Bryant Gumbel First Black Journalist to receive Sports Emmy Lifetime Achievement Award

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Bryant Gumbel will be the first Black journalist to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s annual Sports Emmy Awards in New York.

Gumbel, 74, has been the host of “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” on HBO since 1995. However, his career as a sports journalist has spanned more than 50 years dating all the way back to the 70’s.

On Tuesday, the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences announced that Gumbel would be presented with the Lifetime Achievement award at the 44th Annual Sports Emmy Awards ceremony on May 22, in New York.

“I’m humbled by this announcement and grateful to the folks at NATAS for this prestigious award. After 50 years in the business, sharing the same honor with men like Jim McKay, Howard Cosell, and Vin Scully is heady stuff indeed,” Gumbel responded.

Bryant Gumbel has been the conscience of sports since the ’70s

“Bryant has a storied career, from his start as a sportscaster in Los Angeles to five decades of celebrated work — every bit cementing him as an icon and trailblazer in sports and entertainment,” said Adam Sharp, President & CEO of NATAS.

Gumbel started as the sports anchor at KNBC in Los Angeles before joining NBC Sports in the fall of 1975. He served as host of the network’s NFL, baseball and NCAA Tournament coverage, including the famed 1979 title game between Magic Johnson’s Michigan State and Larry Bird’s Indiana State. He moved to NBC News in January 1982 to host the “Today” show, a role he maintained for 15 years.

His most notable role as host of “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” on HBO since 1995 has earned the program 36 Sports Emmy Awards.

Gumbel is also an Emmy, Peabody, and Edward R. Murrow Award winning television journalist and sportscaster. He has received the Martin Luther King award from the Congress of Racial Equality, the United Negro College Fund’s highest honor, as well as three NAACP Image Awards.

“I’ve always been a sports fan, but I’ve always been less interested in the scores than I was the story elements of sports,” Gumbel said of “Real Sports,” which airs monthly. “I’m overly selfish about it, but I’m enormously proud of it.”