When is Bill coming back?

You never know what you've got till it's gone. This radio broadcast is brutal.

Bill is with the Linfield football team in Texas for their playoff game... he will be back next week.

I never like listening to close games on the radio, anyway. Too tense when you can't really see what is happening.

newpilotfan wrote:You never know what you've got till it's gone. This radio broadcast is brutal.

I think Bill does an incredible job, as seems to be the popular opinion around here. Everyone is a bit different with their delivery, and I tuned in for about five minutes early in the second today and certainly had no problem with the replacement PBP guy. No idea who it was, but I thought he acquitted himself just fine.

DeanMurdoch wrote:

newpilotfan wrote:You never know what you've got till it's gone. This radio broadcast is brutal.

I think Bill does an incredible job, as seems to be the popular opinion around here. Everyone is a bit different with their delivery, and I tuned in for about five minutes early in the second today and certainly had no problem with the replacement PBP guy. No idea who it was, but I thought he acquitted himself just fine.

I too was only able to listen to about 10 minutes of the game tonight, but thought Bill's fill-in did a fine job in his first time ever in that seat.

For those who don't care for his style, I’d recommend having a little patience, and remember how you may or may not have done at your first job out of college.....you too probably had to grow and improve.

The gentleman's name is Ben Creighton....a WSU Broadcast Journalism graduate who is cutting his teeth doing the streamed video broadcasts for UP.  Ben is pretty much a volunteer except for the small stipend he receives....and a free trip to Nashville for Thanksgiving!  

If you were to attend a Pilots Women's Basketball game at the Chiles Center, you would recognize his voice as the excellent PA announcer....something Deaner knows a little about

OBTW, during the streamed video broadcasts, Ben is joined by Lindsay Gregg, a former UW-Milwaukee and professional basketball player in Brisbane, Tasmania, and Melbourne in Australia, and in Puerto Rico, and Holland.  Lindsay is now a basketball coach at Catlin Gable school in Portland....she too is just getting her professional start in broadcasting and UP pays her a minimal fee to do it.

DoubleDipper wrote:

DeanMurdoch wrote:

newpilotfan wrote:You never know what you've got till it's gone. This radio broadcast is brutal.

I think Bill does an incredible job, as seems to be the popular opinion around here. Everyone is a bit different with their delivery, and I tuned in for about five minutes early in the second today and certainly had no problem with the replacement PBP guy. No idea who it was, but I thought he acquitted himself just fine.

I too was only able to listen to about 10 minutes of the game tonight, but thought Bill's fill-in did a fine job in his first time ever in that seat.

For those who don't care for his style, I’d recommend having a little patience, and remember how you may or may not have done at your first job out of college.....you too probably had to grow and improve.

The gentleman's name is Ben Creighton....a WSU Broadcast Journalism graduate who is cutting his teeth doing the streamed video broadcasts for UP.  Ben is pretty much a volunteer except for the small stipend he receives....and a free trip to Nashville for Thanksgiving!  

If you were to attend a Pilots Women's Basketball game at the Chiles Center, you would recognize his voice as the excellent PA announcer....something Deaner knows a little about

OBTW, during the streamed video broadcasts, Ben is joined by Lindsay Gregg, a former UW-Milwaukee and professional basketball player in Brisbane, Tasmania, and Melbourne in Australia, and in Puerto Rico, and Holland.  Lindsay is now a basketball coach at Catlin Gable school in Portland....she too is just getting her professional start in broadcasting and UP pays her a minimal fee to do it.

In other words shut your mouth and be glad you had something to listen to. Also she is a babe!

Chickentender wrote:

DoubleDipper wrote:

DeanMurdoch wrote:

newpilotfan wrote:You never know what you've got till it's gone. This radio broadcast is brutal.

I think Bill does an incredible job, as seems to be the popular opinion around here. Everyone is a bit different with their delivery, and I tuned in for about five minutes early in the second today and certainly had no problem with the replacement PBP guy. No idea who it was, but I thought he acquitted himself just fine.

I too was only able to listen to about 10 minutes of the game tonight, but thought Bill's fill-in did a fine job in his first time ever in that seat.

For those who don't care for his style, I’d recommend having a little patience, and remember how you may or may not have done at your first job out of college.....you too probably had to grow and improve.

The gentleman's name is Ben Creighton....a WSU Broadcast Journalism graduate who is cutting his teeth doing the streamed video broadcasts for UP.  Ben is pretty much a volunteer except for the small stipend he receives....and a free trip to Nashville for Thanksgiving!  

If you were to attend a Pilots Women's Basketball game at the Chiles Center, you would recognize his voice as the excellent PA announcer....something Deaner knows a little about

OBTW, during the streamed video broadcasts, Ben is joined by Lindsay Gregg, a former UW-Milwaukee and professional basketball player in Brisbane, Tasmania, and Melbourne in Australia, and in Puerto Rico, and Holland.  Lindsay is now a basketball coach at Catlin Gable school in Portland....she too is just getting her professional start in broadcasting and UP pays her a minimal fee to do it.

In other words shut your mouth and be glad you had something to listen to.  Also she is a babe!

I like the video broadcasts. Perhaps Ben isn't used to radio. He was short on detail and descriptions. Bill does a great job of identifying who's guarding who or who picked up the foul. It was really tough, in a close game, to try and keep up with what was actually happening on the court. Nothing against Ben. Just missed Bill.

I understand that these two are basically amateurs, and it sure shows. Just because we CAN give two people stipends to announce the webcast games doesn't mean we SHOULD. Not when we could just have Bill Johnson's classic play-by-play calls accompanying the video, as has been done in past seasons.

I don't have anything against them personally, but my opinion is that their broadcasting is quite bad, and makes me want to mute the sound on the video replays. Bring back Bill!

NoPoNeighbor wrote:I understand that these two are basically amateurs, and it sure shows. Just because we CAN give two people stipends to announce the webcast games doesn't mean we SHOULD. Not when we could just have Bill Johnson's classic play-by-play calls accompanying the video, as has been done in past seasons.

I don't have anything against them personally, but my opinion is that their broadcasting is quite bad, and makes me want to mute the sound on the video replays. Bring back Bill!

Bill does radio not video. He can't do both. Good thing the mute button exists.

UP has undertaken a massive change in video production this year as they've brought all video streaming in-house. As you may recall by the huge van that used to be parked outside the Chiles Center, UP previously contracted an external video provider for all soccer/basketball home video productions.

This is a huge undertaking, and Jose Nevarez, a part-time employee who once worked for the WCC, has been phenomenal at running the entire streaming operation.  It is my understanding there is an attempt being made to find the money to get him on a full-time basis next fiscal year.

The improvements and progress they have made in the last three months (virtually all video we see coming from the Athletic Department) have been exceptional......and they are doing it at less cost than before as they are building a student intern work crew as opposed to strictly hiring external professionals....so a win/win in my view.

The goal is to get UP's live video product to the level that it would be picked up by local service providers and potentially Comcast SportsNet NW for higher profile games. No, they are not close to that yet, but by next year after they have worked through a lot of the bugs/issues it is a realistic possibility.  A huge investment has been made in quality replay software and they are growing their expertise in graphics integration as they continue to add all the necessary pieces to be ‘broadcast quality’.

The reason they don’t just patch in Bill’s audio is because they are trying to build a broadcast quality video product. That differs significantly from just patching in his voice. You would never see a ROOT Sports or CSN-NW broadcast just patching in a radio feed….it is a completely different type of play-by-play call.  Bill is communicating with an in-studio producer, has a different sponsor/in-game reads protocol, etc. For video/tv, UP has a director communicating with the talent to manage in-game reads, drop ins, replays, etc., as they want the the feed to stand alone and improve. It will take some time and with what they can offer financially to broadcasters and technicians, UP is just not going to be able to bring in seasoned veterans at this point in the development.

They recognize that the announcing is critical to the legitimacy of the program and will work to improve in that area. But for the critics, I’d suggest you look around at what other Division I college institutions are providing from a live video perspective... not just mid-majors, but high-majors as well. I believe you'll find UP's product will hold up to just about anybody and they haven’t scratched the surface on their potential yet.

In conjunction with that development, I've been told UP is finalizing details with CSN-NW to launch a Portland Pilots 30-minute monthly show beginning in early January......another great opportunity to showcase what they are doing from a creative and live video platform to a much wider audience.

To answer the question, "When is Bill coming back?"

....Wednesday for the PSU game, but then he'll miss the OSU game because Linfield's D-3 football team won today and will be heading to Pennsylvania for the next game on Saturday.

My 2 cents on Ben. I did some research and found his LinkedIn page. He's had precious internships at 710 ESPN Seattle and Turner Sports in Atlanta (he even has a recommendation from one of the NBA TV anchors) and called the Cougs during the Pac-12 Tournament 2 straight years . Yes he's young and starting to get into the business, but from other broadcasters I've heard who are around his age, he's light years beyond them. Yes he has a little ways to go and can improve on a few things, but he has a lot of potential in my opinion. He's done a great job filling in for Bill this weekend. I think the reason he may be struggling with the webcasts is cause he's used to doing radio at WSU (shown on his LinkedIn). But like I said, he's far beyond what other recent college graduates sound like doing play-by-play. Just have patience and give him some time. Again I have no problem with him doing the games this weekend, he's been doing great. Plus I agree with DoubleDipper, he's 1000x better than the current men's PA guy.

*previous internships