A nationally known sportswriter, Hal Lebovitz entertained and informed Cleveland sports fans for more than 50 years with his incisive reporting talents. A graduate of Glenville High and Western Reserve University, he became a full-time writer for the Cleveland News in 1946, covering high school sports. In 1950 he became the paper’s baseball beat writer, then moved to the Plain Dealer with the same assignment when the News folded in 1960 and began a 20-year reign as the PD sports editor in 1964. His highly popular PD sports columns continued thereafter in a chain of papers serving much of Greater Cleveland. So did his “Ask Hal, The Referee” columns, which appeared nationally in The Sporting News from 1947 to 1993. The column drew on Hal’s vast situational sports knowledge acquired through many years as an umpire and referee.

Deceased 2005