A Master on The Microphone
Stepping into the announcing world is tough. Having producers yell in your ear and not trying to completely steal the spotlight from the performers in the ring has to be extremely difficult, but I have never seen a smoother transition onto commentary from anyone like Corey Graves has. He is smart, modern and really has excellent timing on when he can overstep Michael Cole, Tom Phillips or Bryon Saxton. Why is he successful?
Corey Graves is a student of the game. He loves it and loves what it does to his creative juices. When I watched his farewell video, I was not surprised. I knew he would do whatever it took to be successful. This is a guy making a few dollars on a Saturday night at 12am just to get some experience in commentary. He would come in, leave his wife and child in the middle of the night and talk to maybe a few hundred people over the airwaves. I always respected him, always enjoyed my interactions with him and can’t wait to see how great he can become.
Does he remember some jamoche producer that was 21 years old making 7 bucks an hour at CBS Radio? Probably not. I wasn’t important and made sure I did my job before interacting with him. I will say that he always made sure that someone not in the highest of rankings would never feel that way. Whether it was something as simple as offering to grab me a water or coffee (mind you, as a producer you have very little time to escape the glass wall studio to leave) or even going out of his way to banter about sports, Corey was a good dude. I am loving his work in WWE and think he deserves every piece of it.
