESPN’s vice chairman and govt producer of the community’s N.F.L. and faculty soccer protection, stated in an interview that Mr. Mortensen modified route after returning to work from his most cancers remedies.
“He focused on bigger things, the bigger picture, more context, more about why decisions were made,” Mr. Markman stated. “He was still very much our conscience, and Adam and I leaned on him so much: Should we report this? Is this fair?”
Mr. Markman added that Mr. Mortensen typically had problem talking on TV after his most cancers analysis.
“He struggled making saliva,” Mr. Markman stated. “He said, ‘You have to help me. If I get to the point where I’m being incoherent, pull me off.’ He never got to that point.”
But after the N.F.L. draft final 12 months, Mr. Markman added, “he reached out.”
“He thought it was time to walk away.”
In addition to his son, Alex, the offensive coordinator of the soccer group at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Mr. Mortensen’s survivors embody his spouse, Micki Mortensen.
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