Lagniappe sports writer Tommy Hicks was announced Thursday as one of the Alabama Sports Writers Association’s 50 Legends. ASWA celebrates its 50th anniversary this year and as part of the celebration recognizes 50 ASWA legends selected by a panel of ASWA members for their achievements and contributions to the profession.
Those selected as one of ASWA’s 50 Legends were revealed throughout March.
ASWA’s 50 legends will be recognized at the association’s annual awards banquet on Sunday June 12 in Birmingham.
Hicks covered sports in Alabama for 46 years at seven different newspapers, including 23 years at the Mobile Press-Register. He has been on the Lagniappe staff since November 2020. He is a three-time Alabama Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association and a two-time Herby Kirby winner with the ASWA, which is symbolic of the sports history of the year.
He served as president of ASWA twice and president of the Football Writers Association of America in 2011. Hicks won ASWA’s Bill Shelton Award in 2020, which recognizes service to the organization, the profession and the writing community, and he was inducted into the ASWA Hall of Fame in 2018. A graduate of Troy State University (now Troy University), he was selected for 2015 Hall School of Journalism Alumnus of the Year.
Hicks is married to Julie Hicks and has a daughter, Maren Whittaker, and a stepdaughter, Megan Foster.
Other previously announced Mobile Zone winners include Lagniappe’s sports columnist Randy Kennedy, as well as AL.com’s Creg Stephenson, Kennedy’s co-host on Sports Talk 99.5 Radio’s the Randy Kennedy Show. Ben Thomas of AL.com is another winner.
