Company History
~ Primary Clients ~
2009
March - I reached a significant milestone on March 13. On
that night, I covered my 3,000th career
game.
June - I worked on a special project for
82games. We charted/analyzed the various moves and tendencies of NBA
players. This data was used by a game company to develop the latest
version of their NBA video game.
2008
July - I reached an agreement to resume working for
long-time client STATS, LLC. They will once again become Wizard Sports'
primary client. As in the past, I will be covering NBA and college
basketball, NFL and college football, and MLB baseball for
STATS.
October - I was offered an
increased role with the Dallas Mavericks. I began scouting/charting
their own games as my primary responsibility, rather than opponents'
games.
2007
February - I decided to discontinue my monthly company newsletter. However, I am continuing to send out company and personal updates to my newsletter subscribers on a more casual basis as news develops.
March - I decided to discontinue my work covering live MLB baseball games for STATS, LLC.
July - My business relationship with STATS, LLC officially came to an end as I decided not to pursue any further work with them. This move will allow me to focus more on working for my current clients, as well as pursuing other possible opportunities.
August - I accepted an offer to become a sports writer for Hoopsworld. I cover the Indiana Pacers and the NBA for this client, and my work appears on the company's popular NBA website, Hoopsworld.com.
November - I decided to end my relationship with Hoopsworld, primarily so I can concentrate on work with other clients. Being an NBA writer took up a tremendous amount of time, and at a certain point this no longer made financial sense for my business.
2006
February - On February 23, I celebrated Wizard Sports' 10-year anniversary!
March - I made my first contributions to my newest client, 82games.com. I wrote an article about NBA strategy, with accompanying statistical analysis, that was published on the site. We also began some game charting work at this time.
April - STATS and I made a mutual decision that after one year of covering the Washington Nationals as my primary team, that I would return to covering games from around the league, rather than have a primary team for MLB baseball.
June - I wrote an article for the official website of Pacers guard Sarunas Jasikevicius. The piece covered his rookie season in the NBA, and speculated about his future in the league. For more information on my involvement with the Pacers and Jasikevicius, see the July, 2005 and September, 2005 entries above.
July - I worked on a special project for the Dallas Mavericks. I exchanged e-mail with team owner Mark Cuban, who asked me to supply him with some further information and analysis regarding former Pacers forward Austin Croshere, who Dallas had just acquired from Indiana via trade.
December - Through my client, 82games, I began working for the Dallas Mavericks NBA franchise in the area of charting game information for scouting purposes.
2005
January - I reached a significant milestone on January 15. I covered my 2,000th career game on that night.
February - I officially adopted the new Washington Nationals MLB franchise as my primary team for baseball coverage.
April - The first edition of the Wizard Sports Newsletter was released. I use this newsletter as a forum to update family/friends on company and personal news, interesting statistical facts and analysis, and various other related items.
July - I worked on a special project for the Indiana Pacers, at the request of head coach Rick Carlisle. I exchanged e-mail and spoke on the phone with coach Carlisle, who asked me to supply him with further research/analysis to help support their pursuit of point guard Sarunas Jasikevicius. Jasikevicius signed with the Pacers about 3 weeks after I sent my report to coach Carlisle.
August - I returned to working all Indianapolis Colts home games from their press box. For the last 2 ½ seasons, I had been covering these games from my home office instead (see October, 2002 entry above for more details).
September - STATS decided to discontinue the defensive statistics role for NFL football reporting that was instituted last season.
September - I was contacted by Indiana Pacers President/CEO Donnie Walsh, and I did some follow-up work for him related to the earlier project I did for Pacers coach Rick Carlisle (see July, 2005 entry above for more details).
October - I welcomed Roland Beech's 82games.com as a new direct client. At this time, I reached an agreement to work as an NBA Game Charter (videotape analysis) for 82games, and may work in other capacities as well.
2004
August - I took steps to get a close friend of mine involved in reporting for STATS. I began "mentoring" him with getting started in the business, learning our reporting system, career advice, etc.
September - A new reporting role was added for NFL football, involving more in-depth defensive play-by-play and statistics than we have tracked in the past.
November - I granted an interview to a print journalist from Texas, who was writing an article about NBA Champions from the past 25 years and wanted to ask me some questions for the article.
December - I purchased the domain name adrianlawhorn.com, and began using it as the official internet home of Wizard Sports.
2003
May - I developed a mathematical formula to evaluate the productivity and efficiency of NBA basketball players. I completed analysis on every player who played in the NBA during the 2002-03 season, and began to market the formula to various NBA teams and media outlets.
November - I compiled information and wrote an article about former Philadelphia Eagles Pro Bowl running back Timmy Brown. This piece has been published on the alumni website for the school in Indiana that Brown attended during some of the same years that my father was also there.
December - I attended an Indianapolis Colts football game and did some unique on-site data collection. I recorded some unusual information such as what songs are played at the RCA Dome during the game, as well as organized crowd cheering/chants. This information will be used in Microsoft's "NFL Fever 2004" video game.
2002
October - The NFL informed me that they would not grant me press box credentials for the Indianapolis Colts for the remainder of the 2002 season because our live, in-progress game statistics are in direct competition with their own similar service. I covered the final five Colts home games in 2002 from my home office. Previous to this, I had worked on location at every Colts home game since late in the 1997 season.
2001
February - I started covering the XFL. After one lackluster season, the football league folded.
February - On February 23, I celebrated Wizard Sports' 5-year anniversary!
May - I discontinued my work on the reporter website.
July - Coverage of Cincinnati Reds baseball from their press box was added to my other baseball responsibilities. I plan to do this on an occasional basis.
August - TVL baseball videotape analysis, where I track information on type, velocity, and location of each pitch during MLB games, was added. I plan to do only occasional assignments in this area.
December - I reached a big milestone on December 26. On that night, I covered my 1,000th career game.
2000
March - College basketball was added, starting with the NCAA Tournament.
April - I resumed working MLB baseball games for STATS.
April - I decided to discontinue my work analyzing videotapes of NFL games, so that I could concentrate on my live game coverage of all the sports that are active in the fall/winter months.
November - I began full-season coverage of college basketball.
1999
May - I developed an idea early in the year to create a website for the STATS Reporter Network. This site helps distribute various types of information to reporters, as well as giving them a central place to exchange ideas, reporting tips, etc. I created and maintained this site as a contractor with STATS. The site went live in May.
May - I took this year off from covering MLB baseball, in part to work on developing the reporter website, which required a great deal of time during the summer of 1999.
August - I began to work college football games for STATS.
1998
January - I decided to discontinue all my professional involvement with fantasy football, so I could concentrate on and expand my sports reporting duties with STATS.
April - Major League Baseball was the next sport added to my coverage responsibilities with STATS.
1997
April - I began work as a staff writer for Fantasy Insights, the #1 fantasy football website on the internet at that time.
May - I started a service providing individual fantasy football team owners with detailed and "inside" information about NFL teams and players. I limited this to a few customers who were willing to pay premium prices for a custom service, because this was very time consuming.
June - I decided to further improve my previous draft guide product, by customizing the information for each owner and their particular league rules. This new product was called the Wizard Sports Custom Draft Sheet.
August - After several months of planning, this month marked the launch of the Wizard Sports Fantasy Football League.
September - I began to work for STATS, covering NFL football (live and videotape analysis).
October - I started to work NBA basketball games for STATS.
1996
February - The company's first official day of business was February 23, 1996.
June - I unveiled the first Wizard Sports website on June 3, 1996. The original focus of Wizard Sports was writing, marketing, and selling the Wizard Sports Fantasy Football Draft Guide on the internet through the Wizard Sports Fantasy Football Website (the original incarnation of the company site you are on right now). That was the sole function of my company for the first year of operation.
Copyright © 1996-2009 Wizard Sports. All rights reserved.