Football Gurus Form Digital Sports Publishing, Inc.

Posted on August 28, 2000

A group headed by Terry Bowden, the former head football coach at Auburn University and current ABC television analyst, has announced the formation of Digital Sports Publishing, Inc. The new company will produce sports books and magazines to be downloaded via the Web or printed by digital techniques.

``What we want to do,'' said Bowden, ``is use the new technologies to narrow the gap between folks who play and coach the games and folks who watch in the stands and at home. We plan to be the authority fans turn to when they want to know what really happened in the last game and what's likely to happen next.''

Digital Sports will launch first in college football, offering a 2001 preseason guide produced just prior to the first game of the year so that it can include updates on injuries, changing depth charts, and the addition of new recruits and walk-ons. It will be updated regularly throughout the season on the Web.

``Most of the preseason magazines that we all love to read,'' says Bowden, ``are reported so far in advance of August practices they are more like recaps of the previous year than previews of the new one. Digital downloading and on-demand printing make the old ways obsolete.''

``So we won't be just another news service,'' says Bowden. ``We will narrow our focus to top teams. And we'll leave the scandals and politics to others. For us, it will be just the game. Our network of sources will be weighted toward those who know it best, head coaches and assistants who can explain strategies and techniques to fans dying to get beyond the scenes.''

Terry Bowden will be chairman and CEO of Digital Sports Publishing. His father, Florida State head football coach Bobby Bowden and his brother, Clemson head coach Tommy Bowden, are both on the new company's board of directors. His partners in the venture include the Atlanta marketing firm Hope-Beckham, Inc. and writer/editor Ben Brown. Ben Brown, who was on the founding staff of USA Today, has worked with the Bowden family on two books -- Saint Bobby and the Barbarians (Doubleday, 1992) and Winning's Only Part of the Game (Warner, 1996).