The Louisiana Sports Writers Association's columnist-of-the-year award was recently renamed for Finney, who also was honored with lifetime achievement awards from the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the U.S. Basketball Writers Association Hall of Fame.
Finney attended more than three dozen Super Bowls. Having covered a Saints franchise that didn't have a winning season in its first two decades, and didn't win a playoff game until its 34th season, he summed up New Orleans' first trip to the Super Bowl this way: "Finally, all the comedy, all the catcalls, all the misery during the reign of the bag heads, have given way to Kismet."
Funeral arrangements are pending.
And while New Orleans has never been home to Major League Baseball, Finney profiled many of the sport's biggest stars, including Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams.
Finney was born in New Orleans, where he attended Jesuit High School and Loyola University. He began his career by covering American Legion baseball shortly after high school.
His death was confirmed by the Lake Lawn Metairie Funeral Home, which is handling funeral arrangements. His longtime former employer, NOLA.com/The Times-Picayune, reported that he died at his New Orleans home.
He covered the first game the New Orleans Saints ever played, in 1967, and their only Super Bowl, in 2010. His career encompassed all of LSU's national football titles, which occurred in 1958, 2003 and 2007.
Finney also published books about the first 100 years of LSU football and a book about Maravich's extraordinary college basketball career at LSU,Dallas Cowboys Jersey For Sale.
One of Finney's six children, son Peter Finney Jr.,Cheap Football Jerseys, became a journalist whose career included a stint as a sports writer for the New York Post before he returned to New Orleans to work for the Clarion Herald, where he is executive editor. Another son, Dr. Tim Finney, is an orthopedic surgeon and a former team physician for the New Orleans Saints.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Peter Finney, a sports writer whose award-winning career in New Orleans spanned nearly 70 years,Harrison Barnes Jersey, died Saturday at the age of 88.
He profiled some of the most famous athletes of the past century,Adidas NMD Clearance, including boxer Muhammad Ali; golfers Arnold Palmer,Cheap NHL Jerseys From China, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods; basketball stars Pete Maravich and Shaquille O'Neal; football stars Joe Namath, Brett Favre, Drew Brees, Archie Manning, Peyton Manning and Eli Manning; Olympic track champion Jesse Owens and more.
Finney wrote about 15,000 articles. A selection was republished in a book this year. It included his coverage of LSU Heisman Trophy winner Billy Cannon's touchdown return against Mississippi on Halloween 1959 and Saints kicker Tom Dempsey's game-winning, NFL-record 63-yard field goal in 1970.
Finney began his career with the New Orleans States-Item in 1945 and joined the Times-Picayune through a newspaper merger in 1980. He was the Times-Picayune's lead columnist for decades until his retirement in 2013.