Tom Gage wins Spink Award for baseball writing

SAN DIEGO (AP) Tom Gage of The Detroit News has won the J.G. Taylor Spink Award for meritorious contributions to baseball writing.

Gage has been the newspaper's traveling reporter with the Tigers for 36 years.

Gage received 167 of 463 ballots from members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America who have been a part of the organization for 10 consecutive years at any point. The late Furman Bisher of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution got 161 in voting announced Tuesday and Dan Shaughnessy of The Boston Globe 134. There was one blank ballot.

The margin of victory was the closest since Hal McCoy of the Dayton Daily News edged Murray Chass of The New York Times by 25 votes in 2002, the first year the vote was conducted by mail ballot.

Gage is the 66th winner of the award. He will be honored during the Hall of Fame's induction weekend from July 24-27 in Cooperstown, New York.

Gage, 66, has covered more than 5,000 major league games in 54 ballparks, and has seen five no-hitters. Before the News, he wrote for the New Orleans Times-Picayune.