Keith Theodore Olbermann (pronounced /ˈoʊlbərmən/ ; born January 27, 1959) is an American political commentator and writer . A former sportscaster and news anchor , Olbermann most recently hosted Countdown with Keith Olbermann , an hour-long nightly commentary program on MSNBC . Olbermann spent the first twenty years of his career in sports journalism. He was a sports correspondent for CNN and for local TV and radio stations in the 1980s, winning the Best Sportscaster award from the California Associated Press three times. He later co-hosted ESPN 's SportsCenter from 1992 to 1997. After leaving ESPN amid controversy, Olbermann became a sports anchor and producer for Fox Sports Net from 1998 to 2001, during which time he hosted Fox's studio coverage of baseball . After leaving Fox, Olbermann re-joined MSNBC after a hiatus, hosting Countdown with Keith Olbermann from 2003 until 2011. Olbermann has established a niche in cable news commentary, gaining note for his pointed criticism of major politicians and public figures, directed particularly at the political right .[2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] He has feuded with rival Fox News Channel commentator Bill O'Reilly [8] [9] and strongly criticized the George W . Bush administration and John McCain 's unsuccessful 2008 Presidential candidacy .[10] Although he has said on at least one occasion "I'm not a liberal; I'm an American",[11] many describe Olbermann as a liberal .[12] [13] [14] [15]
Early life
Olbermann was born January 27, 1959, in New York City to Marie Katherine (née Charbonier), a preschool teacher, and Theodore Olbermann, a commercial architect, and is of German descent. He has one younger sister, Jenna, who was born in 1968. Olbermann grew up in a Unitarian household in the town of Hastings-on-Hudson in Westchester County , and attended Hackley School in nearby Tarrytown .
Olbermann became a devoted fan of baseball at a young age, a love he inherited from his mother who was a lifelong New York Yankees fan. As a teenager, he often wrote about baseball card-collecting and appeared in many sports card-collecting periodicals of the mid-1970s. He is also referenced in Sports Collectors Bible, a 1979 book by Bert Sugar , which is considered one of the important early books for trading card collectors.
While at Hackley, Olbermann began his broadcasting career as a play-by-play announcer for WHTR. After graduating from Hackley in 1975, Olbermann enrolled at Cornell University at the age of 16. At college, Olbermann served as sports director for WVBR , a student-run commercial radio station in Ithaca . Olbermann graduated from Cornell in 1979 with a B.S. in communications arts..
Sports broadcasting
Olbermann began his professional career at UPI and the RKO Radio Network before joining then nascent CNN in 1981. Among the early stories he covered was the 1980 Winter Olympics at Lake Placid including the Miracle on Ice . In the early-to-mid '80s he was a sportscaster on the old WNEW 1130-AM radio station in New York City. Also in the mid-1980s, he did the voice-over on the USA Cable Network's "Cartoon Express", with cheering kids heard in the background. In 1984, he briefly worked as a sports anchor at WCVB-TV in Boston , before heading to Los Angeles to work at KTLA and KCBS . His work there earned him 11 Golden Mike Awards , and he was named best sportscaster by the California Associated Press three times.
ESPN
In 1992, Olbermann joined ESPN 's SportsCenter , a position he held until 1997 with the exception of a period from 1993–1994 when he was at ESPN2 on SportsNight . He joined ESPN2 as their "marquee" personality to help launch the network. He often co-hosted SportsCenter 11 PM show with Dan Patrick , the two becoming a popular anchor team. In 1995, Olbermann won a Cable ACE award for Best Sportscaster. Olbermann later co-authored a book with Patrick called The Big Show about their experiences working at SportsCenter; he also said that the short-lived ABC dramedy Sports Night based on his time on SportsCenter with Patrick. He made $350,000 at the end of his tenure at ESPN.
Early in 1997, Olbermann was suspended for two weeks after he made an unauthorized appearance on The Daily Show on Comedy Central with then-host and former ESPN colleague Craig Kilborn . At one point in the show, he referred to Bristol, Connecticut (ESPN's headquarters), as a "'Godforsaken place." Later that year, Olbermann abruptly left ESPN under a cloud of controversy, apparently burning his bridges with the network's management; this began a long and drawn-out feud between Olbermann and ESPN. Between 1997 and 2007, incidents between the two sides included Olbermann's publishing an essay on Salon.com in November 2002, titled "Mea Culpa", in which he stated: "I couldn't handle the pressure of working in daily long-form television, and what was worse, I didn't know I couldn't handle it." The essay told of an instance when his former bosses remarked he had "too much backbone," a claim that is literally true, as Olbermann has six lumbar vertebrae instead of the normal five.
In 2004, Olbermann was not included in ESPN's guest lineup for its twenty-fifth anniversary SportsCenter "Reunion Week," which saw Craig Kilborn and Charley Steiner return to the SportsCenter set. In 2007, ten years after Olbermann's departure, in an appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman , he said: "If you burn a bridge, you can possibly build a new bridge, but if there's no river any more, that's a lot of trouble." During the same interview, Olbermann stated that he had recently learned that as a result of ESPN's agreeing to let him return to the airwaves, he was banned from ESPN's main (Bristol, Connecticut ) campus.
Post-SportsCenter
In 1998, Olbermann joined Fox Sports Net as anchor and executive producer for The Keith Olbermann Evening News , a sportscast similar to SportsCenter, airing weekly on Sunday evenings. While at Fox, he again hosted the 2000 World Series as well as Fox Broadcasting 's baseball Game of the Week . In July 1999, Olbermann also guest starred ten times on the Hollywood Squares .
According to Olbermann, he was fired from Fox in 2001 after reporting on rumors that Rupert Murdoch , whose News Corporation owns Fox, was planning on selling the Los Angeles Dodgers . When asked about Olbermann, Murdoch said: "I fired him...He's crazy." News Corp. went on to sell the Dodgers to Frank McCourt in 2004. That year, Olbermann remarked, "Fox Sports was an infant trying to stand [in comparison to ESPN], but on the broadcast side there was no comparison--ESPN was the bush leagues."
After Olbermann left Fox Sports in 2001, he provided twice-daily sports commentary on the ABC Radio Network , reviving the "Speaking of Sports" and "Speaking of Everything" segments begun by Howard Cosell .
In 2005, Olbermann made a return to ESPN on the radio when he began co-hosting an hour of the syndicated Dan Patrick Show on ESPN radio , a tenure that lasted until Patrick left ESPN on August 17, 2007. Olbermann and Patrick referred to this segment as "The Big Show," just as their book was known. Patrick often introduced Olbermann with the tagline "saving the democracy," a nod to his work on Countdown.
On April 16, 2007, Olbermann was named co-host of Football Night in America , NBC's NFL pre-game show that precedes their Sunday Night NFL game , a position which reunited him in 2008 with his former SportsCenter co-anchor Dan Patrick . Olbermann left the show prior to the start of the 2010 season.
News journalism
In 1997, Olbermann left ESPN to host a primetime show on MSNBC , The Big Show with Keith Olbermann (ESPN objected to the use of the title). The news-driven program, with substantial discussion, relied on Olbermann to carry the 8 to 9 PM hour. The show typically covered three or four topics in a one-hour broadcast. Olbermann also occasionally hosted the weekend edition of NBC Nightly News .
When the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke in 1998, The Big Show with Keith Olbermann morphed into White House in Crisis. Olbermann became frustrated as his show was consumed by the Lewinsky story. In 1998, he stated that his work at MSNBC would "make me ashamed, make me depressed, make me cry."
bill press keith olbermann continue hate speech against sarah
Apparently some in the liberal media did not take President Obama's speech to heart. Keith Olbermann and Bill Press continued to ratchet up their attacks less Read the rest
keith olbermann compares glenn to shooter calls on beck to
Keith Olbermann and MSNBC must be sued in a "class action People have died because of the actions of a lunatic. I hear he has a body like the alien on American Dad. Read the rest
olbermann watch msnbc's countdown with keith olbermann
In Time to Ratchet Up the Smears: It's Another Special Education Comment! ryder20 wrote: I find this whole scenario self serving. These politicians (and more impormore Read the rest
keith olbermann imdb
Keith Olbermann, Actor: Countdown w/ Keith Olbermann. Author / sportswriter / radio commentator / TV pundit Keith Olbermann's first book, "The Major League Coaches", was Read the rest
keith olbermann wikipedia the free encyclopedia
Keith Theodore Olbermann (pronounced /ˈoʊlbərmən/; born January 27, 1959) is an American political commentator and writer. He was formerly a sportscaster and news anchor Read the rest
countdown with keith olbermann countdown with keith olbermann
Nine days since Tucson. In a Special Comment, Countdown's Keith Olbermann recounts asking every politician and commentator to renounce violent rhetoric and apologize for any Read the rest
keith olbermann msnbc tv countdown with keith olbermann
Keith Olbermann is host of "Countdown with Keith Olbermann." "Countdown," a unique newscast that counts down the day's top stories with Keith's particular Read the rest
olbermann 'worst persons' changing following arizona shooting video
Keith Olbermann announced Monday a major change coming to one of his broadcast's signature segment: the Worst Persons in the World. The "Countdown" host said he Read the rest
msnbc's olbermann blames republicans for tucson shooting
In nine-minute commentary on MSNBC Saturday, Keith Olbermann sought to attribute "death fantasies and dreams of blood lust" to the Tea Party movement and to the Republican Read the rest
youtube keith olbermann special comment on gabrielle
08 January, 2011 MSNBC This feature is not available right now. Please try again later. Read the rest