Ralph Heygood Wiley Jr. (April 12, 1952 – June 13, 2004)^[1] was an American sports journalist who wrote forSports Illustrated andESPN's Page 2. He was well known for his distinctive literary tone and his writings on race in America.^[2]

Born inMemphis, Tennessee, Wiley attendedKnoxville College from 1972 to 1975, where he playedcollege football.^[3] After suffering an injury, he landed his first professional journalism job at theKnoxville Spectrum. He was a member ofKappa Alpha Psi fraternity.

Upon graduation, Wiley earned a position at theOakland Tribune, where he quickly climbed up the ranks fromcopy boy to beat writer and eventually became a regular columnist. In 1980, he coined the famous phrase "Billy Ball" to describe the managerial style ofBilly Martin.^[3] In 1982, he was hired bySports Illustrated, where he wrote 28 cover stories over a nine-year period,^[3] mainly aboutboxing,football, andbaseball.

Wiley published several books during the course of his career, includingSerenity, A Boxing Memoir;Why Black People Tend To Shout; andBy Any Means Necessary: The Trials and Tribulations of Making Malcolm X, withSpike Lee.

Additionally, Wiley wrote articles forGQ,Premiere, andNational Geographic. He was a weekly contributor to ESPN's Page 2, where he wrote more than 240 columns. His presence on TV includedESPN'sThe Sports Reporters and regular guest appearances onSportsCenter.

Wiley was famous for his well-regarded essays on race in America.^[2] He was known for his ability to mix street vernacular with literary references, and for his witty, erudite, and sometimes forceful writing style.^[3] When writing for ESPN's Page 2, in skirting the line between sports journalism and literary fiction, Wiley wrote many articles in the third person, featuring discursive, jazz-inflected prose and dialogue conducted between himself and a fictionalized character whose identity the writer left deliberately obscure.^{[citation needed]}

Wiley died of aheart attack at the age of 52 on June 13, 2004, while watching Game 4 of the2004 NBA Finals. Survivors included his companion, Susan Peacock of Orlando; his mother, Dorothy Brown of Washington, D.C.; a son from his marriage to Holly Cypress, Colen C. "Cole" Wiley; a daughter from his marriage to Monica Valdiviez-Wiley, Magdalena Elizabeth “Maggie” Valdiviez-Wiley; and a half brother, Samuel Graham of Memphis.

• 1952 births
• 2004 deaths
• African-American sportswriters
• Writers from Memphis, Tennessee
• Sportswriters from Tennessee
• 20th-century African-American writers
• 21st-century African-American writers
• Knoxville College alumni

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• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use mdy dates from October 2022
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• Articles with unsourced statements from May 2015