Albert Breer (born January 26, 1980) is an American

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

journalist and reporter for ''

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with a circulation of over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellen ...

''. Breer previously spent time covering the

New England Patriots The New England Patriots are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area. The Patriots compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East division. The Pa ...

for ''

The MetroWest Daily News ''The MetroWest Daily News'' is an American daily newspaper published in Framingham, Massachusetts, serving the MetroWest region of suburban Boston. The newspaper is owned by Gannett. The newspaper covers several cities and towns in Norfolk, M ...

'' where he contributed stories to the ''

Boston Herald The ''Boston Herald'' is an American conservative daily newspaper whose primary market is Boston, Massachusetts, and its surrounding area. It was founded in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States. It has been awarde ...

'', and later covered the

NFL The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The N ...

for ''

The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe,'' also known locally as ''the Globe'', is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Boston Globe'' is the oldest and largest daily new ...

'', ''

The Dallas Morning News ''The Dallas Morning News'' is a daily newspaper serving the Dallas–Fort Worth area of Texas, with an average print circulation in 2022 of 65,369. It was founded on October 1, 1885, by Alfred Horatio Belo as a satellite publication of the ' ...

'', ''

Sporting News ''The Sporting News'' is a website and former magazine publication owned by Sporting News Holdings, which is a U.S.-based sports media company formed in December 2020 by a private investor consortium. It was originally established in 1886 as a ...

'' and

NFL Network NFL Network (occasionally abbreviated on-air as NFLN) is an American sports-oriented pay television network owned by the National Football League NTP and is part of NFL Media, which also includes NFL.com, NFL Films, NFL Mobile, NFL Now and N ...

. In June 2018, Breer took over as writer of the Monday Morning Quarterback column from Peter King, who left ''Sports Illustrated'' for

NBC Sports NBC Sports is an American programming division for NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, that is responsible for sports broadcasts on their broadcast network NBC, the Cable television, cable channels NBC owns, and on Peacock (streaming service) ...

. He is also a content strategist for The MMQB, ''Sports Illustrated''s NFL vertical.

Notable incidents

Breer was the writer most often questioning former

head coach

Bill Belichick William Stephen Belichick ( ; born April 16, 1952) is an American football coach who is the head coach for the North Carolina Tar Heels. Widely regarded as one of the greatest head coaches of all time, he holds numerous coaching records, inc ...

in the famous 2014 "We're on to Cincinnati" press conference. Breer has said that this led the NFL Network to ban him from covering the Patriots for the remainder of his contract. Breer was suspended from the NFL Network from April 25, 2016, through June 1, 2016, for undisclosed reasons and was prohibited from posting on

social media Social media are interactive technologies that facilitate the Content creation, creation, information exchange, sharing and news aggregator, aggregation of Content (media), content (such as ideas, interests, and other forms of expression) amongs ...

during that time. Prior to his suspension he had agreed to take a position with the MMQB. In May 2017 Breer dismissed widely reported allegations that

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

player Adam Jones was the target of racist taunts by fans at

Fenway Park Fenway Park is a ballpark located in Boston, Massachusetts, less than one mile from Kenmore Square. Since 1912, it has been the home field of Major League Baseball's (MLB) Boston Red Sox. While the stadium was built in 1912, it was substantia ...

because, according to Breer "I've probably been to 200 games at Fenway in my life. Never heard a slur yelled at a player." The same year, Breer defended NFL front offices against allegations of "blackballing"

Colin Kaepernick Colin Rand Kaepernick ( ; born November 3, 1987) is an American civil rights activist and former professional football quarterback. He played six seasons for the San Francisco 49ers in the National Football League (NFL). In 2016, he gained na ...

for his decision to protest the national anthem.

References

Living people American male journalists Ohio State University School of Communication alumni 1980 births People from Sudbury, Massachusetts Sportspeople from Middlesex County, Massachusetts NFL Network people 21st-century American journalists {{US-journalist-1980s-stub