Deadspin

Deadspin

URL	http://www.deadspin.com/
Commercial?	Yes
Type of site	Blog
Registration	Optional
Owner	Gawker Media
Created by	Will Leitch, Rick Chandler
Launched	September 9, 2005
Current status	Active

Deadspin is a sports website owned by Gawker Media that claims to deliver sports "without access, favor or discretion." The site launched in September 2005. With 111 million unique visitors and about 143 million page views as of December 2007,

Deadspin's founding editor-in-chief was Will Leitch, author and a founding editor of the New York City-based culture website, "The Black Table". Leitch announced on June 5, 2008 that he would be leaving to take a position at New York magazine. His replacement is A.J. Daulerio, former senior writer for the site. Rick Chandler and Clay Travis were the associate editors, Tommy Craggs is now senior editor along with Dashiell Bennett, Barry Petchesky and Drew Magary as writers. The editorial tone is similar to that of its sister site Gawker.com, sarcastic, humorous and often critical of mainstream media personalities.

Content

The site posts commentaries, recaps and previews of the major sports stories of the day, as well as sports-related anecdotes, rumors and YouTube videos. The last post each evening is tagged "DUAN" and means Deadspin Up All Night, often taking on a life of its own and featuring wildly diverse (and not necessarily related to sport) comments. Like Gawker.com, stories on Deadspin come from anonymous tips, readers and other sports blogs.

Mainstream recognition

Sports Illustrated cited two stories that came from Deadspin, photographs of Matt Leinart partying in New York City and the first published report that outfielder Matt Lawton had tested positive for steroids, as two of the top web stories of 2005, and Time named the site one of the 50 coolest websites of 2006. In March 2006, Leitch blogged live from the NCAA Basketball Tournament as an official media guest of CBS Sports. He also "glogged" Super Bowl XLI for CBS in 2007.

"You're with me, leather", a phrase allegedly used by ESPN anchor Chris Berman, appeared in an anecdote submitted by a site contributor, became a running gag among readers and was used on-air by television personalities such as ESPN's Tony Kornheiser and MSNBC's Keith Olbermann.

On February 8, 2007, on Around the Horn, Jay Mariotti criticized the idea of athletes blogging the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The host, Tony Reali, quickly interrupted Mariotti and muted him. At the close of the show Reali could be heard yelling "Don't take my Deadspin away from me!".

On March 6, 2007, Around the Horn ran a segment about Peyton Manning making an appearance at a 16-year-old's birthday party. Tony Reali thanked Deadspin for the tip. A year later, Tony Kornheiser recognized the anniversary of the event while also crediting Deadspin for the story.

External links

• Deadspin.com