Get involved, get better....

Coming into this year, I told myself that I want to be the best Sports Director that Westminster has ever seen. It’s easy to tell yourself things, proving them is another story. So I got an early jump last year at the conclusion of the school year on how things were going to change, how Titantown Sports would be able to compete with any collegiate broadcast, and perhaps even some small market sportscasts as well. So, what was I going to do to have my ‘casts be separated from those of the past? For starters, I was going to follow where Sebastian left off, I was going to make sure when people thought of covering Westminster Sports, they saw my face. Sebas taught me that it is more important to be involved than it is to be just an anchor. Getting involved meant to me, covering all the events possible that my schedule allows. So far, I feel I’ve done a pretty good job when it comes to filling up my schedule with Broadcasting activities.

2-2 minute sports drills a week

2-Color commentated games a week

Titantown Sports (full time job)

2 Radio shifts

Greyhound Roundup

Pregame for College radio

By no means am I complaining, because I love every second I’m broadcasting, I really am living the dream when comes to doing my “job.” So when I thought about what I wanted to do for a senior project, I jumped at the chance to follow one of the best teams in Pennsylvania, led by one of the greatest coaches in the history of Pennsylvania High School Football, Terry Verelli. Covering the Greyhounds and doing the Greyhound Roundup takes more than just a knowledge of sports, and football, it takes a passion, and week in and week out I try to provide my viewers with the passion that they show their teams. The “Roundup” will help me in my pursuit of my goals because I’ll be able to show off my raw talent of editing, producing, and being talent all at the same time. I feel my senior project will be completely different from anybody else’s in the sense that it’s really not about me, but it does showcase me. Not many people have had the opportunities that I’m receiving right now, so I’m taking full advantage of this privilege. If you want to see what I’m talking about, you can check out the Greyhound Roundup at www.titanradio.blogspot.com, or www.titanradio.net. Something I’ve been thinking about for a wrap up of my senior project is something I’ve kept pretty low key until now. I’m going to make a highlight tape just full of Wilmington Greyhounds, and specifically for the football team, namely the seniors. After that’s complete, I’m going to make a feature/highlight reel for the 2006 football season narrated by myself, with commentary from your favorite Greyhounds, and of course Coach V. So the timeline for the Hounds Reel is one week after the season is over. The feature reel is going to be a pet project that will probably take me a good chunk of the whole year to complete, and something I will unravel at my presentation (So you may want to make the trip, it’ll be worth it.)

Our second assignment was to come up with a person we’d like to interview for an alumni research project. Right off the bat I called dibs on Denny Wolfe, I know Denny through Jason Mackey, and Denny and I have kept contact through e-mail pretty steadily. Denny is a producer at ESPN in Bristol, and I would love to do what he’s doing, but at the same time, I’m really striving to be an on air talent, preferably an anchor. I was told many things by all types of people about being talent on ESPN, but a couple things that keep recurring in people’s advice is that I need 3 things to get on ESPN: Good looks, good wit, and a good agent. I’ll have to ask Denny how he feels about that situation, and if its true. If it is, I guess I better start looking for an agent (Kirstan.) I believe that talking to Denny has given me insight as to how what I do now really effects how things will happen in my future. If I take things for granted now, and just go through the motions, it becomes habit, and bad habits are extremely hard to break. So if I work hard now, and get used to it, the climb from the bottom to the top of the ranks at the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network won’t take so long.

Until next time, I'm DJ Yokley...