As Trey Wingo explains it, almost every broadcaster has had that moment, when an embarrassing on-air blunder comes almost out of nowhere.
Some are worse than others, although Wingo, the long-time broadcaster and guest on last week’s Subpar podcast, said his “almost ended my career.”
Wingo detailed the error on the podcast, which he said happened during one of his first overnight gigs on “SportsCenter.”
“It’s the first round of the Players Championship at Sawgrass in 1998, and the year before John Daly had gone just nuts,” Wingo said. “Had gotten drunk, missed his tee time, torn up his condo where he was staying, so it was his first attempt to try and get sober, try to clean up his life. He was teeing off a year after the fact, after his low point.”
Wingo said Daly had just received an AA coin symbolizing another month of sober living, which Wingo planned to work into his opening.
“And I’m writing this lede and thinking, this is going to be the greatest thing in the world. The words are just flowing off my lips onto the typewriter,” he said. “So I wrote this sentence right before he teed off: ‘John Daly received his coin signifying [however] many months of alcohol-free living.’ So it’s the dumbest way to say it, right? It’s just clumsy. I should have just said six months of being sober or being straight, whatever. But I wrote it ‘signifying six months of alcohol-free living.’
“And I swear to God, as I’m reading it on camera, I don’t know why, it came out of my mouth, ‘he received a coin signifying six-months of free alcohol.’ I could feel the blood rushing out of my face as we went to the highlights.”
Back then, Wingo explained, the show re-aired frequently, which meant some segments were beefed up and others were shortened as news broke. When they went to the next commercial, his coordinating producer told him, “Trey, we are going to need to fix that lead-in for the re-air.” Wingo, dejected, agreed.
You can listen to the complete interview with Wingo here or watch on YouTube below.
