So why is a British sports broadcaster calling NFL games for Westwood One Sports?

0:08Welcome to the sports media podcast. I'm your host Richard Deitsch. My producer is James Jackson. One guest on this episode. If you are a Westwood one listener of the NFL, you may have heard this gentleman and then thought to yourself, why is there a British sounding voice calling NFL games? Oliver Wilson called this past week's thrilling Jacksonville win over the Eagles at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium for Westwood One Audio. This is his second year calling games for Westwood One. Last year, he did four games, including two in London, one in Berlin, and one in Madrid. He's gotten, at least online, some phenomenal reviews from those in the States who are listening to the Westwood One broadcast.

0:56And I thought it would just be interesting to really answer the question again, how has a Brit ended up calling American football for the national audio carrier? And with that, I bring in Oliver Wilson. Welcome. Hey, Rich. Thanks for having me. This is more terrifying for me than calling games because I don't think I've ever done like an interview like this or anything like that. So, yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing where we go with this conversation. You'll be fine. You're in the trusted hands of a mediocre host. So, I mean, how can you go wrong? All right. So let me ask the first question.

1:30So how does a British freelance broadcaster end up calling NFL games for Westwood One? I think about just over a year ago, I just got a text message from somebody saying, look, I've passed your details to Westwood One. um they asked me somebody in the u.s basically passed my details to mike at westwood one and said they are looking for somebody in the uk to maybe call games for the international series i've sent them a message with your name see what happens and then lo and behold i get a phone call from the executive producer mike eby and he says what have you done what do you know can you call american football i've you've come recommended to me and we had a chat and a conversation and i sent some demos to him and then i had to do a lot of negotiating with my wife about whether i was going to go to her brother's wedding or whether i was going to stay in the uk and call the games on westwood one and that's the very short end of it there's a few more bits in between in terms of the conversations we had but yeah it all very much came kind of out of the blue a little it was something that wasn't necessarily on my radar i'd never pitched myself to westwood one or anything like that because i think there is a fear almost of being a brit on u.s airwaves there is a strong potential for a lot of negative feedback the assumption that you don't know what you're talking about etc and while i was doing it for national radio here in the uk for a fair bit of time the step up to america seemed like a very big step to make indeed and this opportunity came up and you got to grab it with two hands and see where it goes.

3:12And it has been phenomenal getting to call these games. Absolutely fantastic. So in doing a little bit of research, and obviously really outside of your LinkedIn page, that's sort of where it seems like my research begins and ends. But very clearly, you have certainly called soccer, obviously in your world, football. But I was curious, like how many NFL games or any kind of football games had you called, obviously for a British audience before we then heard you for Westwood one. Cause you, you, you did a great job and you clearly were familiar with the NFL. So there's no way you were just cold and went into it.

3:50My sense, we'll see if I can guess it correctly. My sense is you've probably done four or five, six years of the league. Uh, that's my guess, but you tell, you tell the listeners. So I actually started in 2018 was my first NFL call, but that was for what's called the visually impaired feed at Wembley Stadium for the three international games. So myself and another broadcaster, Charles Dagnall, were hired by NFL UK and Wembley to do a commentary where we split the game up a quarter each as the lead, a quarter each as the co-coms, alternating to provide a feed for people that are visually impaired at the stadium.

4:30And they can get a headset and listen to your call and it kind of helps marry up the atmosphere and everything that's going on in the game so I did those three games including the Eagles Jags funnily enough which is why this week really felt like a full circle moment almost of hey I started here and now I'm at Tottenham doing this right and I created a demo from those games and took it to our national radio broadcaster TalkSport at that time who I did reports for a lot of the NFL games as well previously so just doing live updates every so often and I said look I think I can call a game if you don't think i can call a game all good and they said no no you can call a game great let's stick you on the super bowl so the first job i did outside of the visually impaired feed was the rams patriots super bowl which in atlanta which was on our on our main station normally the nfl is on uh the sister station talk sport too but it was on the main station and i was excited and terrified in the same way.

5:34This was a big baptism of fire. And it went well enough that when Tottenham Hotspur Stadium came around to be used and when the games came back to London the following year, I ended up just calling those games. I was kind of doing maybe three a year and then I got to do four Super Bowls in five years. So I didn't do the one in Tampa due to COVID. But the last one I got to call was the Philadelphia Eagles loss in Arizona to Kansas City. so those were on site you would travel to the states to do this yeah those are on site all the super bowls are on site and then all of the um games at london were on site and then i even did some uh on field reporting by accident on the national championship game of the rams against the niners that year before the bengals played the rams in the super bowl because i inadvertently stayed on the field and nobody removed me from it pre-game and i just ended up watching the whole game from the sideline and that i think is why they now have the yellow armband for plate people and personnel they're on the sideline because i accidentally stayed all game down on the sideline and we were doing some live hits back to the studio from that because everyone's saying well you're here we might as well do something with it let's keep going um so yeah so that's all i did i And I did three games a year, maybe four games a year for about five years.

6:55And then due to various reasons at TalkSport, freelancers are always the first to kind of be moved away when things get cut, etc. So I didn't get to do NFL for a season or so. And then I got the call from Westwood One. So I probably had, I've probably done about 15 games, I think, in my life, 15 to 17 games, I reckon. Yeah. the the i i'm fascinated by what your approach would be for an american audience do you do you just call the game as you call it or are you cognitively aware that you're calling it for the american audience and then whatever that means to you does your style or content have to change because of that audience no not at all my belief has always been so i i grew up watching the sport from quite a young age eight o 'clock in the morning there was always an hour highlight show on a Saturday morning and I was hooked from that point we had some friends from America as well that would send me a few bits of like American football paraphernalia when I was a young kid so I was always very aware of the sport playing video games helped with Madden became a fan of one of the teams quite early in kind of 2001 and then stayed following the sport so I already was well versed in kind of the vernacular and the beats and the timing of broadcasts I'd listened to it and seen it so much and for me i think whether you're covering it for the uk audience or a us audience you should always use the correct vernacular the correct terms maybe with the uk audience you dumb down a couple of things explain what a slant is maybe every so often or a post and etc but i was always wanting to make sure that i used the right terminology because that's the way the sport sounds at its best as much as anything else so nothing really changed going into the westward games at all in terms of the delivery etc because i kind of learned and listened to the best growing up anyway for the for the recent game that you just did the jaguars eagles where is the booth in taunton hotspur stadium where were you and mike mayock located so we were 50 yard line front of the top tier i actually when talk sport were doing it that's the tv gantry for soccer games and we always got put there as talk sport and then there are booths higher up kind of in the roof on an isometric view over one of the end zones looking out which is where we did our first one for talk sport and i complained that the tv gantry looked like it was empty which it was so they moved us to the tv gantry and then when i linked up with westwood i said to them guys i know where you're sat or where you what booth you're in and i know it's a terrible view compared to where I can get you.

9:37So if you trust me, investigate this TV gantry, you'll have loads of room. We'll have all the audio feeds that we want in terms of ref mics, et cetera. And so, yeah, we are right on the 50 yard line overlooking the field. It's one of the best commentary positions I think you could have for seeing the expanse of the game and everything and being in the atmosphere, which was obviously amazing and is amplified by how Tottenham Hotspur Stadium is built anyway. But it was phenomenal the last two weeks for both Washington and for Philadelphia. Yeah. I mean, so let's get to that game. The, I mean, you called Superbowl, so obviously you've called the biggest game, but like, have you ever, would that have been the most exciting finish you've ever called for an NFL game?

10:15Just because of how the, the game played out, particularly in the last minute of the game. I mean, you, you know, you, I think most Eagles fans were like, this game's done. And then obviously Jacksonville comes back and kicks the game-winning field goal but like you could hear in your voice and mike's voice you were essentially both who were like we've never seen anything like this before yeah it's i mean the stat we used at the end of the broadcast about opposing teams kicking potential game-winning field goals with 10 seconds remaining or less only ever happening twice and it was two weeks ago in rio at that baltimore dallas game followed by this week shows how rare that sort of ending is anyway but if you add into that uh one-handed grab in great coverage by reek woollen made by parker washington with 340 to go on a fourth down i mean that that's outrageous in itself that could have been the game there then a philadelphia offense has done nothing all game actually puts together together a drive for the first time since the second quarter midway through the second quarter go the near distance of the field kick a potential game winner only have it stripped away by a special teams return I mean it's not just beyond belief for a London game it's beyond belief for any game that you'll see this year and probably in the last decade of American football so the excitement level is massively amped up with that combined with the biased nature of the Philadelphia fan base that was in Tottenham Hotspur Stadium that day as well I mean a friend and I were discussing on a podcast yesterday how there's nothing better than either the big game-winning moment when the crowd roars or that moment that it's stripped away from them in the last second, like Tottenham Hotspur actually did at Manchester United this weekend.

12:03And you rip away a victory from a team in their home stadium. And that's kind of like how that felt for Jacksonville this weekend. It was amazing. So by a mile, the most tense affair, I think, that I've covered in American football terms, and one of the wildest as well. I don't think you'd be able to replicate that level of action. I'm curious because you really would have a much better perspective than even the NFL writers who've written about this and talk about this. Obviously, London is a place that the NFL has really put out some significant feelers that if they do ever expand internationally, it would be pretty high on the list of potential places for a franchise.

12:41Mexico City seems another place as well, maybe one of the German cities as well. so what kind of like fandom exists in the uk but then even specifically london because obviously that would in theory be more most of your ticket sales are like could would this work i guess i would ask you as someone who is in that region it's a very interesting and very complicated answer to it i think because on the one hand we keep bringing these games and selling them out and for the majority of the time anyway. And I know they're struggling a little bit with Wembley over the last few years in particular because it's a bit of a different beast.

13:24You know, it's 80 ,000 to 90 ,000 as opposed to 60 ,000 at Tottenham Hotspur. Tottenham is a nicer venue to go to than Wembley because it's newer. It's designed for American football. So it works really well. On the other hand, I think you also see, for instance, what happened in the build-up to the Washington against Indianapolis game, which was ticket prices were getting reduced quite a lot going into the week of the game just because they wanted to make sure they got a sellout and that frustrated a lot of fans who bought early spent$250 for the lower bowl sideline ticket and then suddenly that's going for$80 face value a week before the game and those are the things that are going to displease a fan base and frustrate them and might make it I think a touch difficult for people to buy into eight games a year coming to London, for instance.

14:15On the other hand, we do have this amazing setup. There is a huge fan base in this country. And not only that, it's a fan base that doesn't want to be talked down to with, oh, you guys love the kicking game of our game because you guys love kickers and you love soccer. It's like, no, we have to go through a lot to be American football fans in this country. You start your American football Sunday at six o 'clock in the evening and diehards will go through until four o 'clock in the morning with that Sunday night football game or a Monday night football game or a Thursday night football game. And we may not be inundated with the same level of media and breakdown on our own channels, but American football fans in this country will source out ways to watch NFL Network to catch up with ESPN through clips on the internet or finding subscriptions that they can get access to.

15:05So I do think the European and British fan base knows enough, is knowledgeable enough to be able to buy into that. You then only have the other problem of everyone's got their teams already. And it's more of an American thing to move teams and buy into your city, regardless of what team comes. We're a much smaller country, so that's difficult for people to necessarily shake off that Dallas Cowboys jersey that they've got and suddenly buy into the London Monarchs, let's say, for instance, just to use the old name of the NFL Europe team. So that would be something that would take time, as Jacksonville have found out.

15:45That's a home game they had this week. It's full of Eagles fans. So it would take time to build that raucous fan base to be behind a London team. But I also think we are taking time with the NFL in terms of bringing games over and doing it the right way, slowly, incrementally, adding more and adding more. It's got to be an evolution rather than a revolution.

16:32before these savings vanish into the night. Must be 18 plus. Purchase and shipping restrictions vary by state and municipality.

16:43Hey, football fans. It's Vaughn Miller, Dallas Cowboys linebacker and host of the Free Range Podcast. Come hang out with me and my guy TJ Banks as we give you the best analysis, insights, and guest interviews from around the league each and every week. New episodes drop each and every Wednesday. Be sure to follow or subscribe to Free Range wherever you get your podcasts. The international schedule coming up. Texans-Jaguars at Wembley on October 18th. Steelers-Saint-Stade de France, that's in Paris, October 25th. Bengals-Falcons in Madrid, Bernabeu, November 8th. Patriots Lions at Bayern Munich's arena in Munich, November 15th.

17:32How many of those games would you be doing for Westwood one? All of those. So I am doing all of the European games for Westwood one this year. The, um, I would, I mean, again, I know for people who live in Europe, um, and especially, I know you have done soccer before. I'll just refer to it as soccer. Um, you've seen some of these very famous, uh, um, you know, soccer cathedrals. But for me, as someone who like, like looks at this, like, wow, the NFL is playing, you know, where like, uh, Madrid or Barcelona is playing. That's like incredibly cool. What's what will, we'll take the, we'll take the France one and the Spain one.

18:11What will that be like? Like what, what from your impression, like what will the NFL in Paris and in Spain be like, I know they played before, but again, you've, you've experienced this. I never have, and most likely never will. So Madrid is unbelievable. And both of these stadia that are being used for Madrid and for Paris are stadiums that I was very lucky enough to go to as a soccer fan when I was quite young. and I hadn't been back to Madrid to see a game since they kind of took down the concrete outer shell but maintained the height and the steepness of the stands internally and built this amazing almost like snail shell cover over it with the roof and the um the scoreboard that runs around the kind of halo ring if you will except it's oval almost rather than a halo ring and I was very impressed with what Madrid had to offer last year I really was I thought it fit really well it felt like an indoor dome game the only thing maybe with madrid is that the front seats are almost your eyes are at pitch level because it slopes downwards and away from the end of the pitch and that's the only thing that takes it away from looking like an nfl stadia particularly internally the stade de france in paris that i'm fascinated to see because they have the ability to move the lower bowl seats to make more or less room to remove a running track to get the fans closer to the pitch if they're not using the running track etc and that is an atmosphere that during six nations rugby during french international football games is raucous to say the least i mean it's used as the national stadia rather than any club stadia so it's only the biggest events that go there and i think madrid showed last year that the fan base is ready for that there's an interesting twist to this year in madrid because one of the teams in madrid atletico madrid play barcelona on the same night and i'm interested how that's gonna potentially split people in the city if it changes because they only just scheduled the time of that game in the last 48 hours so i was very surprised they put them up on the same night especially i was hoping to go to the game for atleti barca on the saturday and then go to the nfl game on sunday obviously and whereas paris yeah paris is a new experience i'm not i don't know i have no idea about the french fandom of american football and how that's going to work but i know that the nfl takes these places into account because they know they can fill it.

20:51And I think it will be really interesting. It will be a very unique experience, I think, in France. I have great familiarity with what it would be like to be a freelance broadcaster in the United States or Canada. Like, obviously, I know, you know, given I do this podcast, obviously, I know, literally know a ton of people who are practitioners. And it is challenging. It is challenging to have to always hustle to get gigs. It's challenging to figure out your money situation. It's challenging to figure out your tax situation. It's different than if you're a gymnast getting a paycheck from CBS every week.

21:24So you're in this position from what I understand in terms of your freelancing. You've obviously worked for some great places. Talk Sport, as you mentioned, is very, very big in UK. You work for DAZN. Obviously, we know that here. And obviously, Westwood One is a major player in audio. But what's that like? What is that like for you as I'll call you a European sports broadcaster? How challenging is that for you to forge a career? Very challenging. And it's to the point that it can, as I'm sure you know, it can take that mental strain on you because the highs are so high and the lows are so low.

22:01And contracts change every two, three, four years. So you might think you're in with a production company or a television company and suddenly all of those contracts suddenly go elsewhere and they've got their guys that they like to invite into the booth first so it's something you kind of have to make peace with but I've always found that versatility has been a big key in that I love doing soccer but soccer is so hyper competitive in this country to the point that it's almost driving down paychecks for commentators because there are people that will honestly say that if you're paying that i would do it for this instead knock another hundred pounds off it something like that and the broadcast is going to take that if they're a good enough voice they're a good enough voice but if they'll do it for cheaper then they'll also do it for cheaper so having a few different strings to the bow like having american football for instance i don't know many people that do it and i'm in a fortunate position now that for the british american football league in the summer and for some of the other events that they do like flag championships i get to be involved in that so that keeps my hand in the american football stuff continually throughout the year even if it's maybe not the same level as doing a nfl game on westwood one you treat it the same way you do the same prep all that kind of stuff um i covered triathlon boxing tennis soccer there aren't many sports i wouldn't do just for the i don't want to get caught out for instance on cricket or rugby because I didn't watch those growing up very much.

23:33But when I got asked by a TV company, do you fancy doing the European figure skating championships a few years ago? I figured, well, as long as I've got a co-commentator beside me and we'll do the nuts and bolts of the broadcast and wonderful Louise can do all the analytics, then great, let's do it. Okay, you need somebody, I'll happily step in. So it's all about not being afraid to try something new as long as you're confident enough that you'll be able to do the research to not devalue the sport with the broadcast. I think that's the most important thing because it's not about us as broadcasters and it never should be about us as broadcasters.

24:08It should be about the sport and the game. And if you can bring the excitement of the game, that's great. But people shouldn't tune in because they want to listen to the commentator. They should tune in because the sport is great and they should just tune out. Maybe if they don't like the commentator, a commentator can ruin a broadcast, but should never be the main focus of it, I always think. In the U.S., the sports podcast base has exploded over the last seven, eight, nine years to the point where the biggest ones, the part of my takes of Barstool or the Ringer's podcast, Bill Simmons, to name whatever you are.

24:50There's a multitude of NFL ones, obviously. But there are people, Oliver, who do this for a living. their podcasters and make a significant amount of money. So the space has now matured. You could still get into the space for sure. It certainly helps if you're famous to get into the space. But it's more of a mature market in the United States in sports than anywhere else in the world. What is it where you are? I would assume there are a ton of soccer slash football podcasts where all former players probably, even depending on what team they played for, they could probably have a team-specific podcast, or they could be national like Gary Lineker or some very famous types of people.

25:31But because I don't know this, and I bet some of my listeners would be really interested, where is the space? And can just some average person still come into that space? And if they figure out what sport is underserved, talk about it. I'm curious if you can educate us a little bit. Yeah, I think there were the initial organic podcasts that got created when podcasting first started to hit and those have been able to generate organically large fan bases through great journalists sitting down and having conversations as a almost a side piece that became something they wanted to listen to every single week and make every single way can turn a lot of money i think at this point in podcasting in uk sports it's the former athletes are realizing this is quite a comfortable way to make some extra income that could be quite sizable just because and i'm not saying they don't prep or anything like that but right but but their name but their name value is probably the way you're going to get people into the tent for sure and you don't have to do that much prep if you're having a free-form conversation i mean i i didn't know what we were going to talk about today none of these answers are kind of scripted or anything like that we're just having a bit of a q a or whatever and podcasts particularly those long form podcasts allow that even more so i think there are a lot of people that are going well i can i can add an extra you know 20 000 30 000 a year whatever just by doing this and it takes up maybe an hour or two of my time particularly when it's mass produced by a name production brand you can turn up to a studio they'll probably provide all the transport everything like that but i also think there is that ability to have a unique selling point still that if you can find something that captures an audience imagination whether it's being funny having that humor around sport I think that's something that's actually a bit of an untapped market just because it's difficult to be funny and still hold your I guess journalistic credentials for instance I wouldn't kind of dare make too many jokes about players and teams etc because I'm hoping one day I'll be able to interact with them on a professional level with the commentary side of things but there is still that space open because people like a distraction particularly if it's funny and comedic and can take their mind off everything plus if it's involved around sport and i think as well just people with good insight if if you can just stay persistent and consistent about when you put it out and putting a few things out maybe getting the odd guest etc as well high profile name then you can tap into that market but it's very saturated and it's become very organized.

28:06A lot of the radio stations do their own podcasts, but they're not really a podcast. It's an off-air radio show that's planned. We're going to talk about this for 10 minutes, this for 10 minutes, this for 10 minutes. So the line between what a radio show and a podcast is is very much being blurred, I think, at this point. Interesting. All right, a couple more here, and then I will let you go. It would strike me that for someone like you, the dream would be to do the World Cup somewhere, to be a commentator. for, I mean, like the rights holder obviously is going to be very hard. Just like in this country, there's only, you know, the Fox just had the World Cup.

28:43There's only six play-by-play people. And realistically, there's really only three play-by-play people when you get to certain like lesser rounds. But there are a lot of places that, you know, depending on travel and stuff like that, they just may need people to do stuff. Is that a goal of yours? And how realistic is it for you to one day try to get to a World Cup and be part of that broadcasting-wise? It's definitely been on my bucket list. I will admit that calling a Super Bowl was higher on my career bucket list just because of the uniqueness. Well, the uniqueness of being a British guy calling it.

29:21I figured how often will anybody get that opportunity? And then, as I said, I got to do it four times. And I said I'd retire after the first if I ever got to do one. And so I had to say to my dad, like, hey, I'm not retiring yet, actually. I'm going to keep riding this wave and see how we go. But a World Cup is a European Championships as well, two of the best football tournaments in the world. Even a Champions League semifinal, let alone a final, would be up there. Realistically, is it going to happen? I don't see why not, only because I don't think there's any point in not striving to be at the very top.

29:56I'm not one of those people that is Michael Jordan levels of like competitive you know I'm going to take people down be the but the one thing I've loved about working particularly with the American broadcasters recently is genuine critical feedback to try and make me better people say hey you're good you're good I don't want to be good I want to be as good as I can be which I hope can be one of the best whether that happens or not look we'll have to see it takes some good fortune it takes some luck it it takes being in the right place at the right time all of those but i just don't see there's any point in doing this job if you're not going to try and get to the top level because that's where the most fun is had at the end of the day going to the big events everybody that got in sports journalism i'm sure you were the same richard like yep we got into journalism and in sports to go to super bowls and world cups that's the dream ticket getting paid to be there is unreal.

30:55So yeah, I hope so. I hope one day. Look, you get to a certain age and you want to be a little more serious when it comes to your shirt. Anybody who's worn a dress shirt knows just how uncomfortable it can be and how annoying it is when they bunch up under a sweater. So you must check out Collars & Co., makers of the Dress Collar Polo. Their shirts are four-way stretch, buttery soft polos with firm dress collars on them. So they give you that dress shirt look, but it's an extremely comfortable polo feel. Now, these are shirts you can wear with anything. Wear them with a blazer, wear them under a sweater, wear them solo as an elevated polo.

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32:11Again, promo code media for 15 % off any purchase of$100 Collars or more. Collars and co. No, I think that's good. My dream was to cover one Olympics when I was a kid, and I ended up covering seven for Sports Illustrated. So I feel like I hit the lottery seven times over. Because when I was a kid growing up in New York, the coolest thing ever was getting the chance to watch the Olympics at night, like on the television, and just to see like all these people from all over the world competing in this one place. So you'd have like the Spanish athletes going against this French athlete. I just thought like that whole melange was like the coolest thing ever and far cooler than a Super Bowl or an NBA finals.

32:57And obviously I was a big sports fan and I was very fortunate. I've covered like Super Bowls and I've covered a number of NCAA championships, covered the US Open forever. But that was the one for me, whatever it was. I also love travel. And so like it combined so much stuff that I wanted. And like, I remember my first was 2002 in Salt Lake City, you know, not the sexiest city of all time. But still, I just remember like like you, I was like, I can't believe they're paying me to do this. Like I would have paid them to do it. And so I totally understand where you're coming from. That that was the dream.

33:34And to realize it was pretty cool. I wanted to travel and see the world. So the first one I did was Salt Lake City. Yeah. I will say. I know. Although Salt Lake City, I will say for anyone listening in Utah, is very underrated. It's actually a cool city, and I appreciated my time there. All right. Beautiful call of America as well. Yeah, yeah. One last one, and then I'll let you go on this. Two of your Westwood One colleagues have been on this podcast many times, Kevin Harlan and Ian Eagle, who have obviously done Westwood One games, two of the more famous sports broadcasters in this country in terms of play-by-play.

34:10Have you had a chance to interact? with anyone from Westwood One, particularly those two guys who are, when you're talking about, let's go into this business and try to be at the top of the profession, I just named two people who are singularly at the top of the profession. So Iron Eagle, I haven't had an interaction with really yet at all. I'd love to, but I also recognize that I don't want to necessarily have that interaction with people that are at the very top of the game like that by going, oh, how do I learn from you do this? You know, I'd like to be introduced and then have a sit down or have a conversation and get to meet face to face, but I don't want to push it.

34:49And I definitely, if I meet somebody on a game day, I know what I like to be in terms of my focus 90 minutes before we go on air. I don't know what they like to do or be in their focus 90 minutes before they go on air. So I would be very tetchy about disrupting them or talking to them then. It's something maybe further down the line, but I'd like to chat with with iron with Kevin Harlan we've never spoken but one of the greatest things about last year doing the games for Westwood one was I was told that somebody one of my producers at Westwood one got a text message from Kevin Harlan saying who is this British guy that you've got doing this game man he's really good at calling it and again I maybe with a bit of imposter syndrome at that time in particular because it's doing it for westwood one as a brit but i didn't believe that was a real thing until i saw proof of the message of something because because it's unreal because i listened to him on the nba on the nfl on westwood one like it's a voice that i've grown up listening to so for him to give me that credit in the same way this week i got a message from jp shadrick the new cardinals play-by-play guy who used to call games for Westwood one as well he did all the Jags games whenever they were in Europe obviously because he was coming over with Jacksonville as part of their media team and he's been so supportive throughout this whole process of he gave me some tips before my first game he's given me kind of feedback on the clips that he's heard etc and we've met up at the Open Championship a few times in the last few years when he's come across for the golf and you know getting interactions like that from people that I've looked up and respected to is amazing but I don't know if I want to pick the brains too much and be that guy coming off as the needy fan as opposed to the colleague and i don't know if i'd be able to separate myself from that needy fan colleague thing yet just because i don't i will still never feel my feet are well and truly firmly integrated in being a consistent part of the westwood one broadcast yet maybe in five years if we're still doing these european games and i'm still getting the cool games for westwood one that's fine maybe Maybe I'll feel more confident that I'm part of the team a hundred percent, but this is just me taking this opportunity and running with it because you never know how long it's going to last, particularly with people, what they love and they don't love.

37:14And when a producer comes in and might want to change something, I might want to keep something and it could all go at the drop of a hat. So I'm just trying to stay cool in my own bubble and feel and work my way into my own commentary style. And then I'll kind of interact with those guys, but we're not on the same level yet. And I would love to say that again. I know Harlan a bit, and I think you'd both enjoy that conversation. I think you need a third person to make the connect. All right, so Oliver Wilson, as he mentioned on this podcast, has been calling the international games, the NFL games for Westwood one.

37:48He just called the Eagles-Jaguars game at Taunton Hotspur Stadium. This coming week would be Texans-Jaguars at Wembley. And then, as you mentioned, he's going to Stade de France on October 25th, Bernabeu on November 8th, and then the Munich game, Patriots-Lions, which could be a really good game, on November 15th. Again, I feel like I've said this somewhere. I certainly told this to Mike Eby. Maybe I thought I said it on Twitter, but if I didn't, I probably should have. He's done a great job on these calls, and it's just a really, really interesting listen. and when I listen to you, Oliver, you do not sound any different than the top guys.

38:31So take it for what it's worth for somebody who's listened to more media than any human being, quite frankly, should consume. So I hope you continue this. And Mike Eby as well said great things. And that is the head of Westwood One Sports. So that's a good guy to have in your corner. Oliver, we'll be following your work. We appreciate your time today. And thanks so much for joining me on the Sports Media Podcast. My pleasure. Thanks for the time, man. Really, really enjoyed it. Could have gone on for twice as long if you wanted to, man. So you'll stay on as I do this very average ending, Oliver.

39:05So stay there. If you enjoy these conversations, please head to the archives. previously before our episode with oliver had the round table on from sports media watch where we talked about stephen a smith's comments on lane johnson and the idea of always having a take obviously we got into the skydance uh portfolio now that tbs sports and wbd have merged uh check that out peter king speaking in the nfl was a guest on this podcast last week as well he has a new book highly recommended called the game uh if you like the dennis miller uh documentary on hbo jeff cameron the director of that also an nfl films guy was on this podcast on september 26th check that out troy aikman speaking of major broadcasters on this podcast september 20th always appreciate his time when he comes on again reviews as well as comments always always appreciated by this podcast.

40:01I want to thank James Jackson for all his hard work. Thanks for everybody at Odyssey for their support. And thank you for listening. We'll see you soon on the Sports Media Podcast.

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