01 Sports Talk Radio
What is it Like Being a Sports Talk Radio Host
On this episode of the Unboxing Careers Podcast, we unbox the career of a sports talk radio host.
Guest: Jeremy White is the host of the Jeremy and Joe Show on WGR550 Sports Radio in Buffalo, NY. Jeremy is a graduate of Syracuse University and has worked for WGR for two decades.
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What We Discuss:
Introduction to the Career of a Radio Broadcaster
The Daily Routine and Content Generation in Sports Talk Radio
Work-Life Balance and the Constant Generation of Content
Advice for High School and College Students Interested in Radio Broadcasting
The Importance of Saying Yes and Being Yourself in the Industry
The Changing Landscape of the Radio Industry and the Value of Authenticity
Insights and Reflections on the Radio Broadcasting Industry
Exploring Alternative Career Paths and Interests
Key Sports Talk Radio Takeaways:
To pursue a career in radio broadcasting, it is important to get your foot in the door and gain as much experience as possible.
Being passionate, opinionated, knowledgeable, and entertaining are key qualities that can set individuals apart in the industry.
Podcasting and practicing speaking in front of a microphone can help develop skills and gain experience.
Networking with established professionals in the industry can be beneficial for career opportunities.
The radio industry has evolved and sports talk radio has become a prominent and thriving
Authenticity and being true to oneself are important in building a successful career in radio broadcasting.
Full Interview:
Greg
Welcome everyone to the unboxing careers podcast where we shed light on what different careers are really like so you can choose a career you'll really love today we are unboxing the career of a radio broadcaster more specifically sports talk radio.
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Greg
I’d like to welcome the show Jeremy white host of a Jeremy and Joe show at WGR 550 sports talk radio in Buffalo Jeremy welcome to the podcast. Thanks for being here, man.
Jeremy White
Thanks for having me.
Greg
Unlike some other jobs like psychotherapy, I think people have a pretty good idea about kind of what your on air role is, right? You go on radio and you talk about it, but there's a lot under the sea as going through. So why don't you give a sense of when you decide you want to do radio broadcasting, was it something you went to school for going in? Did you transition to it? Have them walk us through the decision making process for you.
Jeremy White
So yeah, I always wanted to go into sports. I knew that pretty clearly. I grew up near Syracuse and Syracuse is known as having the best broadcast journalism school in the country. A lot of the sports guys went to Syracuse. I can distinctly remember the day I got an issue with Sports Illustrated and it said, like it's one of those superlative episodes where issues where it's best school for this, best school for that, best school for sports, for beaches, for swimming.
there was that little line that said, best school to go to be a sportscaster, Syracuse University. And I'm like, all right, that's that, that's where I wanna go. So I went to Syracuse for broadcast journalism and I knew I wanted to go into sports. And after that, it was kinda, we'll see what happens. I mean, I'm the sports center generation. So, you know, at that time it felt like the dream was to be on sports center. And then over time I quickly kind of realized that is not what I would like to do. So I knew I would.
to be in sports, in broadcasting. That was pretty clear for me for a long time. I would go to like sophomore year, freshman year of high school, I knew that. And what I'm doing now is very much just, this is where it kind of went. And this is what I turned out being good enough at that people wanted to keep me doing it. So I didn't envision being a talk show host until very late in the game, but there we are. I knew it was in the neighborhood.
Greg
So your initial goal of school was to be either a play -by -play caller, color commentary, something like that.
Jeremy White
Yeah, it was to be either like a television anchor or play -by -play. And I did a bunch of play -by -play. I took classes. Dave Pash, who's a play -by -play guy, NBA, he's the guy that just worked with Bill Walton forever. He's been on everything. He's the voice of the Arizona Cardinals. He went to Syracuse, he taught a class, I took a class with him. A lot of the men and women I was in class with, they are doing play -by -play. So that was definitely the idea initially. And another -
kind of field that I have played around with a little bit and since found that it's a different kind of grind and probably not the one I would choose first.
Greg
Very good. We're gonna get into advice later for high school, college, entry level people that are just coming out of school or someone trying to get into it. But I wanna walk through your day to day a little bit. So tell the audience what shift you have. It's morning shift, I'll surprise everyone here, ruin that for you. But what time you're waking up, how many meetings you're in during the course of a week, how much time you're doing show prep. So you've got a slot that you're recording in.
There's all the work before and afterwards as well. So walk the audience through that a little bit about what your actual day to day or week to week looks like.
Jeremy White
Yeah, it's kind of changed over the years, but where we are now is, I'm on the year six to 10, which is, I mean, a four hour shift in 2024 is a long shift. I mean, people, they don't get much longer. I mean, some people do fives.
But it's a lot of fresh content live every day. It's a podcast world where people consume things as they can. We just kind of have to churn out four hours a day. So the prep style is I'm up 430 -ish and we get in and Joe and I pretty much communicate throughout the day. We'll have book guests the day before or throughout the day. It's like waking up from a dream and writing on a pad. Like, I gotta talk about that. I gotta talk about that.
I'm on my phone a lot, whether it's checking Twitter or Instagram or reading articles or making a note like, that's a good thing that just happened today. Even if I'm at a Home Depot, you know, something might happen in there that I think could spark a topic. So my wife has learned this and my friends know this, that there's never, you're never not working because when you're trying to generate content like that, sure, some of it comes to you in the form of the NHL draft is tonight, the Sabres made a trade. But if they didn't, it could be as simple as,
a buddy of mine asked me a question about Josh Allen and the offense and I found it interesting and I think, all right, I'm gonna spin that into this. So there really aren't set hours outside of being on air, because everything else I do is kind of being at work. You never really turn your brain off, whether you're on the golf course or at the doctor's office, you never know what could come of it. It's like Seinfeld, right? The show about nothing is really about everything.
That's kind of the prep for a job like mine is everything is available.
Greg
Does that get exhausting after a while?
Jeremy White
It can, it can get tough to separate, you know, the sports from the personal side of it. And I think I've found that that's one of the reasons I, I've gravitated to a couple of sports that I don't talk about a lot. Like I watch a lot of soccer and we don't talk about it that much, but I genuinely enjoy it because nobody cares if I'm wrong about something, you know, my job, I can have opinions and I...
I'd like to think that I researched them heavily and I wanna make sure they're right. I wanna make sure I'm paying attention and I'm not just some idiot spouting off at the mouth. But to be that for a sport that I don't have to talk about professionally is liberating. I can say something, it can be a bad take and who cares? I'm just some person yapping to my friends about it. So sometimes it is a little tough to escape. Like Bill's heartbreaking 13 seconds losses, I'm immediately.
contextualizing in my head how we're gonna talk about this for months. Whereas some people might just wanna turn off the television and go into a cocoon, you know. You might wanna turn off the Sabres in January because they're out of it and I'm gonna be watching the games and still living through that because it's just the way it goes.
Greg
Yeah, I forgot to tell you 13 seconds is off limits on this show. So it's not a good topic here. My kids still tease me about it, you know, so brutal. So you've mentioned a little bit about work -life balance, because I want to talk about that, where you're always thinking, you're kind of always on. You obviously, that changes young and single to married with kids, right? There's a lot of everything in between. What would you kind of rate work -life balance to be?
I'm assuming a lot better when you're younger because there's a lot more freedom and less committed time. But let's just go kind of your current lifestyle, right? So raising a family, is a good career to raise a family in? Is it not a good career? Or is it like everything else you might expect?
Jeremy White
Yep. Sure. It is very specifically because of the hours. I mean, I have the ability to, on the one hand, I don't see my kids wake up every morning. I'm gone before they wake up. And when they wake up, they'll ask my wife, they've been doing this lately, let's look at daddy on the phone and they pull up like the GPS and they can see my icon at work and they're at home.
So I never see them in the mornings. And that's a drawback. But a benefit is I can pick them up from their school if it gets out at noon or whatever, or I can go to the zoo with them in the afternoon, or I can golf if I need that for my own mental health. So work -life balance, the difficult thing is I still need time to kind of pull out to prep for the next morning show. And when I was single, like you said, like I was just going through how you're always thinking there's always something there.
Well, now with two toddlers running around, and soon to be a third one, now my brain is constantly on them, and I kind of don't get that free flow state, if I could even go that far. Like I used to sit in my living room or my game room, and I would play FIFA for three hours. And it wasn't about playing video games. It was about, that's almost like meditation for me, where the rest of the things go away, and I would think of things to talk about on the radio. I would come up with topics, just, you know, you get into,
People will say flow state and that sounds ridiculous, but when you're generating that much content, quieting the world and letting things come to you is a great way to do that. And now it kind of never gets quiet with kids. So I kind of have to schedule time like that where we've got childcare, the nanny, or the kids are in bed and I'm gonna block out an hour of time to sit down and go through what I missed maybe during the day. So I'm not as active on Twitter, I'm not as...
up to the minute as I used to be, never miss a single thing. Now I might get to Sabres News two hours after it happens, which for 15, 16, 17 years, that never would have happened. So it has its drawbacks, but I would say overall, it's definitely a net positive just based on the hours I'm in the office are rigid, but they're few. It's only four a day that are rigid. The rest, I can kind of make it work however I want.
Greg
Very good, and people are gonna be looking at this going, he's in his car right now. We were talking beforehand. You're like, eh, this is a quiet place for me, right? I can get away from it, so very good. Wonderful answer. Go ahead.
Jeremy White
Yes, I wrote, you know, as you say, driving places is a chance to get things done. I need to make a phone call. I need to, you know, there'll be a, all right, I got two hours to do things I have to do. That could be book a guest. That could be walking through a Home Depot, texting, you know, or sending a DM to Tom Palisero. Are you available tomorrow? You know, you do it while you're doing the rest of your day. And it's actually easier to kind of focus on these things if there's not a young child asking me to.
Watch this, watch this, which is wonderful, but of course, it pulls you out of the prep for your work.
Greg
Very good. I'm going to transition quickly to advice for younger people. So a little background about me. I actually went to college to study radio. Marketing was my second major in my fallback career, which is what I went into after a couple of mediocre years in radio. But I didn't, I always knew I wanted to do it in high school, but I never had a plan to do it. It was just always get a business type job, right? Do something like that. Once I went to school, I was like, I don't want to do this with my life.
So part of the genesis for this podcast here. High school kids, some may know like you, right, probably less of a sports center world today, but there's tons of content with any sport you could imagine out there between podcasts and things. So if someone thinks they want to go into radio broadcast, they just want to kick the tires on it. And they're currently in high school, what advice might you offer them to say, hey, these are really good skills to learn, or there's a particular class that you might not think it would be helpful for you, but if you take it, it actually will be helpful for you. Anything you can think of that might resonate with someone?
Jeremy White
Sure, it's a very difficult career to get into full time off the bat because I mean, it does not, it does, if we're being brutally honest, the industry does not tend to value you at the beginning. You know, you can make yourself indispensable and you're not getting paid a lot. You know, you might need help from family to live at home.
I mean, I moved to Buffalo and rent 20 years ago isn't what rent was today. And my mom helped me with my rent. I worked in radio and I worked other jobs and kind of just made it work to get as much experience as I could to get my foot in the door. And I think that's still the best way to do it is to get your foot in the door, get in there and show what sets you apart, but be prepared for it to be a struggle early and tough. It really is. If people make it, they make it.
it can be a very unforgiving industry, not even because you don't have it, but because you kind of have to get lucky enough to either get through a point where you can financially make it or someone is helping you or you have another job while you're trying to do just that. So that's the first part of it is going with expectations that it can be a real grind at the beginning. The other thing I would say is just always say yes to everything. Like when I started at WGR forever ago, producing Sunday Night Baseball and it'll happen one time where, hey, someone's so sick, can you cover Bill's practice? And if I didn't know how to do it, I would say like, yeah, of course I can, yep. I'll just go do it. Just get the job done. Show you can do something else. you think you could do this? Yep. And then ask how to do it. Yes, I can do it, I'll be there. And then try to find the answers on how to do it. So always saying yes, even if you're not fully prepared for it, that's big.
So those are the two biggest things I always would have said. And, you know, whenever given an opportunity to kind of wield any sort of, all I'm asking for is more of an opportunity. There was a time WGR where they wanted to move me onto a different shift and I didn't have really any power to say yes or no. But I asked at the time, I said, yeah, that sounds great. I think it'd be a good idea, by the way, if I did that, if I also started doing the Saturday talk show, Sports Talk Saturday.
Because they were gonna move me into the afternoons and I was gonna produce Brad and I was gonna produce Shove on the Bulldog, this is 20 years ago. And I said, the station, it's my opinion, the station would sound better, more cohesive if the guy that's producing these shows was on on the weekends. And they said, okay, yeah. So I kind of got my own Saturday show just by asking, just by saying, laying out a case, I think this makes sense for me and for you. And they gave it to me. And then that was my way to get experience getting on the weekend trying to build my craft trying to become better at what I was doing so It's gonna be hard. You got to be your own advocate. Don't always say yes. That's what those are my big three.
Greg
Do you think it's an advantageous for people in high school to start podcasting just to get experience talking in front of a mic or, you know, obviously if the topic is, I mean, I was in high school before too, right? So as long as the topic will not come back to bite you, it would be advantageous to go, you know, trial by fire to go through that.
Jeremy White
Yeah, yeah, I used to sit in, I think I did a Sabres game in the arena when I was hoping to do play -by -play. I would record myself doing play -by -play into a microphone sitting in the 300 level. Or I went to a high school basketball game with a friend and we just called play -by -play. You know, a podcast is actually a way to put something out there. You don't even have to publish it. But sure, just to practice it. I used to drive home back to Auburn early on and I would drive and I would try to...
host a 25 minute segment myself talking in the car. Now there was really not a way to podcast back then, but how am I ever gonna be a talk show host that can carry a 25 minute segment by myself with no calls if I don't start practicing now? So I would just be driving home, turn off the radio and try to talk for 10 minutes straight, 15 minutes straight, 20 minutes straight because those are the longest calls you'll get in morning radio or any radio really. So yeah, any reps, right?
quarterbacks and receivers do in the off season. They work out, right? If you want something, it doesn't have to be published, it doesn't have to be heard by anybody, but the reps still matter to you and they will make you better.
Greg
Very good. Great analogy, by the way. So, I love the football analogy there. So, let's transition slightly to college. We still have the same advice. So, you know, you can still podcast. College, you have a little more opportunity to kind of explore. A lot of stations will, or campuses will have campus radio stations, right? You can go volunteer. Usually when you start, right, you get the overnight shift on the weekend or something like that, like I did. But you get the experience, right? You get the reps, as you say. There's also classes, right?
Like I was taking media classes. I would also start taking public speaking classes when I was there as well, right? Cause I was always scared of talking in front of people. Are there classes you can think of that maybe you didn't think would be as relevant to you that you did, or were you mainly just focused on like, Hey, here's editing classes for like pro tools and stuff like that. how concentrated were you versus taking other, maybe elective classes that came back to help you.
Jeremy White
Yeah, I took, there was a sports broadcasting class, there was a regular broadcasting class in terms of electives, like creative writing, I did that early on. I felt like that would be, being creative obviously has a ton of value. So creative writing was a big thing I wanted to make sure I got a piece of. I think any sort of, and this might be crazy, I didn't do this, but looking back would have helped, any sort of like elective acting, improv, anything, anything that kind of can train your brain to be, you know, fire quickly and be ready for anything. Or somebody asks you a question and you're just able to roll with it right away for a career in radio or for a career in talk, because it's personality based, but all that personality really is, you can be kind of boring,
but if you sound interesting, then that's you're interesting all of a sudden. You know, I worked with Howard for 20 years who claims he's one of the most boring people in the world, but people love him because he was just really good at being authentic and able to just roll with things and be professional about it. So yeah, I actually think acting and improv and creativity, those kinds of tools can be really valuable because they might set you apart. You know, just going into...
the radio classes, everyone's gonna follow the same kind of cookie cutter thing. So I guess decide what makes you different and lean into that.
Greg
Very good. And I'm going to shift to brand new in the workforce. You mentioned earlier, it's a tough business to get into. I would attest to that. It's the challenge of you got 50 people with limited to no experience, right? College station, maybe they work at a local station for a year or so. Maybe they do a promotions, you know, just promotion on street promotions team for a company or something. You've got 50 people in front of you, sending you a resume or an air check tape or something like that.
What would, for you, what would differentiate those 50 people one from the other? Like is there something someone can do to kind of stand out?
Jeremy White
Okay, learning how to talk is a big part of it. I can remember, I had a job at GR and I walked into a studio where someone was talking and I heard the way they were talking into the microphone and it clicked for me like, that's how to talk into a microphone. Not everybody really knows that and you have to learn that. Some people come out of college.
with myself here, not really understanding that until you get to someone who's actively doing it. So I forgot the question, as I'm like on this tangent, but things that set you apart. Yeah, the main thing that can set you apart is being yourself, like lean into being yourself. What makes you you, if you're the funny guy, if you're the serious guy, if you're the analytical guy or gal, of course, like leaning into what makes you passionate because in my business, my Program Director, he's worked at stations across the US and Canada. He's got a four letter acronym, if I think this is an acronym. P -O -K -E, POKE. Passionate, opinionated, knowledgeable, entertaining. Those are the four things you wanna be. If you're on the radio talking about things, passionate. People wanna know you care about what you're talking about. Opinionated, tell me something you think so people can react. Knowledgeable, it's worthless unless you know what you're talking about. And then entertaining, you know?
So those are the four big pillars of what to do. So whatever you feel about yourself that makes you those things would be the things to lean into.
Greg
How do you feel about younger people networking with already established professionals? So calling a station, be like, hey, I'm looking for my first job and introducing themselves, you know, maybe to an on -air talent or something or board ops, you know, just to get in there. Worthwhile? Do you wait until you're after college, senior year in college, about to graduate? Is it not a good idea to contact people there? What would your advice to that be?
Jeremy White
say reach out whenever you can. I mean anything you can do, the worst that can happen is they can say no, which it has gotten tougher because it used to be you could intern and now that's not as easy because companies have to pay interns and some companies don't want to pay interns. So in an effort to get interns paid, some companies got interns fired and not brought back. But yeah, it definitely can't hurt to do that, to get some sort of exposure to people. I mean foot in the door is a great way to
talked about it's basically what I, it was my path was putting the door. So yeah, reach out, don't be afraid to reach out. If they say no, they say no. They say yes, then you've got an opportunity to get started.
Greg
Very good, and one final question on the career side. So looking back, starting out early, and you might have answered this one already, but what about your industry do you wish you knew sooner?
Jeremy White
Hmm, that's a good one. I don't know
I don't know. I'm trying to think about something that I know now that I didn't know then.
guess what, here's what I would say. My industry has changed so much. Like mine's actually going to be a story back when I was in college, I can remember a professor making fun of people that wanted to go into sports and how wrong look, look back 20 years, boy, how wrong that was because everything else news has died in sports is not that. So that's not, I'm not celebrating the death of news, but in terms of the industry,
I mean, this professor, I kind of joke sometimes with friends that I'm the NFL athlete that keeps the press clipping of the guy that said you were gonna be a bad draft pick in the locker. Like I never forgot that guy saying that. I thought, I'm paying to come to your school and you're telling me I'm wasting my time. Right? And ultimately he was super wrong. Cause sports has exploded. 24 hour sports stations around the country.
Since then, how many would have been added since he said those words? 500. So yeah, that's not something I, maybe I wish I knew that day, cause I felt really bad that day. But you know, here we are 20 years later and sports is king. I mean, sports keeps streaming services alive and networks alive. And I mean, it has kept television alive is sports. So the professional sports mega complex that employs so many people. Like I found my way into that machine. And maybe 20 years ago, knowing that was there would have been a little bit, I don't know, a little bit, it would have been nice to know. I'm gonna reassure you. I suppose. But I never forgot him saying that. And I just think like, man, could you have been more wrong?
Greg
A little motivating. Motivating, I would think, yeah.
Yeah, very cool. All right, one last question and nothing to do with radio broadcasting. So you can't do radio broadcasting anymore or we'll just go broadcasting in general. What do you think your next career of choice would be?
Jeremy White
Great question. What would I do if I wasn't doing this? Landscaping.
Greg
That is probably the most common answer.
Jeremy White
Is it? Yeah, it's not. I mean, I've done that before. I would probably try to do. I would probably try to launch myself somewhere into the world of golf. That's what I would probably do. I mean, I've got friends that work in the golf industry, whether it's balls or...courses or apparel or what I mean I would probably try to find myself somewhere on the Gulf.
Greg
Very good. Landscaping and golf course. It's got it all.
Jeremy White
I've worked on golf courses on the groundskeeping side. I've done that, enjoyed that. So I'd probably want to do that if I could.
Greg
Very good. Jeremy, thank you for your time today. I appreciate it.
Jeremy White
Thank you.
Greg
Jeremy White, everyone. Sports Talk host, show on WGR 550, Sports Talk Radio in Buffalo. Find out more about Jeremy, what he's up to. Please check out the description in the show notes. Hope you've enjoyed today's episode. If you'd like to unbox your career with us, we'd love to have you.
(Interview transcription provided by Riverside.fm. May not be 100% accurate.)
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