The world of sports communication is huge and very complicated with many facets and many locations and even levels within the industry to navigate. It originated as just print for newspapers and magazines with radio following later. It then went to TV with local broadcasts covering sports or specific teams with sideline reporters as well.
Then ESPN came around as an all day sports only station and then a 24/7 sports news station afterwards. Then the web came and you had sports blogs and newspapers, magazines and other publications that created their own sites for more exposure to their TV, radio station, or newspaper/magazine. This created another outlet for people in the field to show their work along with podcasts/online radio shows as well.
Growing up I had idols I looked up to and as I got older I knew what I was going to do for a career path as I had more idols to appreciate than ever before. Growing up in Chicago during the 90s-early 2000’s you would have Hawk Harrelson as the play by play guy calling games for the White Sox, Sam Smith covering the Bulls beat during their 6 peat, Tom Dore, and the late Johnny Red Kerr calling games with the late Norm Van Lier in the studio where he would be joined by Stacy King later on. You also had Rick Morrissey and Mark Gonzalez covering the White Sox on their newspaper beats, and later on hearing Pat Foley calling every Blackhawks games, these were the local people covering the Chicago sports scene for me.
Not being only local minded I also have other idols from the world of sports like Jim Rome, Bill Simmons, Mike Wilbon, Keith Olbermann, Colin Cowherd, the late Stuart Scott, Marv Albert, Tim Kurkjian, Bob Ryan, Tony Reali, Michael Smith, and Dan Lebatard.
One of the most important things my broadcast professor Jordan Bernfield taught me about play-by-play was that you need to develop your own unique style. That you shouldn’t copy what others do but incorporate your own style in a way where you sprinkle it in a small way. The most important thing he taught me was that if you have a monotone voice like him you need to be technically sound and just work really hard at your craft since you don’t have the voice of Marv Albert, Kevin Harlan, Mike Breen, Al Michaels, or Pat Foley.
Being a Chicago boy when I call baseball games I use phrases from Hawk Harrelson that seep into my mind and sometimes I will say things like “stretch”, “You can put it on the board yes”, “good guys coming up to bat or the bad guys leading.”It is ok to have those but you want to be your own voice but many guys before me had their idols that they learned from but still pay homage to in how they call games.
When it comes to the TV personalities that I admired and looked up to (and still do) they all have their own flair like how Wilbon or Simmons are with their passion for their home teams as I do. The broadcasters for the White Sox, Bulls, Blackhawks and Giants will always play a huge part in a broadcasting career because these famous people show of their homer bias. I want to be iconic like Simmons is with his own site Grantland, his movies 30 for 30, or his old blog when ESPN.com just started called the BS report, be on the NBA telecast before and after games, fill in on iconic shows, being well respected but controversial and have his share of fans and enemies.
He and Kurkjian are sports writers who weren’t tall enough to be athletes like me professionally and are still close to the game they love. I’m not the accomplished writer he and others are but I hope to have my own radio and TV sports show on ESPN.
Since I’ve always dreamed big as a kid not just in the world of broadcasting, I had dreams of being a professional athlete or a rock star like most kids. I was mesmerized when I started watching TV with ESPN but really ESPN when it first launched in the 90s. It had a unique style that differed from its parent station, it had different shows and a different kind of a highlight show where the personalities were just stiff people reading the scores, but it had something that got my attention and many other kids back then.
That was the moment I saw the late great Stuart Scott do the “Sports Smash” and their version of Sportscenter. I was hooked as he did it like no one ever had done before. We all know his famous lines like “Booyah” or “As Cool as the Other Side of the Pillow”, it didn’t matter if you were a fan of hip hop or a part of the African American community it showed you can do sports your own way, a different way. Dan Patrick and Keith Olbermann added their sarcastic tone to the highlights back then.
That made ESPN/ESPN2 my favorite stations not just because I would watch baseball, basketball or football, but because the personalities of the network got me hooked in watching it every day. That is where I spent hours of trying to study the craft even before I knew that it was 100% what I wanted to do with my life. I tried to watch Monday night football, Sunday/Monday/Wednesday night baseball, and Wednesday night/Sunday basketball to get more exposure to all the play by play guys and side line reporters.
I would watch Jim Rome’s afternoon show and that is where I would learn about how to make a statement and have the facts to back it up. My friends would say I’m the next Jim Rome since I talk about sports very fast or talk fast like him in general. ‘Pardon the Interruption’; and ‘Around the Horn’ are two of ESPN’s longest running shows on their network that I’ve been watching ever since.
I immediately took to ‘Pardon the Interruption’ hosts Mike Wilbon as a fellow Chicagoan and the New Yorker Tony Kornheiser as they would just argue about sports with a clock and play games doing it. While the ‘Around the Horn’ had a host in Tony Reali who would just judge the point total for the four panelists consisting of sports writers from all around the country. I would like to do the hosting or be a featured panelist on the show when I work in the field.
I am the signifier but the signified is ESPN. My goals are for working for ESPN in many facets. That has been my goal since high school that’s when most people realize their big dream of being an athlete or entertainer is not going to happen for most, and that I wanted to go into broadcasting really just for sports.
That I would remind people during high school after I read each morning announcements to watch the Bulls or Blackhawks and I wanted to do feature pieces on the sports teams. I wasn’t on the schools paper since I wasn’t a very good writer in high school and I was very busy with sports after school. After I graduated, the school added this new thing called High School Cube where they call high school games, which I wish they had when I was there.
I read the sports section of papers, weekly sports magazines, and watch all the sports talks shows mentioned above. Besides from watching as many sporting events locally I’m also plugged in when it comes to sports coverage online with all the applications and websites/social media. I’ve taken the sports marketing/PR/business classes as well in case I can’t find a job in sports broadcasting but still can do something with sports right away. In my current class “Advanced Sports Reporting” the theme of the semester is to write sports stories for a blog each week.
We are given freedom most of the time on what to write about with the list of topics that the professor presented to us in the beginning of the semester. In my classes for radio in the ones pertaining to writing , it was all about your creativity on whatever the kind of writing it was, and in my music radio broadcasting class we can play whatever song we want with whatever factoid and news story or topic we wanted to discuss when were “on air”. With my being on the air last spring I was put into role where there was a specific way in which to read, but I gave it my own personality in how to read the copy. It was my decision on what the order was for the all local sports team’s stories. I also had my own idea for the final story which would be an interesting/nice/cute/weird story that people wouldn’t know about but might find interesting, funny or touching.
Due to a max out of how many classes I could take both fall and spring semester and a record number of people singing up for the station I have to wait till summer and this fall to finally get my own sports show or music show. That’s where my real work will take place and my style will come out based on what I’ve learned along with using some of the style of my idols blended into my own thing. I want to take elements of all of my favorite play by play guys if I call games or take them from all the radio talk show hosts or TV show hosts on ESPN that I like.
Since I was planning on being on the station this semester I had all these ideas ready to use. For my music show we would play music no matter the genre or time period. It would have an element I have always liked from the 97.1 FM the Drive, called ‘deep tracks’. Where you don’t play the most popular or most played song but you play a hidden gem. I would elaborate on that as well with a theme every show like love songs or songs about weather, or songs about road tripping, or songs good for a wedding, etc. I’m not about copying but improving on a good idea because as kid I was tired of hearing the same songs over and over on the radio that’s why people moved away from radio to MP3 players.
When it would come to my own sports show I would take what I learned from Rome, Olbermann, and from late night talk shows, and have a monologue. It would be about one big topic that is bugging me that day or a few small topics like Rome did. But most of the time you will have to co-host so I might have to forget about that and just talk about sports teams in the city I’m living in or working for or national topics.
I would hope to make the rundown on what goes first as well as always talking about the small topics that I always seem to find really cool. I would during the show (if I have a co-host) play little games like I’ve enjoyed from the various sports show I watch, like giving a player’s name and have to guess where he plays for now.
My process is learning from what the professors have taught me, what I have learned on my own from all the reading I have done and all the viewing of sporting events, or from my idols and their talk shows. I hope this will translate to any job in the world of sports broadcasting as I am not going to be picky, and I’m always going to work hard like I have even when I wasn’t being paid to love sports.