Selena Roberts (born May 16, 1966 in

Live Oak, Florida Live Oak is a city in northern Florida and it is the county seat of Suwannee County, Florida, United States. The city is the county seat of Suwannee County and is located east of Tallahassee. As of 2010, the population recorded by the U.S. Census ...

) is an American author and sportswriter. Previously, she was a senior writer for ''Sports Illustrated'' and a columnist for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''. Roberts began her career as a beat writer for the

Minnesota Vikings The Minnesota Vikings are a professional American football team based in Minneapolis. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. Founded in 1960 as an expansion ...

at the ''

Minneapolis Star Tribune The ''Star Tribune'' is the largest newspaper in Minnesota. It originated as the ''Minneapolis Tribune'' in 1867 and the competing ''Minneapolis Daily Star'' in 1920. During the 1930s and 1940s, Minneapolis's competing newspapers were consolida ...

'' and for the

Orlando Magic The Orlando Magic are an American professional basketball team based in Orlando, Florida. The Magic compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Southeast Division. The franchise was establ ...

and

Tampa Bay Buccaneers The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are a professional American football team based in Tampa, Florida. The Buccaneers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) NFC South, South divisio ...

at the ''

Orlando Sentinel The ''Orlando Sentinel'' is the primary newspaper of Orlando, Florida, and the Central Florida region. It was founded in 1876 and is currently owned by Tribune Publishing Company. The ''Orlando Sentinel'' is owned by parent company, '' Tribune P ...

''. She received a B.A. degree in journalism from

Auburn University Auburn University (AU or Auburn) is a public land-grant research university in Auburn, Alabama. With more than 24,600 undergraduate students and a total enrollment of more than 30,000 with 1,330 faculty members, Auburn is the second largest uni ...

in 1988 where she was a sports editor for the university paper ''The Plainsman''. She also made frequent appearances on the

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

talk show ''

The Sports Reporters ''The Sports Reporters'' was a sports talk show that aired on ESPN at 9:30 a.m. ET every Sunday morning (and replayed at 10:30 a.m. ET the same day on ESPN2 and 11:30 AM on ESPNews). It featured a roundtable discussion among four sports ...

''. In a February 7, 2009 article on SI.com that quickly made the cover of ''Sports Illustrated'', Roberts revealed that Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez tested positive for steroids in 2003.

Alex Rodriguez biography

Roberts' book, ''A-Rod: The Many Lives of

Alex Rodriguez Alexander Emmanuel Rodriguez (born July 27, 1975), nicknamed "A-Rod", is an American former professional baseball shortstop and third baseman, businessman and philanthropist. Rodriguez played 22 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the ...

'', was released in 2009. The biography links the slugger's tabloid-like fame and use of

performance-enhancing drugs Performance-enhancing substances, also known as performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs), are substances that are used to improve any form of activity performance in humans. A well-known example of cheating in sports involves doping in sport, where bann ...

with an unquenchable desire for attention, and his father, Victor, who abandoned him at ten years old. The book reported that Rodriguez used performance-enhancing drugs in high school, relying on questionable sources, and delved into reports that Rodriguez used PEDs with the

New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the Boroughs of New York City, New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Amer ...

and tipped pitches to opposing players. The book received widespread media attention before it was released.

Duke lacrosse case

On March 31, 2006, Roberts was one of the first to report on the

Duke lacrosse case The Duke lacrosse case was a widely reported 2006 criminal case in Durham, North Carolina, United States in which three members of the Duke University men's lacrosse team were falsely accused of rape. The three students were David Evans, Collin ...

. Roberts criticized the university as well as the team for a culture that prohibited "snitching" on the later exonerated lacrosse players. Accusations of sexism and racism followed in later articles. The falsely accused players were cleared of any wrongdoing and the lead prosecutor

Mike Nifong Michael Byron Nifong (born September 14, 1950) is an American former attorney and convicted criminal. He served as the district attorney for Durham County, North Carolina until he was removed, disbarred, and jailed following court findings concer ...

was

disbarred Disbarment, also known as striking off, is the removal of a lawyer from a bar association or the practice of law, thus revoking their law license or admission to practice law. Disbarment is usually a punishment for unethical or criminal conduct ...

. Roberts has never admitted wrongdoing nor has she apologized for her remarks.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Roberts, Selena 1966 births Living people Auburn University alumni American sportswriters American columnists The New York Times sportswriters Women sportswriters American women columnists 21st-century American women American women sportswriters