In April 2011 the White House Correspondents' Association honored Balz with the prestigious Merriman Smith Award for excellence in presidential coverage under deadline pressure.

A 1964 graduate of Freeport High School he received bachelor's and master's degrees in communications from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and served in the United States Army from 1968 to 1971.

[1] Balz is co-author, with Ronald Brownstein of the Los Angeles Times, of the 1996 book Storming the Gates: Protest Politics and the Republican Revival.

[4][5][6] Based on two years of reporting, it includes exclusive interviews with then-candidates Barack Obama and John McCain and many of their top advisers during the campaign and election.

[1] After college graduation, prior to entering military service, Balz worked for the Freeport Journal Standard covering the 1968 Democratic National Convention and contemporaneous riots.