Georgia: Ex-coaches learn to describe plays for viewers, not players

Whether pacing sidelines, visiting recruits or glad-handing fans, Jim Donnan was pulled in many different directions as Georgia’s football coach from 1996 to 2000.

It hasn’t been that much different as an ESPN analyst since then.

“In the last few years, I’ve done ESPN.com, ESPN the Magazine, ESPN Radio, ESPN News, ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNU,” Donnan said. “I’ve done everything but ESPN Deportes.”

After years of facing the media, Donnan is among several former Southeastern Conference coaches who have joined the media. Bill Curry, Lou Holtz, Terry Bowden and Gerry DiNardo also have worked as ABC or ESPN analysts after coaching in the SEC, though DiNardo is now an analyst with the Big Ten Network.

Curry recently returned to coaching at Georgia State University, which will begin playing in 2010, but isn’t ruling out occasional broadcasting work in the interim. He will continue to be a frequent guest on ESPN Radio’s “Mike & Mike” morning show, and he has written a book, “Ten Men You Meet in the Huddle,” that is being published by ESPN Books.

The relationship between Curry and ESPN began in 1997, a year after he was dismissed at Kentucky, where he had coached for seven seasons.

“I might have thought about it a time or two,” Curry said of a career in the media, “but it was not a goal and it wasn’t something that was a conscious thing until after the Kentucky situation. I didn’t know how much I would like it, so I wasn’t sure how long I would do it, but I really enjoyed it and stayed in it.”

ESPN spokesman Mike Humes said his network doesn’t necessarily scout potential announcers from the coaching ranks but that those with personalities can be detected.

“You can tell who is going to be outspoken and who is going to be gregarious on camera or just in general has a good sense of humor,” Humes said. “You also look for someone who can break down a play and can translate something that might be difficult and translate it in an understandable way. Those are some of the things you look for.”

The most recognizable among former SEC coaches is Holtz, who is best known for his 11 seasons at Notre Dame but whose final stint was at South Carolina. He is well-known for amusing quips dating back to his first job at William & Mary, where he once responded to a loss by saying, “We had too many Marys and not enough Williams.”

Holtz has partnered with Rece Davis and Mark May announcing midweek games on ESPN and ESPN2 and as hosts of ESPN’s “College Football Scoreboard.” Last season, ESPN gave Holtz the added weekly duty of “Lou’s Pep Talk,” which gave him the chance to give on-the-fly advice to teams as they neared monumental games.

“We had some good feedback on that,” Humes said. “It added something different to the telecast, and I think people enjoyed hearing it. Coach Holtz is one of the greats as far as pep speeches and pep talks, and he’s a great speaker on the circuit. He’s somebody that people like to hear from.”

GETTING STARTED

Curry credits Robert Fraley, who was on the fatal airplane flight with two-time U.S. Open golf champion Payne Stewart in 1999, with helping him switch from coach to commentator. Fraley was Curry’s agent and suggested that he audition with ESPN.

The hiring was quick, but the job was tougher than Curry expected.

“It’s really tedious as far as the preparation,” he said, “and you’re mostly traveling by yourself. You have to go get the rental car. You have to drive to the stadium, and you get lost on the campus.”

Curry began analyzing games right away, but Donnan did most of his early television work in the studio. Donnan’s debut as an ESPN analyst occurred Aug. 25, 2002, when he provided color commentary on Virginia Tech’s 63-7 thumping of Arkansas State.

“We were going over the what-ifs before the game, because you never know what’s going to happen,” he said. “I told the producer, ‘What are we going to do if the score is 49-0 at halftime?’ That was the question I threw out there, and you know what the score was at halftime? It was 49-0.

“But we had a plan. We talked about the depth Virginia Tech had when their second- and third-teamers were out there, and we talked about how this was the Arkansas State coach’s first game and how everything had gone wrong in the first half and what he had to do. It was kind of funny.”

What Donnan hasn’t found as amusing is time spent in the makeup room.

“With that high definition, you’ve got to put on so much makeup,” he said. “What I’ll do sometimes is act like I’m late and that I don’t have time to put it on, but they always catch me.”

Curry broadcast Big Ten games in ’97 and felt he grew along with the Michigan team he covered four times on its way to a share of the national championship that season. He was sent to a professional trainer in Atlanta two or three times his first year to talk about pacing and overcoming the feeling that he had to talk after every play.

Donnan goes to ESPN’s headquarters in Bristol, Conn., about once a month to review tapes of his on-air performance, and he is critiqued in other ways as well.

“The thing I never thought I would do is write,” he said. “They have me write, and they take my stuff and edit it. No matter if you’re writing or on television or the radio, the difficult thing is just the prep, because there are a lot of things that go into looking at 119 teams, or however many there are, every week.”

THE REWARD

Most coaches let ESPN analysts visit their Thursday practices. Analysts then spend Friday with the coaches and in production meetings, learning everybody’s name, number and hometown, and something unique.

Then comes Saturday, when the red light comes on.

Curry has worked more than 200 games and says he has experienced stage fright at the start of every one.

“I can’t teach a Sunday school class without getting nervous,” he said, “but once I get going, I’m fine.”

Here is how Curry details the commentating challenge:

“All you have to do is watch the play, hit the talkback button and tell the producer, ‘The isolation should be on the fullback, No. 44.’ You’re really confident that they’ve got a camera on No. 44, so you say, ‘Show the marvelous job the fullback did of taking out the outside linebacker,’ and about that time the producer or director says, ‘We don’t have it.’

“Then you have to say, ‘As the fullback was doing that, the free safety was biting on the fake of the off-tackle play. The wide receiver was breaking to the post, which allowed the quarterback ....’ Then you hear we don’t have isolation of the receiver, either.

“You’re always having to find a way to be intelligible. You often have to change in mid-thought without appearing to hesitate or without saying anything stupid, and you have to do that roughly 175 times during a game. If you can be brilliant, witty and lucid for 3 hours and 45 minutes, it’s easy.”

Rewards for analysts mostly come in the relationships they build, and being a former coach helps.

When Donnan coached at Marshall, current Ohio State coach Jim Tressel was at Youngstown State. Each won at least one national title at his I-AA school, and the two built a friendship that benefited Donnan when Tressel visited with him on ESPN Radio the morning of last year’s Ohio State-Michigan game.

Curry said his top announcing experience “by far” was being on the telecast team with Mike Tirico and Todd Blackledge that covered Virginia Tech’s 2007 season opener against East Carolina. That was Tech’s first game since the tragic on-campus shootings a few months earlier.

“It was deeply moving with all the significance,” Curry said. “Watching the student body and the team that day was incredible, and it’s something I will never forget.”