By: Joe Strupp A day after reports surfaced that the San Francisco Chronicle's Mark Fainaru-Wada was leaving to join ESPN, E&P has learned that T.J. Quinn of the New York Daily News was also joining the sports channel.
Fainaru-Wada and Quinn, both of whom have broken elements of the sports steroid scandal for their papers, will join a 15-person enterprise unit at ESPN, according to Vince Doria, senior vice president and director of news for the network. "They both have strong 'steroid' credentials," he told E&P Tuesday. "They both worked heavily on that story and they have reported on a number of other topics."
Fainaru-Wada most recently earned headlines, and a major book deal, with fellow Chronicle scribe Lance Williams after the pair revealed leaked grand jury testimony indicating slugger Barry Bonds and other athletes had admitted taking performance-enhancing drugs. They also faced jail time when federal investigators subpoenaed them to reveal their sources, but the threat ended when a Bay Area lawyer claimed to have been the source.
Quinn has received praise for exposing other elements of the steroid story, including early details of Bonds' testimony and more recent revelations that he had failed an amphetamine test.
"I have been impressed with both of them. We are building something of an enterprise unit and these two guys are great reporters, we are thankful to get both of them," Doria said. He said the remaining enterprise team members will come from within ESPN.
"This is more or less formalizing reporting we have done all along," Doria added. He stressed that Quinn and Fainaru-Wada would not report only on steroid-related issues, but other investigative topics as well.
"Certainly, their work in that area has caught our attention and they will do that kind of work here also," he said. "I think they are strong reporters and we can put them on any kind of project. We will put them on other projects."
Fainaru-Wada said, "I saw it as an opportunity to do investigative work and T.J. is a phenomenal reporter. Lance and I always feared [the Daily News] more as the BALCO story progressed, they had been all over it."
Quinn said he was not looking to leave the Daily News, but "the people [ESPN] put together in there is a great group."
Chronicle Editor Phil Bronstein said he was sorry to lose Fainaru-Wada, but said his work on the steroid story helped raise the issue of steroids, while his and Williams' legal battles showed the need for intense First Amendment protection.
"I think it was probably the strongest First Amendment defense ever put up by a media organization," Bronstein said of parent company Hearst's willingness to defend the pair. "People may have initially thought it was about sports figures, and it turned out to be about much more."
Doria said Fainaru-Wada and Quinn would begin their new assignments in two weeks.
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