1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,000 Celebrating the power of possibility. 2 00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:34,000 I'm Josh Ward and I believe anything is possible. 3 00:00:34,000 --> 00:00:37,000 Welcome to Anything is Possible. I'm Hal Oren Hilton Hill. 4 00:00:37,000 --> 00:00:43,000 These are great stories about great people whose lives prove that anything is possible. 5 00:00:43,000 --> 00:00:47,000 I'm excited to have with me today Josh Ward. 6 00:00:47,000 --> 00:00:51,000 Josh is a sports talk show host and producer. 7 00:00:51,000 --> 00:00:56,000 Josh and Swain on the sports animal. 8 00:00:56,000 --> 00:00:59,000 But we go way back. 9 00:00:59,000 --> 00:01:00,000 Way back Hal. 10 00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:05,000 How old were you when you walked into the radio station? 11 00:01:05,000 --> 00:01:10,000 So I was 16. If you poll some of our coworkers you'll get different answers. 12 00:01:10,000 --> 00:01:12,000 Many of them range below that. 13 00:01:12,000 --> 00:01:17,000 I think some coworkers thought, why is Jimmy Himes 12 year old son coming to work every day? 14 00:01:17,000 --> 00:01:18,000 What's going on here? 15 00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:20,000 But I was 16 years old. 16 00:01:20,000 --> 00:01:23,000 I wanted to be in sports radio. I wanted to be in sports media. 17 00:01:23,000 --> 00:01:27,000 And I thought sports talk radio was the path I wanted to take. 18 00:01:27,000 --> 00:01:30,000 And I thought, okay a lot of people probably want to do that. 19 00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:33,000 So I had heard about getting your foot in the door. 20 00:01:33,000 --> 00:01:36,000 You want to get your foot in the door, you want to get started. 21 00:01:36,000 --> 00:01:40,000 And I figured I'd probably go to the University of Tennessee. 22 00:01:40,000 --> 00:01:41,000 But why wait until then? 23 00:01:41,000 --> 00:01:45,000 So I was 16. I could drive. I had access to emails. 24 00:01:45,000 --> 00:01:50,000 So I fired off some emails, some cold emails and said hey I'd like to come check things out in the building. 25 00:01:50,000 --> 00:01:54,000 And I did. And coming up on 23 years later I'm still there. 26 00:01:54,000 --> 00:01:56,000 That is unbelievable. 27 00:01:56,000 --> 00:02:02,000 I remember you being there and just in full disclosure you were interning. 28 00:02:02,000 --> 00:02:04,000 You were working for free. 29 00:02:04,000 --> 00:02:07,000 Technically interning. I think the statutes passed. 30 00:02:07,000 --> 00:02:10,000 But I don't even know if I was allowed to be doing what I was doing. 31 00:02:10,000 --> 00:02:12,000 I was a high school student. I was getting no school credit. 32 00:02:12,000 --> 00:02:14,000 And I was getting no money at least at first. 33 00:02:14,000 --> 00:02:18,000 But I remember how earnest and how hard you were working. 34 00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:22,000 Dayfolk, God rest his soul he passed on. 35 00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:29,000 But I've been there for a while. Dayfolk was my guy, my mentor, my friend. 36 00:02:29,000 --> 00:02:35,000 I'll tell you a secret. We didn't like interns. 37 00:02:35,000 --> 00:02:37,000 Should I leave? 38 00:02:37,000 --> 00:02:40,000 No. But let me explain. 39 00:02:40,000 --> 00:02:48,000 We all stood back in Marvel at the fact that you were working your butt off. 40 00:02:48,000 --> 00:02:52,000 Who were you working for initially? And what were you doing? 41 00:02:52,000 --> 00:02:55,000 So the start of it is I mentioned I fired off some cold emails. 42 00:02:55,000 --> 00:03:00,000 So at the time it's News Talk 99. You're on in the mornings, afternoons, John and Jimmy. 43 00:03:00,000 --> 00:03:03,000 And it's a smaller sports staff at the time. 44 00:03:03,000 --> 00:03:05,000 It's John and Jimmy doing sports talk every afternoon. 45 00:03:05,000 --> 00:03:07,000 And Dave Hooker's the producer. 46 00:03:07,000 --> 00:03:13,000 And Jeff Chacoby. He was a part of sports, doing sales, part of sports with you in the mornings as well. 47 00:03:13,000 --> 00:03:19,000 So I emailed John, Jimmy and Dave and I just said, I'd like to do what you do. 48 00:03:19,000 --> 00:03:23,000 I think John might still have the email. Please don't find it if he does. 49 00:03:23,000 --> 00:03:27,000 But I said I want to do what you do. 50 00:03:27,000 --> 00:03:32,000 I had some cringe jokes that I tried to throw in to make some kind of connection. 51 00:03:32,000 --> 00:03:37,000 For some reason Dave emailed me back and said, hey, if you want to come check it out, come check it out. 52 00:03:37,000 --> 00:03:44,000 I'm sure he thought this teenager is going to come do a tour, see what we do, and then he can go on his merry way. 53 00:03:44,000 --> 00:03:49,000 But he did say, if you'd like to come back, you're welcome to come back. 54 00:03:49,000 --> 00:03:51,000 And I said, when can I come back? 55 00:03:51,000 --> 00:03:55,000 So I started to come back every day after school. 56 00:03:55,000 --> 00:04:00,000 I went to Farragut High School. When the school day was done, I would go into the school office. 57 00:04:00,000 --> 00:04:05,000 I didn't have a cell phone. And I would call and say, hey, is it okay if I come in this afternoon? 58 00:04:05,000 --> 00:04:09,000 I would do that every day. Eventually Dave said, why don't you call me if you're not coming in? 59 00:04:09,000 --> 00:04:14,000 So I would do whatever they asked me to do. 60 00:04:14,000 --> 00:04:17,000 I had a chance to go to University of Tennessee football practices. 61 00:04:17,000 --> 00:04:22,000 That was cool, right, to be able to go and watch and observe and kind of be a second set of eyes. 62 00:04:22,000 --> 00:04:29,000 But if they needed me to help with stats, if they needed me to get a cup of coffee, how hot, a soda, how cold, 63 00:04:29,000 --> 00:04:37,000 I'd be willing to do it. And then from there, that created opportunities to do actual work that was not fun. 64 00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:39,000 But I saw it as important. 65 00:04:39,000 --> 00:04:46,000 So helping with high school football broadcasts on Friday nights, running Saturday and Sunday morning shows at 6 a.m. 66 00:04:46,000 --> 00:04:50,000 is a news talk station. So there wouldn't necessarily be sports shows. 67 00:04:50,000 --> 00:04:58,000 But it was a chance to work a little bit, but to show that I was willing to do whatever was needed in sports. 68 00:04:58,000 --> 00:05:02,000 There's no more important ability than availability. I wanted to be available. 69 00:05:02,000 --> 00:05:08,000 And I thought that that might create opportunities. And it did through producer roles that would come. 70 00:05:08,000 --> 00:05:13,000 And then in the end, my goal was to be on air. And I had a lot of work to do. 71 00:05:13,000 --> 00:05:16,000 I was not suited to be on the air for sure when I showed up at those opportunities game. 72 00:05:16,000 --> 00:05:19,000 Tell me about growing up in Farragut. Tell me about your family. 73 00:05:19,000 --> 00:05:25,000 Yes. So I grew up going to Farragut K through 12. And it was a wonderful experience. 74 00:05:25,000 --> 00:05:29,000 Farragut is a community that I care about a lot. I live there now. 75 00:05:29,000 --> 00:05:33,000 I grew up young. My parents divorced when I was really little, but they were both in my life. 76 00:05:33,000 --> 00:05:40,000 So my mom's a school teacher. She taught sixth grade English at Farragut Middle for close to 40 years. 77 00:05:40,000 --> 00:05:48,000 My dad was a fireman. So when I talk about work ethic and things that I would do, I saw them do that. 78 00:05:48,000 --> 00:05:49,000 The school teacher. Fireman. 79 00:05:49,000 --> 00:05:50,000 You have siblings? 80 00:05:50,000 --> 00:06:00,000 I have a half sister. I grew up as an only child with my mom. But I was around a lot of great people, great friends, great school system. 81 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:08,000 I was really set up to succeed. I was very fortunate in that regard. I live in Farragut now. I love the community. Love the people. 82 00:06:08,000 --> 00:06:15,000 You're also kind of challenged. It's competitive. A lot of people that are smart, hardworking, come from good families. 83 00:06:15,000 --> 00:06:20,000 And that's part of the reason I feel like I'm blessed to have been around all of that. 84 00:06:20,000 --> 00:06:28,000 And I wanted to figure out what I wanted to do. So once I decided, I'm probably not going to try it first to be a doctor or a lawyer, 85 00:06:28,000 --> 00:06:33,000 I thought maybe those are other options if it doesn't work out to do what I want to do. I can go that route. 86 00:06:33,000 --> 00:06:54,000 But my family encouraged me. They said, hey, you want to be a sports talk host? Why don't you go try? 87 00:06:54,000 --> 00:07:05,000 Where did your love for sports come from? And where did this desire to be a sports talk host come from? 88 00:07:05,000 --> 00:07:10,000 Were there icons or markers or experiences that brought you to that? 89 00:07:10,000 --> 00:07:16,000 I just loved everything about sports from the beginning that I remember watching. 90 00:07:16,000 --> 00:07:24,000 So when I was little, five, six years old, I was an Atlanta Braves fan. They were really good in the 1990s. I'm a kid of the 90s. 91 00:07:24,000 --> 00:07:30,000 So I loved watching. I loved playing. I played soccer for a little bit, then baseball, then basketball. 92 00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:35,000 I wasn't built necessarily for football, but I loved to watch football. And we're in Knoxville, University of Tennessee. 93 00:07:35,000 --> 00:07:44,000 So football is big. So I love to watch. I love to play. As I got a little bit older, I think one thing that I've benefited from in my career is, 94 00:07:44,000 --> 00:07:57,000 I have an ability to see reality. And I saw that while I was gifted with many blessings and I love sports, I was not gifted with professional athleticism. 95 00:07:57,000 --> 00:08:06,000 So when you're seven, eight, nine years old, you dream of playing for the Atlanta Braves, for the Bulls, for the Raiders, whatever opportunity. 96 00:08:06,000 --> 00:08:13,000 Can I be a Dallas Cowboy one day? And I learned pretty quickly, nope, you cannot. So what else can I do? 97 00:08:13,000 --> 00:08:18,000 Well, I love listening to Sports Talk Radio. I love the commentary of sports on television. 98 00:08:18,000 --> 00:08:26,000 I'd be one of those kids every morning watching Sports Center at 9am, the 10am, the 11am during the summers. 99 00:08:26,000 --> 00:08:32,000 And I listened to Sports Talk Radio with Mike Keith. I listened to John and Jimmy when they took over Sports Talk. 100 00:08:32,000 --> 00:08:37,000 I loved the talk radio format. I was a kid, Hal. I listened to you. I'd be in the car with my dad. 101 00:08:37,000 --> 00:08:44,000 When I was a little bit older, I'd come home after school either doing homework or hanging out or working out, whatever. 102 00:08:44,000 --> 00:08:50,000 A lot of times you put on music, right? I'd put on Sports Talk in the afternoons and I'd listen. 103 00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:59,000 So I decided, hey, if I want to be involved in sports, if I'm not going to be involved as an athlete, at that point coaching is probably not my route. 104 00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:03,000 Can I talk about sports? That's the route I decided to take. 105 00:09:03,000 --> 00:09:08,000 So you're at the radio station. You're working for free is what it was. 106 00:09:08,000 --> 00:09:17,000 We just had the CEO of our company in the building the other day and she was explicit. You cannot do that anymore, right? 107 00:09:17,000 --> 00:09:20,000 Yeah. My activity would be frowned upon. 108 00:09:20,000 --> 00:09:21,000 Right. 109 00:09:21,000 --> 00:09:26,000 But when did you get a chance to go on the air and who made that decision? 110 00:09:26,000 --> 00:09:32,000 The first time I went on the air was the end of the 2001 Tennessee football season. 111 00:09:32,000 --> 00:09:42,000 Earlier that year, 9-11 occurred. So Tennessee, which typically plays Florida in September, had the game postponed until the end of the year. 112 00:09:42,000 --> 00:09:45,000 It's a huge game. Tennessee and Florida both top five teams. 113 00:09:45,000 --> 00:09:54,000 Dave Hooker was typically the guy that would go cover practice. He'd stay there, watch the whole thing, listen to Coach Phillip Fulmer, and then call in with a report. 114 00:09:54,000 --> 00:09:58,000 On days when he was unavailable, Jeff Chacoby would step in. 115 00:09:58,000 --> 00:10:05,000 On this particular day, Florida week, huge week, Dave can't be there. Jeff can't be there at the start. 116 00:10:05,000 --> 00:10:13,000 He tells me, hey, be there, pay attention, take some notes, let me know what you see. I'll get there when I get there. 117 00:10:13,000 --> 00:10:19,000 Well, he didn't get there until practice was over and Phillip Fulmer had talked to the media. 118 00:10:19,000 --> 00:10:25,000 So Jeff said, I didn't see anything. I didn't hear anything. You need to go on there and do the report. 119 00:10:25,000 --> 00:10:34,000 And I'm like, oh, I've never been on the air. So here's an opportunity to go on the air and do a live report on Sports Talk. 120 00:10:34,000 --> 00:10:40,000 I'm 16 years old and Jeff Chacoby has said, you're going to do it. So he tells Jimmy, hey, Josh needs to do the report. 121 00:10:40,000 --> 00:10:45,000 I didn't see anything. Jeff runs to his car, pulls out his, remember those big morant steps. 122 00:10:45,000 --> 00:10:51,000 He turns on the radio and records it because he knew how much that opportunity would mean to me. 123 00:10:51,000 --> 00:10:56,000 I think I have that cassette tape somewhere at my mom's house. I hope we don't find that either. 124 00:10:56,000 --> 00:11:05,000 But it was a chance to go on the air and give a report about the Tennessee Florida game probably three months after I had started interning there. 125 00:11:05,000 --> 00:11:07,000 Who made the decision to give you a show? 126 00:11:07,000 --> 00:11:17,000 So along the way, working at the radio station while attending the University of Tennessee, I had opportunities to do different on-air things. 127 00:11:17,000 --> 00:11:25,000 I could do reports, got a chance to do some weekend shows, would step in and help host with a Saturday Sports Talk. 128 00:11:25,000 --> 00:11:28,000 I got to do high school football on Friday nights, a number of things. 129 00:11:28,000 --> 00:11:34,000 I graduated in 2007, spent another year producing Sports Talk in the afternoons. 130 00:11:34,000 --> 00:11:41,000 And at that point, the shift had already been made a couple of years prior to an all-sports format. 131 00:11:41,000 --> 00:11:45,000 So there was News Talk and there was the sports animal. 132 00:11:45,000 --> 00:11:49,000 And part of it was local, part of it was syndicated. 133 00:11:49,000 --> 00:11:55,000 And in the middle of the day, there was a syndicated show, the Jim Rhoam show, which is very successful. 134 00:11:55,000 --> 00:11:58,000 But it wasn't succeeding in Knoxville. 135 00:11:58,000 --> 00:12:01,000 He's more of a national pro-sports format. 136 00:12:01,000 --> 00:12:06,000 The interest locally is the University of Tennessee, the SEC and college sports. 137 00:12:06,000 --> 00:12:11,000 So they were creating a local show and John Pennington was going to be the host. 138 00:12:11,000 --> 00:12:13,000 They needed a co-host. 139 00:12:13,000 --> 00:12:18,000 At first, I didn't go for the other host position. 140 00:12:18,000 --> 00:12:23,000 I don't think at the time I was confident that I was ready to be a full-time host. 141 00:12:23,000 --> 00:12:25,000 John pushed me to go for it. 142 00:12:25,000 --> 00:12:30,000 John Wilkerson, Jimmy Himes were very encouraging for me to, hey, why don't you take an opportunity? 143 00:12:30,000 --> 00:12:35,000 Mickey Dierstone was the program director and I went and talked to him about it. 144 00:12:35,000 --> 00:12:39,000 And I believe his response was, I was wondering why you didn't. 145 00:12:39,000 --> 00:12:44,000 So I did, I had others pushing for me to get that chance. 146 00:12:44,000 --> 00:12:54,000 So around August 2008, I started to host a 12-3 show, the show leading into sports talk with John and Jimmy. 147 00:12:54,000 --> 00:12:59,000 And here I am 16 years later, still in that 12-3 slot leading into the afternoon drive. 148 00:12:59,000 --> 00:13:08,000 You know, we all, we all, I don't know of anybody in our building that did not look at you and go, 149 00:13:08,000 --> 00:13:10,000 man, we love this guy. 150 00:13:10,000 --> 00:13:12,000 But it was your work ethic. 151 00:13:12,000 --> 00:13:14,000 You kept your head down. 152 00:13:14,000 --> 00:13:21,000 I've never heard of you in the middle of any office politics, any scuttle butt. 153 00:13:21,000 --> 00:13:25,000 You know, we used to tease you about being John Ward's love child, 154 00:13:25,000 --> 00:13:33,000 but you always had a good sense of humor, very deliberate about your work and your preparation. 155 00:13:33,000 --> 00:13:40,000 You had the benefit of being around some people who are very dedicated to their craft and their profession. 156 00:13:40,000 --> 00:13:44,000 But you and Swain have come into your own. 157 00:13:44,000 --> 00:13:47,000 So I want to commend you because you walk in at 16. 158 00:13:47,000 --> 00:13:54,000 It reminded me a lot of my journey in radio because I kind of got started in the same way. 159 00:13:54,000 --> 00:14:00,000 But there is, there's something that I've noticed about you. 160 00:14:00,000 --> 00:14:10,000 You don't have any verbal ticks. 161 00:14:10,000 --> 00:14:19,000 The way you broadcast and the way you present yourself is very crisp, very professional, 162 00:14:19,000 --> 00:14:25,000 which for me, this has been my profession, this is what I do, right? 163 00:14:25,000 --> 00:14:30,000 To me, that says you worked on that. 164 00:14:30,000 --> 00:14:33,000 I would say I am a product of practice. 165 00:14:33,000 --> 00:14:36,000 I'm not naturally gifted with talking. 166 00:14:36,000 --> 00:14:39,000 I'm an introvert. 167 00:14:39,000 --> 00:14:41,000 With that comes confidence issues. 168 00:14:41,000 --> 00:14:45,000 Probably, hey, if I'm not comfortable in a talking setting, 169 00:14:45,000 --> 00:14:51,000 I've chosen here that I'm going to talk to people every day, hours at a time. 170 00:14:51,000 --> 00:14:53,000 I better get better at it, right? 171 00:14:53,000 --> 00:14:58,000 So one of the ways to do that is talking to yourself. 172 00:14:58,000 --> 00:14:59,000 You can see yourself in the mirror. 173 00:14:59,000 --> 00:15:00,000 There's somebody there. 174 00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:02,000 He's probably not going to judge you too much. 175 00:15:02,000 --> 00:15:06,000 Or if he does, you're the only one that's going to know about it, right? 176 00:15:06,000 --> 00:15:10,000 So I would say that it is time. 177 00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:17,000 If I'm going to talk about work ethic, if I'm going to talk about being dedicated to showing 178 00:15:17,000 --> 00:15:22,000 that I'm up for the challenge, that I'm available, that I'm going to do anything, 179 00:15:22,000 --> 00:15:26,000 that also carries over to, hey, if I want to talk about sports every day, 180 00:15:26,000 --> 00:15:30,000 if I want to win, which is what it is in a competitive field, 181 00:15:30,000 --> 00:15:33,000 because there are a lot of people that would like to host this show. 182 00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:39,000 I know this, or host a show, that it's going to take some work to get better at it. 183 00:15:39,000 --> 00:15:45,000 So I still don't have incredible confidence in that setting, 184 00:15:45,000 --> 00:15:50,000 sitting down, conversation, delivery, all of that. 185 00:15:50,000 --> 00:15:56,000 I'll bet if you were able to go back and ask John, Jimmy, Dave at the time, 186 00:15:56,000 --> 00:16:01,000 hey, is Josh going to be a sports talk host every day? 187 00:16:01,000 --> 00:16:03,000 Is he going to sit here and do this at the time? 188 00:16:03,000 --> 00:16:06,000 They probably thought, well, he has the drive. 189 00:16:06,000 --> 00:16:07,000 He has the passion for it. 190 00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:08,000 There's no doubt about that. 191 00:16:08,000 --> 00:16:10,000 But is it going to come out of him? 192 00:16:10,000 --> 00:16:17,000 When I was a kid, at whatever point I decided, you know, I'm not going to be a professional athlete, 193 00:16:17,000 --> 00:16:19,000 but I want to host a sports talk show someday. 194 00:16:19,000 --> 00:16:23,000 I remember my dad saying, that's great, that's wonderful. 195 00:16:23,000 --> 00:16:27,000 You might want to have a plan B, because you don't really talk. 196 00:16:27,000 --> 00:16:28,000 Okay? 197 00:16:28,000 --> 00:16:35,000 So being an introvert and being shy and not having a big personality, natural talent, 198 00:16:35,000 --> 00:16:41,000 to get up in front of people and talk every day behind a microphone on the radio, 199 00:16:41,000 --> 00:16:44,000 now in front of a screen, that is not my natural ability. 200 00:16:44,000 --> 00:16:54,000 It's taking work. 201 00:16:54,000 --> 00:16:59,000 Throughout the Southeast and America, you guys are on fire right now. 202 00:16:59,000 --> 00:17:04,000 Talk a little bit about the show, YouTube, its reach and what has happened. 203 00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:08,000 So what we do every day is we get on the air and we talk about sports. 204 00:17:08,000 --> 00:17:15,000 But what Jason Swain and I really try to do, I think, is we try to make a connection as much as we can. 205 00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:17,000 We know that people listen every day. 206 00:17:17,000 --> 00:17:19,000 Some people listen every once in a while. 207 00:17:19,000 --> 00:17:22,000 But if they tune in, they want to connect with us. 208 00:17:22,000 --> 00:17:27,000 They want to connect through the conversation of UT sports or whatever is topical that day. 209 00:17:27,000 --> 00:17:32,000 But they come back because they've made a connection with us, we hope. 210 00:17:32,000 --> 00:17:39,000 So one way to do that is through the radio airwaves and that is what drives what we do every single day. 211 00:17:39,000 --> 00:17:44,000 But now with the advancement of technology, we have people streaming everywhere. 212 00:17:44,000 --> 00:17:46,000 We have people streaming locally. 213 00:17:46,000 --> 00:17:50,000 They put in their earbuds if they're at the office in Knoxville or East Tennessee. 214 00:17:50,000 --> 00:17:58,000 But if you're a Tennessee fan and you're in Cincinnati, Ohio or Seattle, Washington or Germany 215 00:17:58,000 --> 00:18:02,000 and you want to connect with University of Tennessee, you can do that more easily now. 216 00:18:02,000 --> 00:18:04,000 You can stream through audio. 217 00:18:04,000 --> 00:18:08,000 And then you mentioned the online YouTube aspect. 218 00:18:08,000 --> 00:18:13,000 The credit here goes to Swain for what he's built previously through the Swain event 219 00:18:13,000 --> 00:18:17,000 and understanding the digital world of what can be created. 220 00:18:17,000 --> 00:18:19,000 We've brought that to Josh and Swain. 221 00:18:19,000 --> 00:18:22,000 So people can watch the show and people can chat with us. 222 00:18:22,000 --> 00:18:27,000 There's a YouTube chat so people can connect with us that way and they can go back and watch. 223 00:18:27,000 --> 00:18:29,000 And there are ways to grow the show too. 224 00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:30,000 There are benefits to us. 225 00:18:30,000 --> 00:18:33,000 We can take short clips of that, share it online. 226 00:18:33,000 --> 00:18:39,000 If Swain says something that I think is really noteworthy with the Tennessee football team, fans want to see that. 227 00:18:39,000 --> 00:18:46,000 Social media has all kinds of negatives that we can come up with, but my belief with social media is to use it. 228 00:18:46,000 --> 00:18:48,000 Don't allow social media to use you. 229 00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:55,000 So we try to use it to create all different kinds of connections with our listeners and now with our viewers. 230 00:18:55,000 --> 00:19:04,000 I remember I would come past your studio and you had, I think you were using something called Tweet Deck or something like that. 231 00:19:04,000 --> 00:19:21,000 And I was watching this young broadcaster on the rise melding the worlds of terrestrial, traditional broadcasting with this new reach over social media and these other streaming platforms. 232 00:19:21,000 --> 00:19:26,000 And you guys are hitting it out of the park. What is your ultimate aspiration in the business? 233 00:19:26,000 --> 00:19:34,000 That is a good question. I've been in the business a while. I think I have a while to go. That's my hope. 234 00:19:34,000 --> 00:19:42,000 So I don't know. At one point it's probably, hey, I want to be program director of our sports radio station someday. 235 00:19:42,000 --> 00:19:45,000 Maybe that still is something that can happen. 236 00:19:45,000 --> 00:19:52,000 But what I think about right now is that connection that I talk about. Swain and I have done the show for a little more than two years. 237 00:19:52,000 --> 00:19:55,000 I would love to continue to grow what he and I are doing. 238 00:19:55,000 --> 00:20:05,000 I'm jealous when I look at the 16 now to 25 year olds that are so young and they have all of this technology of what they can do. 239 00:20:05,000 --> 00:20:10,000 I'm jealous of what they're able to do now, what they can build with that. 240 00:20:10,000 --> 00:20:17,000 We can still do some of that too, but the amount of time and access that they have, things that you can create instantly. 241 00:20:17,000 --> 00:20:20,000 Man, I wish I had more time with that. 242 00:20:20,000 --> 00:20:25,000 So my answer is not, okay, this is what my position, I want my position to be. 243 00:20:25,000 --> 00:20:31,000 This is not about how much money can I make or what accolades. 244 00:20:31,000 --> 00:20:36,000 It's about, okay, I'm from Knoxville. I do a show in Knoxville every day. 245 00:20:36,000 --> 00:20:42,000 I have an opportunity, I'm blessed to be able to connect with fans of the University of Tennessee. 246 00:20:42,000 --> 00:20:45,000 We have people that they're Alabama fans, they're Georgia fans. 247 00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:53,000 Swain will go at them, which is good for the show, but they come to us for either the information or the entertainment. 248 00:20:53,000 --> 00:20:58,000 And having people that I meet say, hey, you help me get through the day. 249 00:20:58,000 --> 00:21:06,000 I'm in my car doing sales, doing whatever, or you're my connections, fans that will come in for a game during the weekend. 250 00:21:06,000 --> 00:21:11,000 When they're out of town and say, hey, I wouldn't be able to connect with Tennessee football without you. 251 00:21:11,000 --> 00:21:16,000 Keeping that going, creating more of those relationships, that's what it's about. 252 00:21:16,000 --> 00:21:24,000 So our dad, you have three kids and you're married, and to watch you go from, hey, I've got my coutillion coming up. 253 00:21:24,000 --> 00:21:30,000 And now you're a father of three and you've got a successful career. 254 00:21:30,000 --> 00:21:32,000 I'm so proud of you, Josh Ward. 255 00:21:32,000 --> 00:21:36,000 Thank you. My wife, Kelly, she's a University of Tennessee grad, two degrees. 256 00:21:36,000 --> 00:21:41,000 So she's more advanced than me, photojournalism as a master's degree. 257 00:21:41,000 --> 00:21:43,000 So she's passed me up in the communications building as well. 258 00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:47,000 And then Owen Maxon Norris, six, four, and two, we're in the thick of it now. 259 00:21:47,000 --> 00:21:51,000 They are a wild crew, but I'm blessed beyond description. 260 00:21:51,000 --> 00:21:53,000 Thank you for being here today. 261 00:21:53,000 --> 00:21:55,000 Thank you.