New York Festivals Television & Film Awards is honoring pioneering sports journalist and broadcasting groundbreaker Lesley Visser with the New York Festivals 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award.
Visser made history as the first woman to achieve numerous milestones in the industry, and will receive the award launched in 2011 at the annual Storytellers Gala virtual event, which will recognize TV & Film Awards and Radio Awards trophy winners in May 2025.
“I am deeply honored to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award from the New York Television and Film Awards, and I love that it will be presented at the Storytellers Gala,” Visser said. “The heart of any sports journalist is dedicated to telling stories. I’m grateful to CBS for giving me this opportunity for more than 30 years, and I salute the men and women who have won this honor before me.”
Visser is tthe first woman inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the first to win the Lifetime Achievement Sports Emmy, and the first recipient of the Vin Scully Award for Excellence in Broadcasting.
Visser is also the first woman to appear on network broadcasts of the Final Four, the NBA Finals, the Super Bowl, and the World Series, and remains the only woman to have presented the Championship Lombardi Trophy at the Super Bowl. She was also the first woman on ABC’s “Monday Night Football,” the first female sportscaster to carry the Olympic Torch, and the only recipient of the Billie Jean King “Outstanding Journalist Award.” Among her many honors, Visser has been named a Muhammad Ali “Daughter of Greatness” and was inducted into the Society of Professional Journalists alongside CBS legend Marvin Kalb.
Visser’s career began at the Boston Globe in 1974. But Visser’s influence extends beyond her professional accomplishments; she has been named one of Esquire Magazine’s “Women We Love” and one of GQ’s “Five Ideal Dinner Guests.”
