Chad Ford

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Chad Ford is an American sports journalist who has worked for ESPN Insider since 2001. He is currently a professor of conflict resolution in Hawaii.

Ford grew up in Kansas City, Missouri. He has a bachelor's degree in history from Brigham Young University-Hawaii, a master's degree in conflict analysis and resolution from George Mason University, and a Juris Doctor from Georgetown University.

He was the co-founder and executive editor of sportsTALK.com before it became ESPN Insider, a subscription service to which Ford still contributes. Ford is known for his "insider information" and breaking news on NBA stories, especially regarding the draft, trade rumors, and international basketball. By 2005, more than 300,000 paying Insider subscribers read his daily reports for ESPN.

Ford is sometimes criticized by those claiming that his reports contain unsubstantiated rumors. Billionaire Dallas Mavericks' owner Mark Cuban once called him an "idiot" ^[1] after Ford criticized him for not re-signing point guard Steve Nash. Peter Vecsey, a columnist for the New York Post, also has referred to Ford derogatorily as "Chad Fraud." In addition, his own peer at ESPN, Page 2 blogger Bill Simmons, also routinely pokes fun of Ford, especially for his tendency to overhype foreign players. Simmons once joked that if Darko Milicic, Nikoloz Tskitishvili and Andris Biedrins were all out of the league in 3 years, they should be forced to live at Chad Ford's house; implying that the 3 Eastern Europeans, widely considered as "draft busts", were selected high due to Ford's poor judge of talent.

Ford has also traveled the world extensively, having lived in Connecticut, Missouri, North Carolina, California, Hawaii and Washington D.C., and having covered the NBA in Asia, Europe, and Africa. He also did research for the United Nations in Northern Ireland.

Ford surprised many people in the NBA and numerous Insider readers last summer when he announced that he was leaving the basketball world to take a position as an assistant professor of international cultural studies for BYU-Hawaii. Ford currently teaches cultural conflict resolution at BYU-Hawaii, does research in sports and conflict, and still contributes occasionally to the NBA and draft sections of Insider.