Rick Cleveland is returning to full time sports writing — and he’s doing it at Mississippi Today.
Cleveland, former executive director and current historian for the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame, will join Mississippi Today as its sports columnist beginning Sept. 1.
“Obviously, I have mixed emotions about leaving the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame, which I believe so strongly in,” said Cleveland, who became the museum’s second executive director in April 2012. “I am proud of the improvements we have made and extremely happy that Bill Blackwell is in place as executive director to continue preserving and promoting Mississippi’s incredible sports legacy.”
“We are delighted that Rick has chosen Mississippi Today as the forum for his return as a full time sports columnist,” said Fred Anklam Jr., co-editor of Mississippi Today.
Plans are for Cleveland to write two columns a week for Mississippi Today, as well as daily blog posts and news stories as warranted. He will continue to write a weekly column for Mississippi newspapers syndicated through the Mississippi Press Association.
Added Cleveland: “I started my career writing sports in Mississippi at age 13 and that’s the way I want to finish my career, doing what I love and writing about what I love. I strongly believe in the mission of Mississippi Today and look forward to new challenges.”
“Rick has a unique perspective on sports in Mississippi,” Anklam said. “We are excited to make his columns available free at Mississippitoday.org.”
Cleveland, long-time sports editor and columnist of The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, is the most decorated sports journalist in Mississippi history, having won numerous national, regional and state sports writing awards.
In 2011 he became the first sports writer to win the prestigious Richard Wright Award for Literary Excellence. In 2000, he won the Mississippi Press Association’s Distinguished Mississippian Award. He has been voted Mississippi’s Sports Writer of the Year a record 10 times and has authored four books.
Ron Winford, president of the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame Board of Directors said: “When the museum lost its first and only director, Michael Rubenstein, in late 2011, we knew he would be difficult to replace. The opportunity to hire Rick Cleveland was a no-brainer. The museum has never been stronger. Rick is leaving it a better place than he found it. On behalf of the Board of Directors: Thank-you, Rick.”
In June, Cleveland began writing a weekly sports column for Mississippi Today, running on Friday afternoons.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
Republish this article
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
- Look for the "Republish This Story" button underneath each story. To republish online, simply click the button, copy the html code and paste into your Content Management System (CMS).
- Editorial cartoons and photo essays are not included under the Creative Commons license and therefore do not have the "Republish This Story" button option. To learn more about our cartoon syndication services, click here.
- You can’t edit our stories, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style.
- You can’t sell or syndicate our stories.
- Any web site our stories appear on must include a contact for your organization.
- If you share our stories on social media, please tag us in your posts using @MSTODAYnews on Facebook and @MSTODAYnews on Twitter.
- You have to credit Mississippi Today. We prefer “Author Name, Mississippi Today” in the byline. If you’re not able to add the byline, please include a line at the top of the story that reads: “This story was originally published by Mississippi Today” and include our website, mississippitoday.org.
- You can’t edit our stories, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style.
- You cannot republish our editorial cartoons, photographs, illustrations or graphics without specific permission (contact our managing editor Kayleigh Skinner for more information). To learn more about our cartoon syndication services, click here.
- Our stories may appear on pages with ads, but not ads specifically sold against our stories.
- You can’t sell or syndicate our stories.
- You can only publish select stories individually — not as a collection.
- Any web site our stories appear on must include a contact for your organization.
- If you share our stories on social media, please tag us in your posts using @MSTODAYnews on Facebook and @MSTODAYnews on Twitter.
Write, Rick, write. Your backstories on Mississippi sports are primo.