JockBio.com is the brainchild of three partners: Mark Stewart, Mike Kennedy and Ron Jaffe. Together we’ve written and designed more than 100 sports books. You’ve probably seen our work before on the shelves of your local library or public school or at your favorite book store. We also benefit from the hard work of a crew of dedicated contributing editors and interns.

JockBio is your chance to sample our collective talents free of charge. Scroll down to find out more about each one of us.

Photo by Matt Richman

Mark Stewart Writer/Editor

Mark is one of the most prolific sports biographers in the world, with more than 200 books and hundreds of athlete profiles to his credit. A graduate of Duke University, he has been active in sports journalism since the 1980s. Mark put in a four-year stint as editor of Racquet Magazine before launching a successful freelance career a decade ago. Since then he has worked with the NBA, NFL and NCAA, and contributed to a number of sports magazines, including Street & Smith and SportScene. Mark also edited the show daily for The Super Show sporting goods convention for more than 15 years. His first foray into the world of sports biographies came in the mid 1990s, when he helped to create and execute IMP’s groundbreaking Sports Heroes, Feats & Facts project. At the same time he collaborated on a series of books with 30 different athletes, including John Elway, Florence Griffith-Joyner and Martin Brodeur. Mark also wrote Tiger By The Tale, the first biography of Tiger Woods. An experienced interviewer, Mark has worked with countless luminaries in and out of the sports world. He is pictured above interviewing Dr. Mehmet Oz. Mark is the Managing Editor of EDGE Magazine.

You can e-mail Mark at jockbio@earthlink.net

Mike Kennedy Writer/Editor

Mike ranks among the busiest sportswriters in the business. In the last five years, he has authored or collaborated on more than 30 books. Among his recent works are Kidd Rocks (Jason Kidd), Quest for Gold (Michelle Kwan), and En Fuego, a bilingual series on the starts of Latino baseball. Mike is also the lead author for Grolier’s new sports series, published by its Franklin Watts division. Already on the shelves are books on Soccer, Skateboarding, Roller Hockey,Baseball, Football, Basketball, and Ice Hockey. Each book traces the history of the sport it covers, offers helpful playing tips, and profiles all-time great players. A graduate of Franklin & Marshall College, Mike enjoys golf and plays to a 15 handicap.

You can e-mail Mike at jockbio@earthlink.net

Ron Jaffe Layout/Design

Ron comes to JockBio.com by way of the retail side of publishing. Formerly the Senior Director of Marketing at Waldenbooks, he has had a hand in hundreds of publishing projects in every conceivable category. He designed the popular New Wave sports series for Millbrook Press, and produced more than three dozen titles for that company. Other past and present clients include MasterCard, BBC Audiobooks America, Earth Satellite Corporation, Viking/Penguin, Simon & Schuster, and Grolier. During his 17 years at Waldenbooks, he conceived, designed and published more than 400 original titles, and oversaw partnerships with the likes of Warner Bros., The Walt Disney Company, Jim Henson Productions, DC Comics, Kodak, Anheuser Busch/Sea World and Prevention Magazine. Ron also was co-publisher of Third Story Books and publisher of Longmeadow Press.

You can e-mail Ron at jockbio@earthlink.net

Jeff Angus

Jeff Angus is a management consultant specializing in work for entrepreneurial organizations—and author of Management by Baseball: The Official Rules for Winning Management in Any Field. He reported on baseball for both the Associated Press and United Press International, was a sportswriter for the Seattle Sun, and is a member of SABR, on whose web site more of his baseball work can be found. Jeff's commentaries on political economy and business evolution have appeared on the op-ed pages of many papers, including The New York Times, The Baltimore Sun, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and The Seattle Times. He has also been a regular opinion columnist for InfoWorld, InformationWeek and Knowledge Management.

You can e-mail Jeff at jockbio@earthlink.net

Zack Burgess

Zack Burgess is freelancer operating out of Philadelphia. He began his career as a teenager at the Detroit Free Press; from the moment he walked into the building, he knew that writing and reporting the news was what he was meant to do. The smell of ink and the adrenaline of deadlines took him from The Kansas City Star to The Washington Times to Slam Magazine, where he was a senior writer. Zack’s work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Newsday and The Washington Post. A Howard University graduate, he has covered every major sporting event except for the Super Bowl and the Olympics.

You can e-mail Zack at jockbio@earthlink.net

Ann Casano

Ann Casano eats, breathes and sleeps New York Yankee baseball. The New Jersey native presently designs and teaches online film courses and does a variety of freelance writing and editing for the web. However, baseball is her true passion. Rockies versus Giants, Tigers versus Rangers, Cubs versus Phillies—it doesn't matter—if there is a game on television, chances are she's following it. Often times, her TV doesn't turn off until the final west coast game has ended.

You can e-mail Ann at jockbio@earthlink.net

Andy Collins

Andy has been a successful advertising writer since 1986, but his passion has always been sports. A cum laude graduate of Utica College of Syracuse University, he first wrote sports for the Oneida Daily Dispatch, and then for the Evening Times in Little Falls, NY. After covering the now-defunct Class-A Little Falls Mets, Andy jumped to a Syracuse ad agency, and has been there ever since. He is still the proud owner of thousands of '60s and '70s baseball cards from his youth (when wax packs cost a dime!). Andy lives near Syracuse with his wife Jo-vanna and daughters Emily and Julia. Both girls have grown up at the ballpark, as the Collins family has held season tickets for the AAA Syracuse SkyChiefs for the past 10 years.

You can e-mail Andy at jockbio@earthlink.net

Eun Jung Decker

Eun Jung has been a writer in one incarnation or another her whole life. She has written on foreign policy, travel, and marketing as well as being a creative writer. Her work for JockBio.com is her first foray into sports writing, and she is happy to have made the journey. Her articles have appeared in the International Herald Tribune, The Japan Times, and the Honolulu Star-Bulletin among others. Eun Jung runs Play for Life International, a nonprofit organization dedicated to using sports as a tool for development for children in underserved areas of the U.S. and abroad, along with her husband, Colin. She believes in the transformative power of sport and works to reach as many children as possible.

You can e-mail Eun at jockbio@earthlink.net

Russell Dinnage

Russell has dreamed of being a journalist since he first sat down to write sports articles for his high school newspaper. Growing up as an American living overseas, he became a passionate soccer fan, and has written extensively on the sport. He has cut his teeth at The Intelligencer Journal, the daily newspaper in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where he attends Franklin & Marshall College. Russell remains devoted to soccer, catching action from the European Champions League on television whenever possible.

You can e-mail Russell at jockbio@earthlink.net

Robert Eubanks

Robert Eubanks is best known in sports photography circles for his work with the WNBA’s Washington Mystics and 2008 Olympic boxer Gary Russell. In between photo assignments, Robert is a firefighter for the D.C. Fire Department. His work can be seen in The District Chronicles, P.G. Suite Magazine and other area publications. He snapped the photos for our interview with Joe Louis Reliford.

You can e-mail Robert at jockbio@earthlink.net

William Gould

WIlliam Gould's name was last seen in mainstream print during the 1970s, when his freelance work appeared in several national magazines, including Rolling Stone. After graduating from the University of Denver, where he was managing editor of the school paper, William went over to the Dark Side and joined the world of industrial capital equipment, air pollution control systems, and financial services. A love of sports and long-neglected literary itch precipitated his reemergence as a writer.

You can e-mail William at jockbio@earthlink.net

Mike May

As the longtime Communications Director for SGMA International, Mike May is one of the best-known figures in the sports world. When he is not conducting press conferences or appearing on national television, he can be found on the soccer field coaching his daughter, playing golf with his son, or getting pounded on the rugby pitch. Mike has interviewed or profiled many of the world’s top athletes and sports personalities, including golfers Bernhard Langer, Gary McCord and Gene Sarazen, Winston Cup champion Jeff Gordon, basketball star Sheryl Swoopes, baseball immortal Larry Doby, football stars James Lofton, Bryce Paup, Jim Everett, Tom Jackson and Marshall Faulk, and famed broadcasters Ray Scott, Ernie Harwell, Bob Costas and Chris Berman.

You can e-mail Mike at jockbio@earthlink.net

Bill Mehlman

Bill Mehlman has written for publications as diverse as MAR magazine (the Breeders Cup), the Boston Globe (op eds), Carpenter (features about construction and the union) and numerous obscure zines (poetry). A graduate of Yale with a degree in English, he got sidetracked and wound up spending twenty years as a professional chef and owned a number of businesses including a jazz club in Harlem. He lives in New York City, where, in addition to writing (that novel will get finished in '08) and freelance copyediting, he is a full-time, ineluctable Yankees fan.

You can e-mail Bill at jockbio@earthlink.net

Kevin Ostroske

Sports and writing have been Kevin’s passion for many years. After graduating from Hofstra University, where he majored in Broadcast Journalism, he spent 11 years working in two Regional sections of the Professional Golfer’s Association (Metropolitan and Southern California). As the Director of Junior Golf, he was in charge of administrating golf events for players 7-17-years-old and organized educational seminars in the Rules of Golf as well as NCAA College Scholarship workshops. He has written numerous articles on golf, including getting children started in the game and the importance of character and ethics. For the past five years, Kevin lived in Germany, where he was a writer for Munich Found City Magazine.  While there, he played in the WHL (the Bavarian ice hockey league). He has since returned to the U.S. and continues to play hockey in a local men’s league. Kevin is an avid fan of the NHL, NFL, Tour de France, World Cup and PGA Tour.

You can e-mail Kevin at jockbio@earthlink.net

Jim Sargent

Jim Sargent grew up loving sports, especially baseball, basketball, and football, in Flint, Michigan. He graduated from Kearsley High in 1958 and from Flint Junior College in 1960. After one semester at Eastern Michigan, he worked for two years in Flint, completing the BS in Social Sciences at EMU in 1964. After three years of teaching and coaching at two Michigan high schools, Stockbridge and Frankfort, he lived on campus for three years and earned the Master’s and PhD Degrees in US History at Michigan State University. He taught American History for 40 years at Clemson University, Ball State University, and, starting in 1977, at Virginia Western Community College in Roanoke. Jim also served as VWCC’s Dean of the Social Science Division from 1994 until he retired in 2010. His books includeRoosevelt and the Hundred Days (Garland, 1981), co-author of Danny Litwhiler: Living the Baseball Dream (Temple Press, 2006), co-author, with Robert M. Gorman, The South Bend Blue Sox (McFarland, 2012), and author of We Were the All-American Girls (McFarland, 2013). His most recent book is bookYesterday’s Tiger Heroes: The Detroit Tigers and the 1956 Baseball Season (Wynwidyn Press, 2014). He and his wife Betty live in Roanoke, Virginia. A member of SABR, Jim observed, “I didn’t have the talent to complete at the professional level, so writing about former athletes is my way of playing the game.”

You can e-mail Jim at jockbio@earthlink.net

Michael Spatz

Michael Spatz is a graduate of the University of Kansas. He majored in history. Michael grew up in the Washington, DC area rooting for the Braves and Ravens. The author of the Dan Haren JockBio, he has his eye on a career in sports journalism.

You can e-mail Michael at jockbio@earthlink.net

Mariah Stewart

Mariah Stewart is an undergrad at Wake Forest University. She is the architect of the New Jersey Sports Heroes website and has authored biographical sketches on more than a dozen athletes past and present, including baseball pitchers Andrew Bailey, Rick Porcello and Charlie Morton?and Wake Forest alum Erik Hanson. Mariah has worked in television for the Emmy Award-winning production company Engel Entertainment, and built the social networking program for EDGE Magazine in her home state of New Jersey (Facebook EDGE Magazine NJ). Working for JockBio.com, Mariah has penned our profiles of Matt Kemp and Wake legend Brian Piccolo.

You can e-mail Mariah at jockbio@earthlink.net

Mary Ellen Sweeney

Mary Ellen Sweeney has been a magazine writer and editor since 1987, when she joined the staff of TFH Publications. She has authored more than a dozen books on tropical fish and is considered one of the foremost authorities in her field. Mary Ellen has also worked for AT&T‚s Artificial Intelligence Department. Somewhere in between marine organisms and scientists falls the realm of athletics. The daughter-in-law of one of Ireland‚s legendary track coaches, she has been sideswiping sports for years, but her Maria Sharapova JockBio marks the first time she has written on the subject. 

You can e-mail Mary Ellen at jockbio@earthlink.net

Phillip Vaughn (Philip Von Borries)

Phillip Vaughn (Philip Von Borries) is the author of four baseball books, including American Gladiator: The Short Life And Hard Times Of Pete Browning; Ameridi: An American Baseball Reader and Louisville Diamonds. His baseball bylines have appeared in The Oakland Athletics Magazine, The Chicago Cubs Program Magazine, The Washington Times, Sports Collectors Digest and Oldtyme Baseball News. Phillip’s baseball background also includes historical work on Pete Browning’s new grave marker, dedicated in 1984 during the centennial anniversary of the Louisville Slugger bat.

One of the few turfwriters to have won both the Eclipse Award (Thoroughbred Racing) and the John Hervey Award (Harness Racing), Von Borries has written for numerous American, Canadian and European publications, among them The Thoroughbred Record, The Kentucky Derby Magazine, The European Racehorse, The Thoroughbred Times, The Blood-Horse, The Daily Racing Form, Turf & Sport Digest, Hoofbeats and The Standardbred. The author of Racelines and RaceLens, he has also done extensive publicity for the Arlington Million and the Kentucky Derby; television production work on the latter for ABC-TV; and appeared as an extra in two horse racing movies: Sylvester and Seabiscuit.

You can e-mail Phillip at jockbio@earthlink.net