The day after US News & World Report announced its shift comes word that another magazine is slashing its publication schedule and increasing online reliance ... Stretching back to 1886, The Sporting News has one of the longest track records when it comes to sports journalism.  In recent decades, it has also had one of the most troubled from a business standpoint, beating the odds simply to survive on numerous occasions as it passed from owner to owner during a time of major industry transition. Now the latest owner—American City Business Journals—has mapped out a digital Hail Mary play that could salvage TSN: starting a digital daily effective July 23, an emailed Sporting News Today 365 days a year with stats, scores, etc., and slashing the weekly print publication to twice a month. The new business model is a mix as well: the digital daily will be free while the magazine, which will be reintroduced in September with an emphasis on analysis and commentary, remains $3.99 an issue. The magazine circulation is about 700,000. 

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As the NYT explains, it’s a kind of “back to the future” move: take what the magazine was once known for—being the weekly sports Bible—and try to make it that kind of relevant in 2008 by providing a full morning briefing for “serious sports fans.” In today’s instant news world, can that work? Not in lieu of immediate gratification but as a way of providing a coherent picture the reader doesn’t have to piece together on his or her own, it just might.

Charlotte-based ACBJ acquired TSN in 2006 from Paul Allen’s Vulcan Sports Media, expanding sports holdings that include Street & Smith’s Sports Group. Street & Smith’s already includes a pair of publications operating in a similar way—the still-weekly print SportsBusiness Journal and the digital SportsBusiness Daily.

Disclosure: I wrote for The Sporting News and SportsBusiness Journal as a freelancer.