R.I.P. Seattle Sports Personality J Michael Kenyon

J Michael Kenyon - 2000

J Michael Kenyon, one of Seattle’s legendary sportswriters and a longtime local wrestling historian, M.C. and promoter, died April 26.

He was 73-years-of-age, according to KIRO7.

Kenyon, who was born Michael Glover and grew up in the Lake City neighborhood of Seattle, suffered from congestive heart failure.

In 1967, Kenyon became the first SuperSonics beat writer for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. A decade later, he covered the arrival of the Mariners. In 1980, Kenyon was the city’s second sports talk show host -- after KIRO’s Wayne Cody -- on 570 KVI.

Kenyon also worked for KING radio, the Yakima Morning Herald, Tacoma’s News Tribune, the Hollywood Citizen-News and the Baltimore Sun, among other outlets.

Kenyon quit the P-I four times, including once because one of his stories wasn’t published. His track record on radio was similar, with one of his departures from KING being mid-show after a station manager gave unwanted input to Kenyon’s reporting.

“He often became a better story than the one he was writing,” wrote Dan Raley, a friend and another legendary Seattle sportswriter.