William Paul Plaschke (born September 6, 1958, in Louisville, Kentucky) is an American sports journalist who has written for the Los Angeles Times since 1987.
In 1980, he received a bachelor's degree in mass communications from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, where he was the sports editor for the school's paper, the Alestle.
Fellow panelist and Denver Post columnist and author Woody Paige often refers to him as "Reverend Bill."
Plaschke was the subject of controversy while serving as a correspondent for the Los Angeles Times at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics for a column that accused U.S. gymnast Gabby Douglas of a lack of patriotism for failing to smile and place her hand over her heart during the playing of the U.S. National Anthem;[6] the column was in turn described as "a stunning display of superfluous concern-trolling,"[7] "rife with thinly-veiled racism and sexism"[8] and attracted further widespread criticism.
: Baseball's Last True Believer (with Tommy Lasorda) (2009), and Paradise Found: A High School Football Team’s Rise from the Ashes (2021), about how a high school football team inspired the people of Paradise, California after the town was virtually destroyed in a wildfire.