{"id":28907,"date":"2019-10-01T19:23:43","date_gmt":"2019-10-01T23:23:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/?post_type=bu-article&p=28907"},"modified":"2021-04-30T17:24:38","modified_gmt":"2021-04-30T21:24:38","slug":"bob-fishman-is-ahead-of-the-game","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/articles\/bob-fishman-is-ahead-of-the-game\/","title":{"rendered":"Bob Fishman Is Ahead of the Game"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By 9 am on a steamy Florida morning in September, tour buses have already begun unloading football fans outside Hard Rock Stadium. Nearby tailgaters begin setting up grills, coolers and beach chairs. Kickoff for the Miami Dolphins\u2013New England Patriots matchup is four hours away, but the football world is already focused on this game. Fans, gamblers, fantasy football managers, Patriots lovers and Patriots haters all want to see if Antonio Brown\u2014signed by the Patriots on the preceding Monday and accused of rape the next day\u2014will play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s week two of the 2019 NFL season and seated in the second of four tractor trailers that make up his team\u2019s mobile production studio, Bob Fishman (\u201969), the director of CBS Sports\u2019 broadcast of the game, talks into his headset. \u201cYou\u2019re excused from the camera meeting,\u201d he tells one of his camera operators, giving him an early assignment: wait for the Patriots bus to arrive and get a shot of Brown stepping off. The CBS crew working the game consists of more than 40 people, but it\u2019s Fishman who will call the shots that make up the live broadcast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fifteen minutes later, he sits down with his camera crew in a nearby catering tent. \u201cDom, your day is about to change,\u201d he says to the operator of camera 20, perched high above the 50-yard line. He gives him the job of following Brown all game, whether he\u2019s playing or not. Then Fishman runs through other potential story lines for the day. He mentions the Patriots\u2019 past struggles in hot weather. \u201cWatch for guys sucking oxygen or standing under fans,\u201d he says. And he mentions the two teams\u2019 owners: \u201cKraft and Steven Ross\u2014we must get on-screen today,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Fishman\u2019s 44-year career at CBS Sports has included 20 Daytona 500s, 27 US Opens, 37 NCAA basketball tournaments and three Olympic Games. He\u2019ll be inducted into the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame in December 2019.\u00a0Photo by John P. Filo\/CBS<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

He\u2019s laying the groundwork for shots he may need in the game. Each play, and there will be more than 120 of them, is a mini-story that Fishman tells on the fly using replays and other shots that provide context for the action. To do so, he will coordinate with producer Mark Wolff, associate director Brian Jagoda and technical director Terri Rozic to select replays, reaction shots and graphics. All of this happens at a rapid pace, with Fishman directing cuts from one shot to another just seconds before the images appear on millions of television screens. \u201cWe\u2019re not creating the game, we\u2019re documenting the game,\u201d he says. \u201cBut you can turn it into a creative process by juxtaposing the winners and losers in a creative way.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fishman ends his camera crew meeting with a simple message: \u201cI love you guys being aggressive, but let\u2019s always get back for the snap.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 44 years with CBS Sports, Fishman has directed 27 US Open Tennis Championships, 20 Daytona 500 NASCAR races, three Olympic figure skating competitions, two World Series and countless other events including college football, professional basketball, and horse racing. Fishman now works just NFL and NCAA basketball games. He\u2019s CBS\u2019 lead director for the NCAA basketball tournament\u2014\u201cMarch Madness\u201d\u2014a role he\u2019s filled since the first time it was broadcast, in 1982, with just one exception: Fishman missed the 1990 tournament to receive a bone marrow transplant for non-Hodgkin\u2019s lymphoma. He\u2019s received 16 Emmys, three Directors Guild of America awards, and in December he\u2019ll be inducted into the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Broadcast Pioneer <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Fishman\u2019s first exposure to broadcast sports came as a kid in the Virgin Islands where his parents managed a resort. He could pick up Spanish-language broadcasts from Puerto Rico and rebroadcast baseball games of his beloved Dodgers on shortwave radio early in the morning. \u201cI wanted to be a baseball announcer,\u201d he says. He also played soccer, which took him to Claremont Men\u2019s College (now Claremont McKenna) before he transferred to BU. At COM, he studied film and television production and knew he wanted to apply that to sports. \u201cI realized I wasn\u2019t going to be an announcer because there were a lot of people better than me,\u201d Fishman says. \u201cBut I had an affinity for behind-the-scenes stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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