The best fantasy sports writers in the industry will soon be able to aspire to the same ultimate honor as the athletes they cover.

The Fantasy Sports Writers Association is set to select the first class for its hall of fame at the end of this year.

“The goal is to recognize contributions made in a variety of different ways,” FSWA president and chairman Mike Beacom tells FSB.com. “It’s not just going to be the respected writers in the industry. It’s also going to be those who offer something of value to help the industry grow.”

Beacom says that the details have yet to be ironed out, such as the rules for eligibility, the size of the class and exactly what the honor will entail. The FSWA is, however, set on making it happen by the end of this year and then inducting the first honorees when the annual awards are given out early in 2010.

“We want to do something special for these winners. We plan to make a big deal out of this,” Beacom says. “Part of the motivation behind the hall of fame is to motivate young writers to want to do well — give them something where they can say, ‘Man, that would be cool, a hall of fame for me.’”

Beacom says that the FSWA is looking at classes probably in the range of three to five inductees a year, and that potential nominees will have to go through some sort of entry ballot process. On the eligibility front, it appears that the standard will likely be 10 years in the industry, though that could certainly change in the final guidelines. The Association aims to have the process finalized by July 1.

“It’s going to be fun figuring out how to do this, where all the booby traps lie and how to step around them,” Beacom says.

Of course, once the FSWA figures out how it’s going to nominate, select and induct hall of famers, it will face the daunting task of narrowing down the candidates to a single inaugural class. Beacom already concedes that “there’s no way” all of the deserving people will make it into the first group. Although there’s always the chance that will result in some hurt feelings, the whole effort will really be better off if each year brings a strong class, especially in the early stages.

FSB.com will have more on the FSWA hall of fame process as it develops through the summer. In the meantime, which fantasy writers do you think the first class needs to contain?

(Note: Beacom is the publisher for SportsBuff.com, which is owned by the same company that operates this site.)

Tags: fantasy sports, fantasy sports business, fantasy sports industry, fswa, fswa hall of fame, mike beacom

This entry was posted on Friday, March 6th, 2009 at 8:52 pm and is filed under Lead Stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.