Sideline reporter

A sideline reporter is a professional journalist who assists a sports broadcasting crew with sideline coverage of the playing field or court. The sideline reporter typically makes live updates on injuries and breaking news or conducts player interviews while players are on the field or court because the play-by-play broadcaster and color commentator must remain in their broadcast booth. Sideline reporters are often granted inside information about an important update, such as injury, because they have the credentials necessary to do so.

Origins of sideline reporting

Jim Lampley is considered to be the first sideline reporter. According to Lampley, the job grew out of the wreckage of the 1972 Munich Olympics, when new wireless technology was put to use in ABC's Quicksilver coverage of the Israeli hostage crisis and the subsequent massacre. As Lampley recalled, "Months later, they asked, 'What else could we do? Would it work in a football stadium? Could we put someone on the sidelines?'" The first broadcast with a sideline reporter(s) was the UCLA Bruins vs. Tennessee Volunteers football game in 1974, on ABC.