Martin Taragano, born 27 October 1959 in the Bronx, NY, about two blocks from Yankee Stadium, has been a published author since 1988 – the same year he started his sports newsletter, Sports Fans Association of America (SPFAA), not to be confused with the Sports Fans of America Association, Inc. While Martin established his reputation as one of the country’s most knowledgeable and respected sportswriters and sports historians after the publication of his first two sports encyclopedias in the early 1990’s, membership in his non-profit, individual SPFAA newsletter grew from 180 the first year to over 12,000 members worldwide today. It now ranks as one of the largest sports fans associations in the country. The purpose of the SPFAA was and is to help fans of all four major professional team sports (MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL), as well as fans of NCAA Division 1 men’s and women’s college basketball, men’s college football, NASCAR, tennis’ 4 Grand Slams, PGA/LPGA’s 4 Majors plus Horse Racing’s 4 Triple Crowns do research. This research provides not only an outlet to learn more about both historical and contemporary major sports, major annual events such as the World Series, Super Bowls, NBA Finals, NCAA Final Fours, but also about the greatest sports celebrities and personalities in history as well as those superstars on the current scene. Such research provided to members also provides an outlet for them to publish their findings, and to preserve international interest in all major American sports by disseminating entertaining and didactic, expert sports knowledge to help sports fans become better informed purveyors of the entire sports world spectrum from both contemporary and historical perspectives. Once a member, membership is a fundamentally volunteer-driven organization with its research committees and regional group structures co-dependent upon members donating their sports knowledge and love of sports by having leadership roles. Now interested members can join via this web site rather than old fashioned snail mail. The over 12,000 current members come from all walks of life, all ages, all types of occupations. In addition to being executive director of the SPFAA, Martin, as a writer, had his first magazine clip accepted for publication in Sports Illustrated when he was only a 19 year-old college student. Moreover, he’s the author of three books, two sports encyclopedias and a sports novel. His debut novel, THE HUMAN OVEN, was shortlisted as a finalist in the 2002 Associated Writing Programs(AWP)/Thomas Dunne Books(St Martin’s Press) Best Novel of the Year Competition. He was an MFA candidate at the Iowa Writers Workshop, earned his B.A. in creative writing on scholarship at the University of Iowa, was accepted to Columbia University in 1996, and also completed graduate work in rhetoric and American literature at the University of Texas, Austin. He is the recipient of myriad writing grants and fellowships. His work has appeared in Basketball Forecast, The South Carolina Review, Sports Parade, Quartos (London), Listen Magazine, The Gold Sheet, among others. His professional affiliations include qualified, active membership of The Authors Guild, Society of Professional Journalists, Society for Baseball Research(SABR), National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association & Hall of Fame, United States Basketball Writers Association, and the Professional Football Writers & Researchers Association, among others.
