By Cliff McCollum
City Reporter
Twelve to 13 football games, 30 to 34 basketball games, 50 baseball games. 24 coaches’ shows, and a call-in sports radio show.
It may sound like the ultimate sports fan’s dream, but it’s a year in the life of Barry McKnight, broadcasting director and ‘voice’ of the Troy Trojans.
Football is heavy on McKnight’s agenda for now, as the Trojan’s season kicks off on Sept. 3 against Clemson, but he has to wait until spring for his favorite sport – baseball.
“If you’re in the business, you have to do football, especially in the South,” McKnight said, “but I’ve always loved baseball. There’s more time to build on a theme, to tell a story. Baseball makes it easier for me to craft a narrative.”
McKnight said while many sportscasters are leaning on statistics to add to their broadcast, he tries to find ways to better enliven his coverage.
“People have come to rely so much on stats that it can become a crutch,” McKnight said. “I try to stay away from that as much as I can because people want to listen to a story, not numbers and figures.”
McKnight began his broadcast career in 1986, starting in Fort Walton, Fla.
“I’d never worked in radio before, had never taken a broadcasting class in my life,” McKnight said
McKnight then came to Auburn, working twice for WAUD in Auburn.
“I did just about everything you could do at those jobs. I covered city council, did obituaries,” McKnight said. “I may be the only guy to have done play-by-play for Opelika High, Auburn High and Lee Scott.”
McKnight said he’s been privileged to see a number of Opelika athletes over the years, both here and at Troy.
“Maurice Stringer about 20 years ago was a great player, great runningback at Opelika. He was injured at Troy, but a great athlete.”
McKnight also mentioned recent OHS grad Jonathan Chandler, who played wide receiver and quarterback for the Trojans, as a standout, saying he was a versatile player.
McKnight lives in Auburn, but travels to Troy enough to average almost 27,000 miles a year.
“It’s not that I dislike travel, but when you live 90 miles away, it’s almost like every game is an away game,” McKnight said.
The overlap between sports seasons can be difficult for McKnight, too. Those parts of the year where football and basketball, and subsequently, basketball and baseball, have conflicting schedules, McKnight’s wife Deborah said she can tell it’s hard for her husband.
“Sometimes, he doesn’t sleep at all. No matter whether he comes in at 3 or 4 in the morning, there’s still the show the next day,” Deborah said. “I’m still not sure how he does it, other than he’s doing something he loves.”
McKnight said he enjoys sportscasting, but his favorite moments of the job are mentoring and working with students.
“I always tell them that instead of learning the tricks of the trade, learn the trade,” McKnight said. “It’s good that you love sports, but you have to love the language. Instead of taking time to do fantasy leagues and memorize stats, they need to read the language, learn how to talk the talk.”
To McKnight, creativity is the most important facet of his job, as he decides what to highlight and how to highlight it, molding the story using nothing but his vocabulary and a few sports facts and figures at his disposal.
“You have to care about the flow of a broadcast, the feel of the narrative,” McKnight said. “You have to give people something they’d want to listen to, and you have to sometimes do it quickly, as events happen.”
McKnight’s sports radio show, with co-host John Longshore, airs on WMSP AM 740 in Montgomery from 7 a.m. until 10 a.m. Listeners can also tune in at sportsradio740.com
Barry is the hardest working man in sports.
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