Warner Wolf
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Warner William Wolf (born November 11, 1937), is an American television and radio sports broadcaster, best known for being a very popular local news sports anchor in Washington, D.C. and New York City.
Wolf began as a radio broadcaster in 1961, doing news, weather, and sports for WLSI-AM in Pikeville, Kentucky. He then moved on to radio jobs in Martinsburg, West Virginia and Washington D.C. at WTOP-AM before landing a sports television role in 1965 at WTOP-TV in Washington. There he became very well-known and popular as the news sports anchor; he also did play-by-play announcing of local college and professional basketball, football, and baseball games.
In 1975, Wolf gained an ABC Sports network role, working on Monday Night Baseball telecasts and as a host for coverage of football and the Olympics. Wolf's reception in those jobs was mixed, and he decided that he was best at the local news sports anchor role.
He thus returned to that position with a job at WABC-TV in New York in 1976, and then in 1980 moved to rival New York station WCBS-TV. His move to WCBS resulted in a lawsuit, American Broadcasting Co. v. Wolf, in which ABC alleged that Wolf failed to negotiate in good faith and sought specific performance of their contract which would have kept Wolf off the air for two years. The New York Court of Appeals rejected ABC's argument, although they permitted ABC to seek relief in the form of monetary damages. He also broadcast live sports reports for Israeli television during the 1991 Gulf War.
He went back to WUSA-TV in Washington, D.C. as the sports anchor, replacing Glenn Brenner in June 1992. He was dismissed in August 1995. Between 1996 and 1997, Wolf was the guest host of The Tony Kornheiser Show on Thursdays on WTEM-AM until he moved to New York as a substitute sports anchor on Imus in the Morning when the regular sports anchor, Mike Breen, was away. Because of his work on Imus in the Morning and Don Imus' recommendation on the air continuously, Wolf went back to WCBS-TV as the sports anchor in 1998. He stayed there until May 2004.
During this time he also continued to do some work in radio, giving sports reports on the nationally syndicated Imus in the Morning program. Indeed Wolf broke the news of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the Imus show, since he saw the World Trade Center on fire from his lower Manhattan apartment. Wolf also covered the story for WCBS-TV.
Wolf is legendary in the sports broadcasting business for his use of catchphrases, including:
- [after someone does something dumb] "Give me a break!" or "Come on!"
- [on a ball that hits the foul pole] "It hit the fair pole! It has to be the fair pole because it's a fair ball!"
- [after a one-sided defeat by, say, 40 points] "If you had <that team> and 39 points ... you lost!"
- [for a unpopular sports figure] "A Boo of the week!"
- [after playing an unexciting sound bite from an athlete]: "Thanks for stopping by."
- [when commentating on a basketball videotape] "Swish!"
- [discussing a poorly-performing team] "Change the rule: if you can't win two games in a month, you're out of the league!"
and most of all:
- [when introducing a highlight clip] "Let's go to the videotape!"
On May 27, 2004 Wolf was fired by WCBS-TV General manager Lew Leone who was eventually fired himself for mismanaging the station, which included the firing of Wolf. He was forced out without being giving a chance to say goodbye on air, three months before his contract expired, and replaced by a much younger anchor, Chris Wragge. The day after his firing, his picture covered half the front page of the New York Daily News with the other half being covered by the headline "WOLF FANS RAISE A HOWL".
A few months after his firing, which generated much public outcry, Wolf was hired by radio station WABC-AM and can be heard weekday mornings with Curtis Sliwa & Ron Kuby as well as Mark Simone's Saturday morning radio program. Wolf hosts a Saturday sports talk show on 1050 ESPN Radio. Wolf modified his trademark "Lets go to the videotape!" to "Lets go to the audiotape!"
Wolf played himself in the film Rocky IV and has made several other cameo appearances. He is the author of the books Let's Go to the Videotape and Give Me a Break.
On his mother's side he is a distant cousin of Abraham Lincoln.
Despite rumors to the contrary, and a similarly receding hairline, Warner is not the son of former Three Stooges comedy troupe member Larry Fine. His father was Jack Wolf, another employee of Ted Healy, the man who founded the Stooges.
Warner's parents and Warner himself are Orthodox Jews.
