White Sox Co-Owner, Sports Broadcast Pioneer Eddie Einhorn Dead At 80

By Zoe Greenberg in News on Feb 25, 2016 8:15PM

Eddie Einhorn, via MLB.com

Eddie Einhorn, who rose from being a hot dog vendor at Comiskey Park to being co-owner and vice chairman of the White Sox, died Tuesday night at the age of 80, following complications from a stroke.

Einhorn served as an executive for the White Sox for 35 seasons, including 25 years as vice chairman. He was also president and CEO of the team from 1981 to 1990, according to the Tribune.

“Eddie was a creative whirlwind whose ideas — many of them far ahead of their time — changed the landscape of sports, and sports on television, forever,” White Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said in a statement. “He was a man of many interests, projects, ideas and opinions, and we all will miss him dearly.”

Einhorn began his career in sports broadcasting, revolutionizing the field by broadcasting college games to a national audience. He founded the TVS Television Network and began broadcasting the N.C.A.A. tournament in the 1960s, when there was not yet an audience. In 1968, he broadcast the first nationally televised regular season game, nicknamed “The Game of the Century” between two undefeated teams, Houston and UCLA. Einhorn sold TVS in 1973 for more than $5 million dollars, as the The New York Times reported.

In 1981, Einhorn and Jerry Weinsdorf, former classmates at Northwestern, led a group that bought the White Sox. Under their ownership, the team won its first title in 88 years when it defeated the Astros in the 2005 World Series, according to ESPN. Einhorn was in Houston for the victory.

“The baseball gods are still smiling on us,” he told reporters after the win. “It’s been worth the wait. We didn’t think it would take this long, but we made it.”

Throughout his life, Einhorn continued to be a major force in sports broadcasting. He negotiated baseball’s first billion-dollar television deal, with CBS and ESPN, and was a television consultant for United States Olympic Committee and the United States Figure Skating Association.

“He was ahead of his time, plain and simple,” the broadcaster Dick Enberg, who introduced Einhorn when he was inducted into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011, told The New York Times in 2013.

Einhorn is survived by his wife of 53 years, Ann, his daughter Jennifer, his son Jeff and his grandson Meyer.

The White Sox will honor Einhorn by wearing a sleeve patch during their upcoming regular season.