Whit Watson
A four-time Emmy winner and ten-time nominee, Whit Watson has been working in sports media since his teens. During a tenure with Golf Channel and the NBC Sports Group that started in 2010, he’s called live golf in seven countries for five different men’s and women’s professional tours, in addition to studio work on “Golf Central” and college basketball games on NBCSN. In 2022, he added PGA TOUR LIVE streaming coverage on ESPN＋ to his busy calendar.
Concurrent with his television duties at Golf Channel, Whit has played a key role with Westwood One Sports at The Masters, conducting daily player interviews and securing an exclusive interview with the winner each year. His experience in Augusta includes Tiger Woods’ historic fifth green jacket in 2019 and Dustin Johnson’s record-setting performance in 2020.
Whit was a familiar face in his native Florida for seven years (2003-2010) as a play-by-play announcer and lead studio host for Sun Sports and FOX Sports Florida (now Bally Sports Sun and Bally Sports Florida). His play-by-play duties included NCAA basketball, football, and baseball, plus high school state championships in football and basketball. At the pro level, Whit was a host and reporter for the NBA’s Orlando Magic and Miami Heat, the NHL’s Tampa Bay Lightning, and MLB’s Tampa Bay Rays, in addition to hosting highlight shows, talk shows, and even a live in-studio fishing show. Whit’s time in the Sunshine State took him to the World Series, the NBA Finals, the Stanley Cup Finals, and college football’s national championship game.
Before moving to Golf Channel, Whit appeared on SEC Network as the primary studio host for men’s college basketball coverage during the 2009-2010 season, and was on location for the 2010 SEC Men’s Basketball Tournament in Nashville.
From 1997 through 2003, Whit was a studio host at ESPN in Bristol, Connecticut, hosting the network’s iconic “SportsCenter,” frequent stints on ESPNEWS, and specialty shows on ESPN2 — notably, the weekend edition of “RPM 2Night”, the network’s signature motorsports program. When not on the air in Bristol, he hosted and reported from events as disparate as the Indianapolis 500 and the Boston Marathon.
An internship in the Broadcast department of his hometown Orlando Magic during the 1993-94 NBA season led Whit to a full-time position with the franchise as Associate Producer. In addition to writing and producing video features for television, Whit became the team’s first-ever sideline reporter for radio broadcasts. In four seasons with the Magic, Whit reported from several NBA All-Star Games and was with the team when they reached the NBA Finals for the first time in 1995.
Whit Watson’s long journey in sports media began at WVBR-FM in Ithaca, New York, an independent, student-run radio station where he eventually rose to Sports Director. Whit received a B.A. in English from Cornell University in 1993.
He currently lives in Orlando with his wife, Tracey. The couple has two grown children.