Dick Crippen is a former sports and weatherman anchor in the

Tampa Bay Tampa Bay is a large natural harbor and shallow estuary connected to the Gulf of Mexico on the west-central coast of Florida, comprising Hillsborough Bay, McKay Bay, Old Tampa Bay, Middle Tampa Bay, and Lower Tampa Bay. The largest freshwater i ...

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

, television market. Crippen began his career at

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Broadcasting * Aliw Broadcasting Corporation, Philippine broadcast company * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial American ...

affiliate (Now

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

) WLCY-TV Channel 10 in 1965 as one of the station's first on-air personalities. In 1981, he left for rival

WFLA-TV WFLA-TV (channel 8) is a television station licensed to Tampa, Florida, United States, serving as the NBC affiliate for the Tampa Bay area. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside St. Petersburg, Florida, St. Petersburg–licensed The CW, C ...

. He anchored the evening sportscasts until the late 1990s. In the late 1970s through 1984 he was the public address announcer for

Tampa Bay Rowdies The Tampa Bay Rowdies are an American professional soccer team based in St. Petersburg, Florida. The club was founded in 2008 and first took the pitch in 2010. Since 2017, the Rowdies have been members of the USL Championship in the second tie ...

home soccer games at

Tampa Stadium Tampa Stadium (nicknamed The Big Sombrero and briefly known as Houlihan's Stadium) was a large open-air stadium (maximum capacity about 74,000) located in Tampa, Florida, which opened in 1967 and was significantly expanded in 1974–75. The fac ...

. He also served as the

Tampa Bay Buccaneers The Tampa Bay Buccaneers (colloquially known as the Bucs) are a professional American football team based in Tampa, Florida. The Buccaneers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC S ...

' radio play-by-play announcer for the first half of the 1978 season. Crippen has done play-by-play work on the Water Channel's ''American Powerboat Television'',

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

's coverage of Unlimited Hydroplane Circuit, as well as

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. It is considered to be one of the top ranked motorsports organizations in ...

's Motor Racing Network.The Water Channel
He also hosted an hour-long weekly sports show called ''Bay Sports with Dick Crippen'' on the

Spectrum Sports Spectrum Sports (abbreviated as SPECTSN), also known under the corporate names Spectrum Networks, or Charter Sports Regional Networks, is the collective name for a group of regional sports networks in the United States that are primarily owned a ...

cable channel. The show aired on Wednesday evenings at 8 pm and repeated on Friday and Sunday nights at 8 pm. The show ended when Spectrum Sports folded in 2017. Crippen now works in community development and as senior advisor for the

Tampa Bay Rays The Tampa Bay Rays are an American professional baseball team based in the Tampa Bay area. The Rays compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) American League East, East Division. They are one of two major ...

baseball team. Dick is also a popular speaker speaking on sports, motivation and broadcasting. He is a popular host of many local events, including athletic ceremonies at the

University of South Florida The University of South Florida (USF) is a Public university, public research university with its main campus located in Tampa, Florida, Tampa, Florida, United States, and other campuses in St. Petersburg, Florida, St. Petersburg and Sarasota, ...

References

External links

Crippen gets more time to tell his tales

* ttp://tampabay.devilrays.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/team/front_office.jsp?c_id=tb Crippen Senior Advisor
Bay Sports with Dick Crippen

Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American sports announcers Tampa Bay Buccaneers announcers Tampa Bay Rays Tampa Bay Rowdies Television anchors from Tampa, Florida {{US-journalist-20thC-stub