Paul Fichtenbaum Appointed Editor of the Time Inc. Sports Group; Chris Stone Named Managing Editor of SPORTS ILLUSTRATED

NEW YORK, Oct. 18, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Today it was announced by Time Inc. Editor-in-Chief John Huey that Paul Fichtenbaum is now Editor of the Time Inc. Sports Group. He succeeds Terry McDonell who spent the past decade as Sports Group Editor and is now a Senior Advisor to Time Inc. concentrating on digital initiatives for the company. Huey also announced that Chris Stone has been promoted to Sports Illustrated Managing Editor. He is the ninth person to hold this position in SI history. 

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"There was no better place to spend the last decade both as a journalist and a developer of new media," McDonell said. "Now that Paul and Chris are in place the timing is perfect." 

In his new role, Fichtenbaum is responsible for the editorial oversight of the Group's portfolio consisting of the Sports Illustrated, Golf and SIKids franchises, which collectively reach an audience of 32MM. Stone will oversee the editorial operations of the iconic weekly while working across all platforms to deepen the editorial integration and develop new franchises. They will team with recently hired SI.com Managing Editor Matt Bean and Sports Illustrated Creative Director Chris Hercik, to form the nucleus of a dynamic leadership unit that will define the Group's editorial transformation.

"I am honored and humbled to be placed in the leadership position of this group with its storied brands. It's an exciting and revolutionary time and I feel that we're positioned well to succeed on all platforms. I'm also thrilled to be working side-by-side with brilliant young editors, Chris Stone, Matt Bean and Chris Hercik, who bring energy, smarts and vision to everything they do," said Fichtenbaum.

Prior to this role, Fichtenbaum was Editorial Director for the Sports Group where he began the process of designing the Group's integrated approach to sports coverage across all media. Before that, he spent eight years as Managing Editor of SI.com which became a powerhouse generating 10MM monthly unique visitors and hundreds of millions of page views. Along the way the site earned a plethora of honors including four consecutive MPA Website of the Year Awards, and a National Magazine Award for its NFL coverage. Fichtenbaum joined SI in 1989 and oversaw numerous magazine beats including the NHL, MLB, NBA, NFL, college football, tennis and soccer before taking on the dotcom role.

Stone joined Sports Illustrated in 1992 and he ascended the ranks to become assistant managing editor in 2009. While AME he worked closely with the magazine staff to design numerous cross-platform programs and was part of the leadership team that developed SI's award-winning tablet editions. He also oversaw the Swimsuit franchise evolution into a multiplatform global juggernaut and notably was senior editor for baseball when SI uncovered Alex Rodriguez's positive steroid tests which has been one of the decade's most transcendent stories.   

"Sports Illustrated was the prism through which I viewed the sports world growing up and I've had the good fortune of participating in its evolution over the last two decades. We tell stories—muscular, entertaining, differentiated stories and journalism—and we're going to keep telling them, using all of our platforms to tell them in the most ambitious and accessible ways possible," said Stone.

About Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated is a multimedia sports brand that takes the consumer into the heart and soul of sports.  The Sports Illustrated franchise is anchored by the weekly magazine—the most respected voice in sports journalism, reaching a weekly audience of nearly 22 million adults—and www.SI.com, the magazine's 24/7 sports news website that delivers more than 300 original stories to its users each week.  The franchise also includes Sports Illustrated Kids (www.sikids.com), a monthly magazine targeted to kids age 8 and up; GOLF Magazine and www.Golf.com; www.FanNation.com, a social networking and sports-news aggregation platform; SI Presents, the magazine's specialty publishing division; as well as SI Books, SI Pictures, SI Productions, SI Digital and SI Events.  Founded in 1954, Sports Illustrated is a division of Time Inc., the world's leading magazine publishing company and a subsidiary of Time Warner.

SOURCE Sports Illustrated