Skip to main content

Where Are They Now?: Jonathan Coachman

Not many people get to live out their childhood dreams. Jonathan Coachman has gotten to do just that and much more.
“There’s only one thing I’ve ever wanted to do for a living,” Coachman told WWE.com in a recent interview. “And that is being a sports broadcaster.”
After working for several local news stations throughout Kansas, The Coach joined WWE in 2000 as a backstage interviewer, but soon became an announcer on Raw, SmackDown and Heat, as well as Mr. McMahon’s on-air assistant. He even mixed it up in the ring a few times. Those unique experiences have prepared The Coach for his current gig at ESPN, where he calls the highlights on SportsCenter, hosts his own radio shows and takes part in the network’s NFL coverage.
Classic Coach photos | Current photos | Video highlights
Coachman grew up playing as many sports as possible and went on to play basketball at McPherson College in Kansas. During his time in college, Coach got his first taste of the broadcast booth.
“We had a tiny radio station in town,” he explained. “The owners let me do play-by-play for a couple different colleges. I even parlayed those shows into college credit. My college didn’t really have a broadcasting program, so I told them it would be good for credit. They bought it.”
Shortly after graduating, Coachman, in his own words, “stumbled” into his first professional broadcasting job at KAKE in Wichita, Kan.

 
“[My audition] was horrible, I was awful, not very good at all,” Coach said. “But I kept calling them and calling them and calling them. The news director finally called me that Friday. He said he just got fired, but they were letting him stay until the end of the day. He said, ‘I don’t think you’re ready to work at this level, but I want to hire you as the weekend sports anchor if you can get here by 5 o’clock today. I jumped in my car and prayed that it would get there.”
Follow The Coach on Twitter
Coach’s car made it to Wichita and he was on the air soon after. Though he had on-air experience from his college days, the young broadcaster didn’t realize how tough the professional ranks were.
“I didn’t realize how good I needed to be to get to the level where I am now,” he said. “Every single day was a challenge just to get on the air. We’d do three minutes at 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. and I’d barely get the segment written and edited. I remember thinking, “Man, how do people do this five days a week?”
He stuck with it and greatly improved, enough to get a call to work at KMBC in Kansas City, Mo. One of his first stories, oddly enough, was about WWE coming to town.  Coach was sent to Florida to produce a series of stories on WWE, which was in the middle of the Attitude Era boom. It was an unbelievable experience for a 22-year old Coachman.
“My eyes were as big as saucers,” he recalled. “I got to see The Rock from a distance and interviewed five or six different guys. I’ll never forget sitting down with Al Snow and thinking he was the biggest star on the planet.”

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Big Show def. Jack Swagger

Jack Swagger had his hands full against the supersize goliath Big Show, who was still seething after Swagger interfered in his match against Cesaro on last Friday’s SmackDown. As the two former World Champions waged war, Swagger pushed The World’s Largest Athlete to the brink of his pain threshold with a punishing Patriot Lock. But Big Show powered through the pain, and dropped Swagger with a brutal KO Punch to claim victory. Watch replay on WWE Network  |  Highlights | Photos
Post a Comment
Read more

Seth Rollins’ talk of Money brought Mayhem

COLUMBUS, Ohio – While Seth Rollins dropped a potential bombshell, it was The New Face of Fear that overcame three champions and sent a definitive message that they are ready for WWE Money in the Bank. Kicking off WWE Main Event, Seth Rollins congratulated the “volcano” that is Roman Reigns, for winning the WWE World Heavyweight Championship Match Qualifying Battle Royal on Raw. However, he also pointed out that Reigns crossed The Authority and there would be definite repercussions this Monday on Raw. In reference to his “former business associates” – Reigns and Dean Ambrose – Rollins commented that he was the only one that could control them. Rollins then claimed that, in addition to the WWE World Heavyweight Championship Ladder Match at the June 29 pay-per-view, there would also be a Money in the Bank Contract Ladder Match – and that he was the first entrant in that contest. Whether that match is, in fact, a reality remains to be seen. But when Ambrose eme...
Post a Comment
Read more

Cesaro def. Big Show by Disqualification

ntroduced by his new advocate, Paul Heyman, Cesaro went head-to-head with Big Show – the very same giant he  threw over the top rope to win WrestleMania’s Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal on Sunday. Watch as Cesaro became a Heyman Guy  | Exclusive: Michael Cole interviewed Heyman In the height of a contest between The World’s Largest Athlete and “The King of Swing” – before Cesaro could attempt a Cesaro Swing on his gigantic foe – Jack Swagger suddenly attacked his former tag team partner and brought an end to the match by disqualification. Angry over the disruption, Big Show hurled the disruptive Real American out of the ring. Cesaro used this to regain a post-match advantage, hitting the Neutralizer on the giant in the center of the ring!
Post a Comment
Read more