Leonard J. Koppett (born Leonid Kopeliovitch; September 15, 1923 – June 22, 2003) was a Soviet-born American sportswriter and author who wrote 17 books on sports, mainly baseball.

Born in Moscow as Leonid Kopeliovitch,[1] Koppett moved with his family from the Soviet Union to the United States when he was five years old.

The former was inspired by Koppett's conversations with contemporary athletes who had little or no knowledge about the history of their game and the great players of decades past, while the latter memorably began with a one-word paragraph — "Fear."

— and then explored how the batter's instinctive fear of the thrown pitch is the key point around which most other aspects of baseball play are derived.

[citation needed] Two weeks prior to his death, Koppett completed his final book, The Rise and Fall of the Press Box, which is part autobiography and part memoir about changes in sports media coverage since World War II when he became a sportswriter.