What Happened When Schiavone Rss Feed
It's just a week out from TNT's debut of its brand new wrestling league, All Elite Wrestling (AEW), and Tony Schiavone swears he has no idea what his role will be on the broadcast.
It seems almost certain the Craigsville native will be part of the television broadcast team. Why would a fledgling league sign one of professional wrestling's most recognized voices only to put him behind the camera?
The official statement from AEW released in August said that Schiavone will join the broadcast team and serve as senior producer.
Yet, last week Schiavone, talking by phone from his home in Marietta, Georgia, wasn't ready to commit to his exact role on the first TNT broadcast Wednesday, Oct. 2.
"I don't know what I'm going to do," he said. "I just know I'm collecting a paycheck."
Schiavone has been earning a paycheck from wrestling since the mid-1980s, but before that he was the voice of many other sports.
Broadcasting beginnings
The Buffalo Gap graduate grew up listening to football and basketball games on Staunton's WTON. He knew that sports broadcasting what he wanted to do for a living.
When he graduated from James Madison University in 1980, Schiavone contacted the Staunton radio station asking for a job. He didn't get paid, but Schiavone helped with setting up equipment and keeping stats during games.
About halfway through the basketball season, during a game at Stuarts Draft, the announcer hadn't shown up by the time the game was starting. Schiavone did the only thing he knew to do — he called the play-by-play of the game. The other announcer showed up at halftime. He had gone to the wrong school.
When Schiavone brought the equipment to the station Monday morning, the owner, Al Charles, called him into his office.
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"Al said, 'I listened to it. You sounded terrible, but you did the right thing. We needed to get on the air,'" Schiavone said. "And that kind of started my broadcasting career."
Schiavone also got another break.
In 1980, Fort Defiance, led by Dell Curry, was playing in the basketball regional championship at Emory & Henry College. It had snowed a lot, but Schiavone managed to get to the game. So did the announcer from competing station WANV in Waynesboro. But when it came time to go on the air, only WTON's phone line worked. WANV couldn't get on the air to broadcast the game. Anyone who wanted to listen to the game had to do so on WTON that night.
When Schiavone got back to the station, the entire staff gave him a standing ovation.
"That was kind of my launching pad," Schiavone said. "To be honest with you, to this day, I credit Al Charles with my entire broadcasting career."
Schiavone was hired to do football play-by-play for James Madison University. He still has the letter confirming his hiring. But in his heart, Schiavone was a baseball guy. He had played it at Buffalo Gap and always dreamed of announcing the sport.
At the same time the JMU job came available, Schiavone heard there was a minor league baseball broadcasting job in Greensboro, North Carolina. He applied for that job also and felt like he had a good chance. So he turned down the job at JMU and, when he was hired to do baseball, headed off to North Carolina.
He moved from Greensboro to Charlotte to work for another minor league team. That ended up being his connection to wrestling. The Crockett family owned the baseball team and was also a major wrestling promoter.
Schiavone was a wrestling fan since his teenage years, so he knew about Jim Crockett Promotions. Once he got the baseball job, he started lobbying to help with wrestling.
After almost two years with the baseball team, he got another break.
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The wrestling side of the business needed someone to interview Ric Flair for an upcoming match.
"I interviewed Flair, got to know him and they liked me," he said. "They slowly had me work into wrestling. By 1985 I gave up baseball full-time and went into wrestling."
He worked for Crockett for four years before getting an offer from Vince McMahon to work for WWF (which would eventually change its name to WWE). He moved to Connecticut.
"The job was wonderful, tremendous job," he said. "It was a great place to work, but the lifestyle wasn't very good."
His family didn't like Connecticut, so when he got an offer from Turner Broadcasting to work on their wrestling broadcast, and move to Georgia, he took it, leaving McMahon after just one year.
Turner is where Schiavone became a household name, at least among wrestling fans. He became the voice of WCW's Monday Nitro in addition to other WCW broadcasts. That's why his Twitter bio is, "I'm the old guy who was the voice of your childhood."
He worked there until 2001 when WCW went out of business. Since then he's worked for the Atlanta Braves, the University of Georgia and the Gwinnett Braves.
In 2009, Schiavone became the producer of the Georgia Bulldogs radio network. He's not on air, but basically runs the broadcasts for football and basketball.
He wasn't completely separated from wrestling during this time. He's been hosting a podcast since 2017 with Conrad Thompson called "What Happened When?" where they look back at the heyday of WCW.
He said the guy you hear on baseball broadcasts probably isn't the real Tony Schiavone. Neither is the one on wrestling broadcasts. The podcast, however, is probably as close to the real Schiavone as you'll get.
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"I would not suggest that you point anybody toward my podcast," Schiavone said. "I hate to say that, but my sister, who lives in Swoope, said she wanted to listen to my podcast. I said, "Oh, no you don't.' Our podcast is very much into guys' humor ... it's a very R-rated podcast."
Then, a couple of months ago, Schiavone was contacted by a friend at WWE who said McMahon wanted him back. Word got out, though, and AEW reached out to Schiavone as well. The new league was preparing to launch in the fall on TNT.
Someone from WWE's human resource department contacted Schiavone, but never offered him a job. Meanwhile, Tony Khan, the founder of AEW, did make him an offer.
"I was still waiting to hear from the WWE, not that I wanted to work for the WWE, but I needed to hear both sides," Schiavone said. "Because if the WWE offered me a million dollars I needed to take it."
Finally, WWE called him and said they didn't have any job available. He hung up the phone, contacted AEW and signed a three-year deal with the league.
"Honestly, as soon as I met Tony Khan, I knew I wanted to work for him," Schiavone said.
Working for AEW means Schiavone gets to remain in Georgia and keep his job with the Georgia Bulldogs network. He did resign as Gwinnett's baseball announcer after 11 years.
"That was a tough thing to do," he said. "Baseball has always been my first love."
Schiavone has been working to help produce videos and YouTube shows for AEW in the run-up to the launch of the league. But as far as what his role will be next week and beyond with AEW, he'll wait and see.
Jim Ross, who was the voice of WWE, is also part of AEW. Ross was instrumental in getting Schiavone to join the new league. Ross has told him he'll be part of the broadcast team, but Schiavone hasn't heard anything officially.
What he does know is that, next Wednesday, AEW will launch with matches in Washington, D.C., and Schiavone will be there.
"I'll be on the show, I'm sure, but exactly what I'll be doing, don't know," he said. "Will I be doing in-ring interviews? Will I be part of the broadcast team? Don't know. No one has really come out and said."
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Source: https://www.newsleader.com/story/sports/2019/09/24/buffalo-gap-graduate-tony-schiavone-part-tnts-broadcast-all-elite-wrestling/2380589001/