Kevin Cowherd is an American

author In legal discourse, an author is the creator of an original work that has been published, whether that work exists in written, graphic, visual, or recorded form. The act of creating such a work is referred to as authorship. Therefore, a sculpt ...

humorist A humorist is an intellectual who uses humor, or wit, in writing or public speaking. A raconteur is one who tells anecdotes in a skillful and amusing way. Henri Bergson writes that a humorist's work grows from viewing the morals of society ...

and former award-winning sports and features columnist for ''

The Baltimore Sun ''The Baltimore Sun'' is the largest general-circulation daily newspaper based in the U.S. state of Maryland and provides coverage of local, regional, national, and international news. Founded in 1837, the newspaper was owned by Tribune Publi ...

''. He is the author, along with Hall of Famer Cal Ripken Jr., of ''The New York Times'' best-seller ''Hothead'' and five other baseball novels for young readers. Their latest book, ''The Closer'', was published by Disney-Hyperion Books in March 2016.

Biography

Cowherd's debut novel, "The Gym," was published in November 2023 by Apprentice House Press. A "darkly-funny" tale of Jack Doherty, a walking mid-life crisis who, overweight and lonely, newly-divorced after a spectacular act of infidelity on the part of his wife, joins a gym hoping for an existential do-over, if not washboard abs and bulging biceps. Cowherd's latest work of non-fiction is ''When the Crowd Didn't Roar: How Baseball's Strangest Game Ever Gave a Broken City Hope.'' The story of the singular 2015 game between the Baltimore Orioles and Chicago White Sox, played against the backdrop of Baltimore's ruinous Freddie Gray riots and the only game in Major League Baseball history held in a locked stadium in front of zero fans, will be published by the

University of Nebraska Press The University of Nebraska Press (UNP) was founded in 1941 and is an academic publisher of scholarly and general-interest books. The press is under the auspices of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, the main campus of the University of Ne ...

in April 2019. Cowherd has also written five other books of non-fiction: including: ''U Must Be Cinderella: Inside College Basketball's Greatest Upset Ever and the Audacious School That Pulled It Off.''.; ''Way Down in the Hole: The Meteoric Rise, Tragic Fall and Ultimate Redemption of America's Top Cop''; ''The Art of Crisis Leadership'' with co-author Rob Weinhold; ''The Opening Act: Comedy, Life and the Desperate Pursuit of Happiness'', a memoir of Baltimore comedian Larry Noto; and a biography, ''Hale Storm: The Incredible Saga of Baltimore's Ed Hale, Including a Secret Life with the CIA''. Cowherd has also written for ''

Men's Health ''Men's Health'' (''MH''), published by Hearst Communications, Hearst, is the world's largest men's magazine brand, with 35 editions in 59 countries; it is the bestselling men's magazine on American newsstands. Started as a men's health magazin ...

'', ''

Parenting Parenting or child rearing promotes and supports the physical, cognitive, social, emotional, and educational development from infancy to adulthood. Parenting refers to the intricacies of raising a child and not exclusively for a biologica ...

'' and ''

Baseball Digest ''Baseball Digest'' is a baseball magazine resource, published in Orlando, Florida, by Grandstand Publishing, LLC. It is the longest running baseball magazine in the United States. History and profile The magazine was created in 1942 by Herbert ...

'' magazines and is the author of a collection of ''Baltimore Sun'' columns, ''Last Call at the 7-Eleven'', published in 1995 by Bancroft Press. Cowherd, then a ''Baltimore Sun'' sports columnist, was also given tongue-in-cheek credit for correctly "predicting" the

Loma Prieta earthquake On October 17, 1989, at 5:04 p.m. PST, the Loma Prieta earthquake occurred at the Central Coast of California. The shock was centered in The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park in Santa Cruz County, approximately 10 mi (16 km) ...

. On Tuesday October 17, 1989, the

occurred in the greater

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a List of regions of California, region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, S ...

in California, interrupting preparations for Game 3 of the

1989 World Series The 1989 World Series was the championship series of Major League Baseball's (MLB) 1989 season. The 86th edition of the World Series, it was a best-of-seven playoff played between the American League (AL) champion Oakland Athletics and the ...

between the Bay Area's two Major League Baseball teams, the

Oakland Athletics The Oakland Athletics (frequently referred to as the Oakland A's) were an American Major League Baseball (MLB) team based in Oakland, California from 1968 to 2024. The Athletics were a member club of the American League (AL) American League We ...

and the

San Francisco Giants The San Francisco Giants are an American professional baseball team based in San Francisco. The Giants compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (baseball), National League (NL) National League West, West Div ...

. In the morning edition of '' The San Jose Mercury News'' that day, Cowherd's column had "predicted" the earthquake, as he wrote that "these are two teams are from California and God only knows if they'll even get all the games in. An earthquake could rip through the Bay Area before they sing the national anthem for Game 3," which was precisely when the quake occurred.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cowherd, Kevin Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American columnists American humorists Writers from Baltimore The Baltimore Sun people Sportswriters from Maryland