Samuel P. Smith

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This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please improve this article if you can. (May 2008)

Sam Smith, born in Brooklyn, New York on January 24, 1948, is an NBA writer for the Chicago Tribune. He is married with two children. Smith has appeared numerous times on the local sports television talk show Chicago Tribune Live on Comcast Sports Net.

Smith "retired" from the Chicago Tribune April 1, 2008.^{[citation needed]} He continues to write through a blog at HoopsHype.com.

[edit] Pre-Tribune years

Growing up in Brooklyn, Smith was a huge New York Yankees fan.^{[original research?]} His favorite childhood baseball players were Sandy Koufax and Mickey Mantle.^{[citation needed]} After high school, Smith attended Pace University, graduating with a degree in accounting. He earned his master's degree in journalism from Ball State. He then went on to become the Press Secretary to Connecticut Senator Lowell Weicker in the 70s. Before his employment with the Chicago Tribune, Smith wrote for a newspaper in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

[edit] Books and articles

Smith has written two books: The Jordan Rules and Second Coming: The Strange Odyssey of Michael Jordan from Courtside to Home Plate and Back Again (or simply Second Coming). The Jordan Rules was featured on the New York Times Bestseller List. He is known around the NBA as a writer that proposes many trades. The most notable of which would be his attempts to persuade the Chicago Bulls to trade for Kevin Garnett. One major proposal made by Smith was the Ron Artest and Brad Miller for Jalen Rose trade, sending Artest and Miller to the Indiana Pacers. The Bulls eventually executed the deal, avoiding many future embarrassments by Artest.