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First cover, Aug. 16, 1954. (Wikipedia)

By Bill Kovarik

Sports Illustrated — once the beloved icon of sports news and photography — has been sidelined for financial irregularities and technical fouls. It probably won’t be back.

The fouls involved articles scraped up through artificial intelligence bots – an ethical lapse which came to light in November, 2023. Worse, the magazine tried to cover it up with AI portraits of the supposed authors. The ruse was quickly spotted and the editor was fired.

As advertisers began pulling out, the remaining editors and management faced increasing financial trouble and then, on Jan. 5, 2024, defaulted on regular quarterly payment to its owners, Authentic Brands Group. Two weeks later, ABG terminated the licensing agreement and laid off most of the reporting staff.

So, let’s pause for a moment of silent reflection, in recognition that another great institution is passing us by, headed for the intellectual property bone yards, where its icons will be recycled to brand products like designer swimsuits and tennis shoes.

Sports Illustrated was founded in 1954 by Henry Luce of the Time-Life group to compete with two of the major sports magazines of the time — Sport (founded 1946) and the venerable Sporting News (founded 1886). Back then, people thought Luce was crazy to invest in a “jockstrap” magazine, but his timing was good.

Illustrated magazines were filling the consumer demand for high quality visual experiences while the dominant media — radio and early television — offered audiences only low visual definition. Sports Illustrated also presented better quality journalism and photography than was possible in daily newspapers at the time, and Luce managed to keep all his magazines a step ahead of the competition.

In the 1950s and 60s — a time when politics was America’s most dangerous occupation — Sports Illustrated occupied center field by raising the tone of sports news. Along with sports that were already well covered, like boxing and baseball, Sports Illustrated opened tennis, golf, football and basketball to greater public participation.

Some of its editorial innovations are still well known, such as the athlete of the year and the annual swimsuit issue. Making the cover of Sports Illustrated was, for an athlete, a lot like a Nobel Prize for a scientist.

However, by the end of the twentieth century, the business of magazine and newspaper publishing fractured under competitive pressures from cable, streaming and internet publications. Advertising and circulation declined, and so did Sports Illustrated, despite valiant attempts to save it.

The magazine was sold during the Time-Warner breakup in 2018 and, after changing hands, was picked up by Authentic Brands Group, which specializes in

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