Just do It: How To Start Student Play By Play
I was recently asked “how do you get students to do play by play or color for a sports broadcast?” It’s simple. Just do it. That’s it. It’s scary. It’s uncomfortable but that’s it. Just do it.
When your program is to the point that you GET to add on-air talent to your broadcast in order to improve, you my friend have done a great job. Congratulations! You have actually done the hardest part. Now it’s time to do the scariest part - give a 14-18 year old child a microphone and access to the entire world.
I have been blessed to work with some of the best broadcasters in history and sitting at the feet (or the back of the pressbox) while Skip Caray and Pete Van Wieren called Atlanta Braves games helped me really understand what a good broadcaster needs and more importantly what they do. I’ve been there to pick Bob Rathbun’s brain as he did a REMI broadcast for an Atlanta Hawks playoff game. I’ve been a part of thousands of broadcasts with local talent and students that have helped me to really cull ideas to help you get your program started.
The first thing you have to do is Make Them Have Fun. Every great broadcaster that I have worked with is having fun while they call the game. They are smiling because honestly, you can hear smiles on the air. You do need to address that what your student is doing can be stressful but you have to make sure they know that they are supposed to have fun doing this. Address that they are nervous to start. Make sure they know that they are supposed to be nervous. They are supposed to make mistakes. They are going to make mistakes. Ultimately, they are there to learn and shouldn’t kill themselves trying to measure up to the professionals that have spent years or decades perfecting their skills.
A major issue that I see with students starting in the booth is that they only know sports in 15-60 second clips or via highlight package on the four-letter network from Connecticut. In order for your student to become successful as on-air talent, you have to Make Them Consume Sports. They need to watch sports and watch the entire game. They need to actually watch the game and listen to the person on the air as they describe the action. Watching sports is not the same as consuming it. It’s simple. The more they watch, the more they will know. The more they know; the better they will be able to describe what they see.
Speaking of describing what they see, you have to encourage your student to Keep It Simple. See it: Say it. It really breaks my heart when I talk with a developing talent and they mention looking for their “phrase.” Catch phrases aren’t sought, they are organic. It’s something you just do. Your students just need to say what they see. This goes back to the point above about consuming sports. They need to know the sport and what it looks like in different phases of the game. Again, just like everything else, this will come with time and experience. At this point, JUST DO IT!
Emote Efficiently. I have worked with hundreds of students and adults working to build their tape in live sports production and the most annoying thing is the over the top emoters. Those who act like every play is the most important or most spectacular play of the season…. Or history. A 3 yard run from the 38 to the 41 should not sound the same as a game winning field goal and often it does. Tell your students to get excited when it’s important… until then, they are to just tell the story.
High school sports can be the most frustrating thing in the world when it comes to getting info. Football is hands down the worst! I have literally done games where I waited to hear the PA announcer say the name before I could say the name of the player. It’s extremely important for your announcers to say Names Not Numbers. If you want to sound like a fool, call a game and say “now 15 passes to 5 and 3 takes a shot…” Fight to get names and numbers for your players. Basketball is by far the easiest. Go to the scorers table during warm ups and ask for a picture of the book. Then you have all of the players' names and their numbers. Baseball is the same - I would typically ask for a copy of the starting line up from each team or get access to their GameChanger account.
Speaking of GameChanger. Stick and Ball sports require stats. If you have access to the team’s GameChanger, it’s easy, you just look at the stats their person is generating. If you don’t, you have to keep a scorebook yourself. It’s not hard; there are tutorials all over YouTube to show you how. The reason this is important is that there is a lot of downtime between action in the game and you have to have something to fill the time. That typically comes in the form of stats. Tell the batter’s story for the day or the season. Find something to say about a pitcher or a fielder. You have to find something… It will make your broadcast go from just a report of what’s happening to an engaging show.
Just Do It. Unless you are lucky, your broadcasters are not going to be good when they start. That’s ok. That’s what you are here for. Keep the faith. If your broadcast team sucks, stick with them. They are going to grow. They are learning. You are learning. If you stick it out, review their broadcasts with them and support them, it will pay off in the long term.
Meet the Author, Tom White
Tom White is the Education and House of Worship Specialist at Amitrace. Tom's role is to help educators build better programs through better training, planning, and equipment.
Before joining Amitrace, Tom was the Broadcast Engineer at Grady College of Journalism and Communication at the University of Georgia. Prior to that role, Tom taught at Morgan County High School and Rockdale Career Academy where he and his student produced thousands of live streams for sports, news, and community events.
Tom’s program at the Rockdale Career Academy received the NFHS Network Program Of The Year in 2016 and his program at Morgan County High School received the New Program of the Year title in 2018. Tom has been a long time contributor to many publications and is the host of Teaching to The Test Pattern Podcast.
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