Longtime Chatham Daily News sports reporter Mark Malone has received provincial recognition for the third time for his skill behind the lens.
Malone has won a 2021 Ontario Newspaper Awards for sports photography (under 25,000 circulation), for a photo he captured of Chatham Diamonds baserunner Camden Blackburn stretching to beat a tag on a pickoff attempt at first base during a Baseball Ontario minor bantam playoff game at Fergie Jenkins Field at Rotary Park on Aug. 22, 2021.
The judge’s comments note: “From the strain in the baserunner’s outstretched arm to the waiting glove looming inches above, there is fabulous tension in the moment Mark Malone captured for the Chatham Daily News.”
This is Malone’s third time winning an ONA in the sports photography category. He won back-to-back provincial awards in 2018 and 2019.
Malone won a provincial award for his news-writing skills last year taking home best spot news writing (under 25,000 circulation) for his coverage of a fatal crash in July 2020 that claimed the life of a seven-year-old girl and sent her two siblings to hospital.
He has also received provincial recognition for his sports writing for a feature story he wrote in 2002 on the 1934 Chatham Colored All-Stars being honored by the Toronto Blue Jays.