Radford sophomore is a flourishing sportswriter at VT On Sports Illustrated

More than almost anything, Josh Poslusny wants to be a sportswriter.

Someday, he hopes to fly around the country, from one ballpark to another throughout the spring and summer months, working as a beat writer covering Major League Baseball’s Kansas City Royals, chronicling the team’s every move on and off the diamond. The Royals are his favorite team, and baseball is his favorite sporting pastime.

“Baseball is a calm sport and covering it is definitely what I'm good at; it's my niche,” said the Radford University communication major from Ocean Springs, Mississippi.

Though only a sophomore at Radford, Poslusny – everyone calls him Poz, or Little Poz if they know his dad – has already gained substantial experience covering collegiate baseball, football, basketball and wrestling for a variety of media outlets.

One of those, however, has a familiar ring to it: Sports Illustrated.

Poslusny spends hours writing about Virginia Tech athletics for VT On SI, a locally focused online subsidiary of the longtime gold standard in sports journalism.

In the fall of 2025, a friend who is a lead editor for On SI offered Poslusny a writing position with the website. Poz has been a prolific writer for other media outlets since arriving in Radford, so his editor friend knew Poslusny could more than keep up with the rigorous pace of writing game recaps, columns and the ever-changing college student-athlete transfer portal.

In November, the prolific Poslusny carved enough time from his demanding academic schedule to write about 35 articles from his residence hall, a press box or wherever he “could just sit down and get work done,” he explained. In December, Poslusny was even more productive, submitting about 40 articles. And because the transfer portal is in a constant state of motion, Poslusny consistently faced uber-tight deadlines.

“It’s a lot of work,” he said, “but I’m doing what I love.”

Poslusny is sharpening his journalism skills not only through real-world, hands-on experience, but also through the knowledge he is gaining from Radford faculty, particularly those in the university’s School of Communication. Among those he credits is Assistant Professor of Media Studies Hyeri Jung, who teaches Communications 104 – Basic News Writing, a course Poslusny said had “a big impact” on him.

“Poz is a skilled sports news writer,” Jung said. “Not many first-year students are as good as Poz in covering a specific news topic. I look forward to seeing him flourish as a sports news reporter.”

Soon after taking another course that Poslusny said helped him tremendously with his writing and interviewing skills, he secured an additional writing job as a college baseball beat writer.

Those journalism and communications courses are doing more for Poslusny than preparing him for a future gig as a sportswriter. They are helping him find his place as a Highlander.

“I’ve built a lot of great relationships here at Radford and throughout Southwest Virginia,” he said. "I feel like Radford has helped me find my place, especially coming here from Mississippi, and it has helped me make a footprint on the community with my sports writing and those relationships I’ve built.”