A version of this story appears in the June 4, 2018, edition of Sports Illustrated. To subscribe, click here.
In the spring of 1980, less than a year out of college, Peter King took a job as a cub sports reporter for the Cincinnati Enquirer. Somewhere around that time, King sat down for a headshot, one that, decades later, would bounce around the Internet after King became the face of Sports Illustrated.
In the photo, he’s wearing a plaid shirt, bulky glasses and a massive afro. It’s an awkward picture, to be sure.