He still covers all Reds home games, writing a blog for the Dayton Daily News and for his own web-site, halmccoy.com.
He gained national attention in 2003 when he continued to cover the Reds despite strokes in both his eyes that left him legally blind.
He was at the forefront of the Pete Rose investigation, breaking many stories during the 1989 season while also covering the Reds on a daily basis.
He has won 52 Ohio and national writing awards and was the first non-Cincinnati newsperson elected to the Cincinnati Journalists Hall of Fame.
He is the third writer from the Dayton Daily News to win the Spink Award, joining Si Burick (1982) and Ritter Collett (1991).
He stated that the Dayton Daily News "will no longer cover the Cincinnati Reds the same way it has in the past" because "they just can't afford the more than a quarter of a million dollars a year" it costs to send him coast-to-coast.
[1] In response to a common misconception that the Daily News was forcing him to retire, McCoy wrote on August 7, 2009: ...
[2]Despite no longer providing a print column for the Daily News, McCoy maintains a regular online blog published through this publication's website titled "The Real McCoy" and continues to provide contributions to the Dayton Daily News from time-to-time.
Because his sight has left him unable to drive, he advertised on his blog for a chauffeur; he received over 400 applications but only interviewed Ray Snedegar, a recently widowed Dayton-area military veteran and part-time hearse driver of about the same age as McCoy.