CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. (CLARKSVILLENOW) – Legendary sports broadcaster Phil Wood recently came and spoke at the Clarksville Rotary Club. The former MASN television and radio host for the defending World Series champion Washington Nationals shared stories from their postseason run and how he envisions a MLB team in Tennessee sooner rather than later.
“I kind of talked in general about what it is that I do and about the Nationals,” Wood said. “I also shared how I’m convinced that in 10 years there will be a baseball team in Nashville. It’s a great market. The research shows that in this part of the country, people have no issue driving two or three hours to a sporting event. I think that with the right ownership they would do extremely well.”
Wood has worked in broadcasting for over 40 years, but it wasn’t until after he graduated college that he began to pursue one of his many passions in life.
“I went to Austin Peay and graduated in 1972 with a double major in History and English with a minor in sociology,” Wood said. “I did not have a clue what I wanted to do after. Certainly, the thought of broadcasting never entered my mind. I had written for the All State and I could always talk. In January of ’73, I started working for my father’s company as an electrical contractor which was unbelievably boring. After about three weeks of that, I was sitting at home and thought, ‘You know what? I bet it’d be fun to work in the media’. I applied to every television, radio station and newspaper in the greater Washington area where I grew up. I got one response and it was from WTOP. I got called in for an interview and sat across the desk from the news director.
“After getting more of a lecture on why I should really look for some other way to make a living, he finally asked me a question,” Wood said. “From where you live, how long does it take you get here? I answered and then he wrote on my resume 30 minutes and then underlined it. He shakes my hand and says we don’t really have anything now, but maybe in six months something will open up. Six days later, the assistant news director calls and says that they have an opening they weren’t expecting and it’s mine if I want it. I said great when do I start? He said in 45 minutes. It says here that you can be here in 30. For awhile I was a glorified copy boy, but before I knew it, I was writing scripts for the news guys in the studio to read when they did sports. I stayed there as a news writer until ’77. Then WRC radio which was the NBC affiliate in D.C. had gone from music to a news talk format. They offered me a job as a news writer and producer.”
While there, Wood worked on a sports talk show and would later be thrust into the host role after filling in one weekend for the normal host.
“I thought okay we’ll you’ve never done this before and after this you’ll never do it again, so just make the most of it and have some fun,” Wood said. “I figured worst case scenario I could just read scores for four hours. Surprisingly, people called in and asked stuff that I actually knew. The next thing I know the show is over and I’m done. Monday, I go back to work and the news director tells me from now on I’m the substitute host.
“After they figured out I could do that, I worked as a news reporter and then they made me a news anchor,” Wood said. “I started doing the night show and it went very well. Sometimes I talked about sports, sometimes it was pop culture, rock and roll, old D.C. history or anything else I wanted. It was wonderful. Not long after, my old employer WTOP called and offered me a job to do a sports talk show wrapped around Orioles baseball, Capitals hockey, Bullets basketball and UVA basketball. I worked there until ’82…To make a long story short, things really changed when baseball moved back to D.C. in 2005.”
During March of his senior year in high school, Wood eventually decided on a college to attend after a friend pitched him on the idea of going to Austin Peay State University.
“I get asked that a lot,” Wood said on what brought him to Clarksville. “I was playing in a rock and roll band at the time and the keyboard player was a guy named Steve White. He said he applied to Austin Peay, got accepted there and that’s where he planned on going after graduation. He showed me the brochure and it folded out like a road map. It was an artist rendering of an aerial view of the campus. It was lush and beautiful. I thought to myself, ‘I’m a guitar player and this place is just 45 minutes west of Nashville. What’s not to like?’
“I literally applied on a Monday and was accepted on a Friday,” Wood said. “I said, ‘well Mom and Dad this is where I’m going’. So, I came down here in the fall of ’68. I roomed with Steve White at Miller Hall. Within two weeks, I’m just ingrained in the Clarksville music scene. I’m playing in my dorm room one day and a kid named Bobby Daniels heard me playing. He asked me to come out and sit in for his band for the night at Fort Campbell so I did. From there, I started to get calls from other bands to play with them and begin to get a little exposure locally. Playing guitar in a rock and roll band was really all I wanted to do with my life. Eventually my dad told me, ‘You know what son? Guitar players are a dime a dozen’. He was absolutely right. I realized once I graduated from college that my rock and roll days were pretty much over.”
As a current adjunct professor at his alma mater, Wood shared how his classes have gone since deciding to return to Clarksville to teach.
“It varies from year to year,” Wood said. “In a class of 15, it only takes two or three to make it really worthwhile and fulfilling. What bothers me more than anything is that the kids who sign up to major in sports media go into it thinking it’s easy. Then they find out they can’t do it and there’s actual work involved. Over the years, I’ve spoken to dozens of kids out of class because I think that’s probably more of my duty than just giving lectures in classrooms.”
With the Nationals recently capturing the World Series, Wood believes it was a storybook ending to a long and illustrious career for himself.
“I’ve been doing this Saturday morning television show called Nats Talk with Mike Wallace who pitched in the big leagues back in the ’70’s,” Wood said. “Mike and I talked about it and he said, ‘this will be our 10th year, so let’s do 10 and then ride off into the sunset’. That’ll be it for broadcasting at that point. After that, I’ll be down here more often.”
If it were up to Wood to choose his own replacement in the booth, he wouldn’t likely pick from the typical broadcaster demographic pool.
“There’s too many old white guys doing what I do and I’m a big believer in diversity,” Wood said. “I’d love to see more women get involved in sport broadcasting. I’d also like to see more minorities do it. Times change and in the years to come, I think there will be much more opportunities for women and minorities.”
Even though Wood still currently resides in his Maryland home, there are many things about the city of Clarksville that keep him coming back.
“I felt like Clarksville was more of my home than the D.C. area because I’d go home for the holidays and couldn’t wait to get back here,” Wood said. “I had a circuit of friends here who are still my friends years later. Much better friends than kids I knew in junior high and high school. My wife also really liked it here and my daughter Becky is here now pursuing her Master’s Degree. It’s a great place to live.”