Josh Chetwynd
Encyclopedia
Journalism
Chetwynd has worked as a staff reporter for USA TodayUSA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
, The Hollywood Reporter
The Hollywood Reporter
Formerly a daily trade magazine, The Hollywood Reporter re-launched in late 2010 as a unique hybrid publication serving the entertainment industry and a consumer audience...
and U.S. News & World Report
U.S. News & World Report
U.S. News & World Report is an American news magazine published from Washington, D.C. Along with Time and Newsweek it was for many years a leading news weekly, focusing more than its counterparts on political, economic, health and education stories...
. His writing has also appeared in such publications/websites as The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
, The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
(of London), Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
, MLB.com
MLB.com
MLB.com is the official site of Major League Baseball and is overseen by Major League Baseball Advanced Media, L.P. . MLB.com is a source of baseball-related information, including baseball news, statistics, and sports columns...
, The Harvard Negotiation Law Review, The Observer Sport Monthly, and Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
.
He was a two-time winner of the Los Angeles Press Club Award for best newspaper article written by a correspondent (1999 and 2000).
Broadcasting
Between 2002 to 2008, Chetwynd served as the baseball analyst for the British television network Five, where he worked with Jonny Gould on MLB on FiveMLB on Five
MLB on Five was a sports television programme on the British Five Network featuring live coverage of Major League Baseball games. It was usually broadcast on Sunday and Wednesday nights...
. He joined the show at the beginning of the 2002 season. He would work as the co-host until the middle of the 2003 season when he returned to the United States. While in the U.S. he covered the World Series three times and did reporting from Spring Training in Arizona for the show from 2003 to 2005. At the start of the 2006 season, he resumed the co-host position full-time. He held that post until the show was cancelled after the 2008 season. In October 2006, Chetwynd also took over as the host of Monday night coverage of the NFL on Five for a season when Colin Murray
Colin Murray
Colin Murray is a Northern Irish sports and music radio and television presenter. He is the current host of the BBC Television show Match of the Day 2 on BBC Two, and the BBC Radio 5 Live shows 5 Live Sport and Fighting Talk, as well as a show on BBC Radio Ulster. He has previously hosted regular...
had to leave due to the show clashing with his radio show. In addition, Chetwynd did voice over work for sports packages on Five's sister digital station FiveUS between 2006 and 2008.
On 4 July 2010, he began co-hosting MLB on 5 Live
MLB on 5 Live
MLB on 5 Live is the banner title for all live Major League Baseball commentary broadcast on BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra. The show began on July 4, 2010 and was originally hosted by Jonny Gould and Josh Chetwynd, with Nat Coombs hosting when Gould was unavailable...
with Jonny Gould. In 2011, the show was picked up for second season with Nat Coombs
Nat Coombs
Nathaniel 'Nat' Coombs is a British television & radio presenter & writer.-Education:Coombs was educated at the boys' independent school Dulwich College in Dulwich, South London, and at University College London.-Television and Radio:...
replacing Gould as the primary presenter.
Books
Chetwynd has written three books.His most recent, called The Secret History of Balls: The Stories Behind the Things We Love to Catch, Whack, Throw, Kick, Bounce and Bat' was released in May 2011 to very positive reviews. The Denver Post wrote: "[Chetwynd] shows us how the evolution of the ball has had a profound influence not only on each athletic activity we play but on much larger issues such as technology, language and culture." The New York Journal of Books said: "Anyone with an interest in sports or game development and history will thoroughly enjoy bouncing through these offerings." The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
dubbed it "[a] little gem of a book ..." and ESPN The Magazine
ESPN The Magazine
ESPN The Magazine is a bi-weekly sports magazine published by the ESPN sports network in Bristol, Connecticut in the United States. The first issue was published on March 11, 1998....
labelled it "essential trivia."
Chetwynd's 2008 book Baseball in Europe: A Country by Country History' received critical acclaim. Booklist
Booklist
Booklist is a publication of the American Library Association that provides critical reviews of books and audiovisual materials for all ages. It is geared toward libraries and booksellers and is available in print or online...
called it "an excellent research tool as well as informative and entertaining." MLB.com
MLB.com
MLB.com is the official site of Major League Baseball and is overseen by Major League Baseball Advanced Media, L.P. . MLB.com is a source of baseball-related information, including baseball news, statistics, and sports columns...
wrote it was "a comprehensive, handy reference guide to everything you need to know about America's Pastime on the Old Continent." Nine: A Journal for Baseball History and Culture said it was "a well-written, highly informed, carefully researched and scrupulously documented addition to international baseball scholarship."
He also co-wrote the 2007 book British Baseball and the West Ham Club: History of a 1930s Professional Team in East London. It was written with Brian A. Belton.
In addition, he has contributed chapters or essays to two other books: Baseball without Borders: The International Pastime' and West Ham United Miscellany'
Baseball career
Chetwynd's baseball career included stints at the NCAA Division I college level, professional baseball in the United States and Europe and international play for the Great Britain national baseball teamGreat Britain national baseball team
The Great Britain national baseball team is the national baseball team of Great Britain. It is governed by the British Baseball Federation, which is a member nation of the Confederation of European Baseball.-History:...
.
He competed for four years at Northwestern University
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....
in the Big Ten conference
Big Ten Conference
The Big Ten Conference is the United States' oldest Division I college athletic conference. Its twelve member institutions are located primarily in the Midwestern United States, stretching from Nebraska in the west to Pennsylvania in the east...
. He was named to Academic All Big Ten teams twice as a catcher. Following graduation in 1993, he signed a professional contract with the Zanesville Greys in the independent Frontier League
Frontier League
The Frontier League, based in Sauget, Illinois, is a professional, independent baseball organization located in the Midwestern United States, Western Pennsylvania, and Southern Ontario. It operates mostly in cities not served by Major or Minor League Baseball teams and is not affiliated with either...
. The team won the first-ever Frontier League championship that year, but Chetwynd was released midway through the season.
Although he grew up in Los Angeles, Chetwynd was born in London, England. Beginning in 1996, he had a 10-year career as a member of the Great Britain national squad. He would represent GB in five European Championships (1996, 1999, 2001, 2003, 2005). His best performances came in 1996 and 2001. At the 1996 European (B-Pool) Championships he hit .412 with a .706 slugging percentage. The team won the gold medal at that event to earn elevation into the top tier of European baseball. At the top level in 2001 he hit .353 at the championships held in Germany.
In 2003, Chetwynd played a season as a professional in Sweden's Elitserien, helping Oskarshamn to a share of the regular season title. He tallied a .438 batting average, which placed him 5th among league leaders. He finished his career playing in Great Britain's top league. As a player-coach, he led the London Mets
London Mets
The London Meteorites, better known as the London Mets, are a British baseball team who play in the southern section of the BBF National League.-History:...
to two national championships (2007, 2008). In 2009, his final season, he won a third championship as a member of the Bracknell Blazers. In the finals that year, he went 5-for-5 with 4 RBI. Overall, he hit .440 over six seasons in Great Britain's highest domestic league.
Education
Chetwynd holds two degrees in journalism from Northwestern: a BSJ (1993) and an MSJ (1994). He graduated with a JDJuris Doctor
Juris Doctor is a professional doctorate and first professional graduate degree in law.The degree was first awarded by Harvard University in the United States in the late 19th century and was created as a modern version of the old European doctor of law degree Juris Doctor (see etymology and...
from the University of Arizona
University of Arizona
The University of Arizona is a land-grant and space-grant public institution of higher education and research located in Tucson, Arizona, United States. The University of Arizona was the first university in the state of Arizona, founded in 1885...
in 2006 and completed an LLM from The London School of Economics and Political Science in 2009.
For his work at the LSE, he received the 2009 Brian Keelan Memorial Prize for excellence in the study of dispute resolution in a commercial context.