With more than two decades of sports journalism experience — including extended stints at two of the most prestigious sports media outlets in the industry — Sam Khan Jr. has emerged as one of the top reporters covering college football. As a senior writer at The Athletic, Sam leads the company’s coverage of national college football roster construction and the transfer portal in a rapidly evolving environment.

In his current role, Sam spearheaded the creation of The Athletic’s inaugural edition of College Quarterback Tiers, ranking every starting quarterback in the sport ahead of the 2025 season. He also led the launch of The Athletic’s transfer portal quarterback rankings, the transfer portal top 100 and the company’s first edition of transfer portal team rankings. His coverage of the portal, NIL and roster construction has reached millions of unique readers.

Prior to moving into his current role, Sam served as The Athletic’s college football “Texpert,” blanketing football and recruiting coverage of the state of Texas’ college football programs. In that role, Sam documented Texas and Oklahoma’s move from the Big 12 to the SEC, the Texas Longhorns’ return to prominence under Steve Sarkisian, Texas A&M’s much-publicized firing of Jimbo Fisher and the sudden rise of Texas Tech as a disruptor in the sport. Sam continues to contribute to Texas college football coverage alongside his primary role, as well as coverage of the Big 12 and the SEC. 

His 2022 story on Arch Manning’s official visit to Texas — “Inside the Texas spending blitz that hooked Arch Manning and a No. 2 recruiting class” — earned recognition in the “Best of The Athletic 2022.” He co-wrote a 2024 story on the domino effect of Nick Saban’s retirement from Alabama, titled “Exploring the Nick Saban butterfly effect, 400-plus job changes later: ‘You better be prepared’” which received acclaim in “Best of The Athletic 2024.”

Sam has also co-hosted two college football podcasts since joining the company. His coverage of Texas college football recruiting was part of a series that earned top 10 placement for “projects” in the 2021 Associated Press Sports Editors writing contest.

Before arriving at The Athletic, Sam spent eight years at ESPN.com in a variety of roles. He launched, managed and wrote the company’s website dedicated to covering Texas A&M football and recruiting. In that position, he documented the rise of Johnny Manziel at Texas A&M. He later moved on to cover SEC football at-large, then later Big 12 football. Sam penned three pieces for ESPN The Magazine during his time at the company.

In 2020, Sam co-wrote a retrospective on the Southwest Conference titled “‘I don’t wish either of them well: The demise of the Southwest Conference, 25 years later.’” The story received wide acclaim for its depth, perspective and storytelling and reached more than a million readers. It also was included in the “Notable sports writing” section of The Year’s Best Sports Writing 2021.

In addition to writing duties, Sam made multiple appearances on SportsCenter, College Football Live, The Paul Finebaum Show and multiple ESPN Radio programs. He also served as a field reporter for ESPNU’s National Signing Day coverage on multiple occasions.

Sam began his career at his hometown newspaper, the Houston Chronicle. He led the paper’s coverage of high school sports for five-plus years, breaking news, writing features, coordinating and selecting all-city teams and helping produce special sections for preseason and postseason high school sports coverage. He also ran the paper’s first high school sports blog, created the paper’s first high school sports podcast and did on-camera video reports for the paper’s website. His work on the high school sports beat led to two top-10 finishes in the Associated Press Sports Editors writing contest (2006, investigative and 2010, breaking news). He also won the Chronicle’s “Jesse Award” in 2010 for best use of social media.

In his last year-plus, Sam covered college sports and served as the Chronicle’s beat reporter covering University of Houston athletics. In addition to beat writing, Sam also ran the paper’s UH sports blog, produced regular video and multimedia coverage and contributed to coverage of the NCAA Tournament and 2011 Final Four, which was hosted in Houston. Sam also spent time covering the Houston Texans, Houston Rockets, Houston Astros while at the Chronicle.

Sam holds a Bachelor of Arts in psychology from the University of Houston, which is where he launched his journalism career while working as a reporter for the student newspaper, The Daily Cougar.