Bruce McAvaney

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Bruce William McAvaney OAM (born 22 June 1953 in Ferryden Park, South Australia, Australia) is an Australian sports broadcaster.

McAvaney is well-known for his commentary of Australian rules football matches on Channel Seven from 1990 until 2001. In 2007 he resumed calling AFL with the Seven Network as they regained the rights to Broadcast AFL. He is known for his animated style, infectious enthuisiasm and his use of the word 'special'.

He has been the face of his network's Olympic Games coverage for more than 25 years.

He is known for his meticulous research and in-depth knowledge of the sports and athletes he covers.

McAvaney lives in Adelaide with his wife, TV producer/reporter Anne Johnson and two children, Sam and Alexandra.

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[edit] Career

After five years service as a public service clerk, inspired by legendary racecaller Bill Collins, McAvaney’s media career began in 1976 at Adelaide radio station 5DN where he called horse races and hosted a sports show. Two years later he moved to television joining ADS7 to read sport news and produce the weekly Racetrack show.

His first big break came in 1980 when colleague Sandy Roberts went to the Moscow Olympics for Channel Seven and Bruce was chosen to host the Adelaide end of the telecast.

In 1983 he joined Melbourne's Channel Ten to read sport news with then cadets Eddie McGuire and Stephen Quartermain working under him.

The following year he went to the Los Angeles Olympics to commentate track and field events and be the secondary host.

McAvaney co-hosted Ten's telecast of the 1988 Seoul Olympics to public and critical acclaim, coming runner-up to Sandy Roberts in the 1989 Penguin Award for "Best Presenter in the field of Summer Olympic Presenting for an Australian commentator working for Channel 7, for the year of 1988" and an award from the Glenelg local council, the "Putting Glenelg on the map" award.

During his time at Ten he called the Melbourne Cup from 1985-88 and hosted telecasts of major sporting events including the 1987 World Athletics Championships in Rome and the 1988 Grand Prix Athletics in Berlin.

At the end of 1989 Bruce rejoined the Seven Network where he established Sportsworld as the most authoritative and highest rating sports show on television.

[edit] Australia's finest commentator[citation needed]

McAvaney's reputation of Australia's "Mastercaster" grew during his time at Seven where he became the face of the network's sports coverage from the Melbourne Cup, World Athletics, AFL, Motor Racing, the Australian Open Tennis, Australian Masters Golf and the Olympics.

A stickler for detail and knowledgeable on all sports, McAvaney did himself no harm when he said the following of Florence Griffith-Joyner - "Impossible, no female could run that fast." and he also cast doubt on Ben Johnson on the 1988 Olympic record. Johnson was later proven to be dope-fuelled and doubt has also been cast on Griffith-Joyner, especially after her untimely death in 1998.

In 1999, McAvaney won the inaugural TV Week Logie for Most Outstanding Sport Broadcaster ahead of cricket legend Richie Benaud, racing caller Johnny Tapp and SBS soccer host Les Murray.

He was awarded an OAM by The Queen in June 2002 for service to sports broadcasting, and to the community through charitable and sporting organisations.

In 2001, when Seven lost the rights to broadcast AFL, McAvaney stopped working as an AFL commentator. However, he continued his role at the Seven Network as host of Sportsworld and anchor of major sports events.

He has covered every games since Moscow in 1980 to Athens in 2004, where he called swimming and athletics, including Ian Thorpe's wins in the 200m and 400m freestyle.

In early 2005, McAvaney appeared as a host on radio station SEN 1116 on The Insiders. He also returned to Stawell with the station and called a memorable Stawell Gift final which was won by Joshua Ross in 2005. After The Insiders was axed in the station's financial crisis he quit.

Following the Seven Network/Network Ten consortium's winning bid for the 2007-2011 Australian Football League television broadcasting rights in January 2006, McAvaney has returned to his role as a football commentator and commentates all Friday Night games and all 2PM Sunday Games.

He joined Melbourne radio station 3AW for the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games to call athletics and co-host nightly show Sports Today called The Games Today for the 11 days of competition.

He provided an epic commentary of Craig Mottram's silver medal in the 5,000m

[edit] Memorable moments

McAvaney's excitement has been a major part of Australian sporting moments from calling Channel 10's coverage of Empire Rose's Melbourne Cup, to Cathy Freeman's gold medal in the 400m at the Sydney Olympics in 2000.

When Freeman crossed the moment, McAvaney let fly with the superlatives and was overcame with emotion when he said "what a moment, what a legend" to which athletics legend Raelene Boyle replied "what a relief".

He has said he rates nine-time Olympic gold medalist Carl Lewis as among the finest athletes he has seen and five-time gold medalist Michael Johnson gave McAvaney his shoe following his victory in the 400m at Atlanta in 1996 as a sign of respect.

He was the lone caller when legendary AFL full-forward Tony Lockett kicked his 1300th career goal to become the all-time greatest goalkicker in the game's history, while playing for Sydney Swans at the SCG in 1999.

The public perception was he had a football love-affair with great players such as North Melbourne star Wayne Carey and Essendon player James Hird and was synonymous for scream "Caaaary", when the star centre-half forward took a mark or kicked a goal. He is also commonly lampooned for his use of the word special.

When Gary Moorcroft took mark of the year for Essendon against Western Bulldogs at Telstra Dome in 2001, McAvaney remarked "that will go around the world on CNN" - and it did.

In an interview in 2002, McAvaney said the chance to front the coverage of a FIFA World Cup in which Australia was involved would top of his career as a broadcaster.

When Makybe Diva won the Melbourne Cup for the third time in succession in 2005, McAvaney dubbed it "the greatest victory in the history of the race".

In May 2006, he listed his top three sporting moments of all time as:

1. Makybe Diva winning a third Melbourne Cup 2. Ben Johnson and Carl Lewis in the 100m final at Seoul Olympics 3. 1971 Mohammad Ali v Joe Frasier

In the Summer Olympics of 2004, over come with emotion after the win of Hicham El Guerrouj in the Men's 1500m Athletics Event, he quoted, "But he's coming back the champ, El Guerrouj is coming back...he is a legend. He has gone from the greatest never, to the best of all time."

When McAvaney appeared on Seven's show, Sunrise, taking over Mark Beretta.

[edit] Impersonations and Other Media

Along with Richie Benaud, McAvaney is probably the most commonly impersonated sports commentator in Australia.

Popular impersonator Billy Birmingham, of Twelfth Man fame, featured McAvaney on his Bruce 2000 single released following the Sydney Olympics.

Andrew Startin also features his take on McAvaney in many of his show, including multiple times on Channel Nine's The AFL Footy Show, while actor/comedian Rob Sitch produced a memorable performance of McAvaney on ABC television's The Late Show in 1992.

In 2007, Tich Lange released a hip-hop version of The Sunnyboys classic song "Alone With You" as "I'm Alone Wid U" mentioning Bruce McAvaney favourite term "special" in one of the first verse as the best as well as sampling a commentary of Bruce's call of Tich's brother Adam when playing for North Melbourne Football Club.

[edit] Combatting rumours

In 2002, McAvaney hit back at a rumour he claimed had dogged him and his family for two years - that he was gay and living with a big-name athlete (thought to be Matthew Shirvington).

He told a News Limited newspaper the talk had been "upsetting and weird".

"And stressful and a long way off the mark," he said. "Which made it easier in one way, but more frustrating in another.

"It was incredibly frustrating because it was damaging and there was no truth, in any way, shape or form, to any of the stuff. It was that far out there I was almost laughing sometimes. That made it a bit easier; it was silly.

"I don't know where it originated and I'm not sure what motivated it, but I'm also aware that there are other people in the media or in the public eye who've suffered the same thing, but they get on with it.

"The only thing I actually worry about in the end is that my family situation - my wife and particularly my children - are safe and well and happy." McAvaney added that being branded gay did not carry the slur it once did. "It's nothing," he said. "It just isn't factual."

[edit] 2007 AFL Season Sayings

During the 2007 AFL Season, McAvaney added two new sayings to his large array of memorable commentary sayings from the past. These included "Clever", which is said very loudly and longer than normal commentary words. The other saying is " Ohh He's Good Isn't He". He says this emphasising the "Good". He has used these sayings frequently during 2007 when a player does something brilliant or exciting.

[edit] External links