Ari Michael Wolfe (born January 7, 1971) is an American sportscaster. Wolfe currently calls events for

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

, Stadium Network, Tennis Channel, the Kansas City Chiefs, Pac-12 Networks and NBC Sports. Additionally, Wolfe serves as an anchor and reporter for the

NFL Network NFL Network (occasionally abbreviated on-air as NFLN) is an American sports-oriented pay television network owned by the National Football League (NFL) and is part of NFL Media, which also includes NFL.com, NFL Films, NFL Mobile, NFL Now and N ...

. Wolfe is a 2-time NBC Sports Olympic broadcaster and a 2-time Emmy award winner for his work in college sports.

Early life and career

Wolfe was born in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Ma ...

and raised in

Madison Madison may refer to: People * Madison (name), a given name and a surname * James Madison (1751–1836), fourth president of the United States Place names * Madison, Wisconsin, the state capital of Wisconsin and the largest city known by this ...

Wisconsin Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake M ...

. He currently resides in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

. Wolfe graduated from

Emory University Emory University is a private research university in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1836 as "Emory College" by the Methodist Episcopal Church and named in honor of Methodist bishop John Emory, Emory is the second-oldest private institution of h ...

in 1994. He later earned his master's degree at USC. As a student Wolfe did both play-by-play and color commentary for the Trojans' basketball, football, and baseball teams on KSCR (104.7 FM) in Los Angeles. He also hosted the sports talk show ''Blackjack and the Wolfe Attack''. Before moving into commentary, Wolfe worked out of Los Angeles as a Highlight Coordinator, creating highlight packages of NFL football games for ''

Fox NFL Sunday ''Fox NFL Sunday'' is an American sports television program broadcast on the Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox television network. The show debuted on September 4, 1994, and serves as the pre-game show for the network's National Football League (NFL ...

''. He held similar responsibilities for Fox’s coverage of the

NHL The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...

and

MLB Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

Broadcasting career

Since graduating from USC in 1997, Wolfe has called games in college and professional sports. He currently calls events for NFL Network, ESPN, the Kansas City Chiefs, CBS Sports Network, Tennis Channel, Pac-12 Networks, NBC Sports and Stadium Network. Since 2009, Wolfe also serves as an anchor and reporter for NFL Network. He is a two-time Emmy winner. Beginning in 2019, Wolfe is the play-by-play announcer for the Kansas City Chiefs preseason games. He previously has called preseason games for the Philadelphia Eagles in 2005 and for the Minnesota Vikings from 2007-2011. For the 2014 NFL preseason, Wolfe called games with Kurt Warner for NFL Network broadcasts. Wolfe currently calls college football and college basketball for ESPN and Stadium Network with games airing on Facebook. He joined Stadium in 2014 and his primary role is calling Mountain West Conference games. 2009 marked the beginning of Wolfe's work for MTN and BTN. Wolfe served as the play-by-play announcer for football, and men's basketball games. Wolfe left BTN following the 2010 season, while his work with the

Mountain West Conference The Mountain West Conference (MW) is one of the collegiate athletic conferences affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) (formerly I-A). The MW officially began operations ...

continued until the network ceased operations in 2012. Wolfe has since called Mountain West football games for Root Sports and the Mountain West Network. Wolfe won his 2nd Emmy for his work during the 2014 Mountain West college football season on Root Sports. Wolfe began calling tennis for the Tennis Channel in 2017 and at the start of 2019, he agreed to a long-term contract to work at Tennis Channel thru 2022. For the 2019 Mountain West Tennis Championships, Wolfe served as the analyst on the Mountain West Digital Network. In 1998, Wolfe began his play-by-play career as the voice of the

Albany Firebirds The Indiana Firebirds were a team in the Arena Football League. The team was based in Indianapolis, Indiana. Home games were played at the Conseco Fieldhouse, also the home of the Indiana Pacers of the National Basketball Association and Indiana ...

, serving in that role for six seasons. When the Firebirds left the

Arena Football League The Arena Football League (AFL) was a professional arena football league in the United States. It was founded in 1986, but played its first official games in the 1987 season, making it the third longest-running professional football league in ...

(AFL), Wolfe was hired to be the play-by-play voice for the

Philadelphia Soul Philadelphia soul, sometimes called Philly soul, the Philadelphia sound, Phillysound, or The Sound of Philadelphia TSOP, is a genre of late 1960s–1970s soul music characterized by funk influences and lush instrumental arrangements, often feat ...

, where he remained until 2008. Wolfe has always been synonymous with the AFL. Leading up to 2018 season Wolfe called arena games for CBS Sports Network,

OLN OLN (formerly Outdoor Life Network) is a Canadian English-language Category A specialty channel. OLN primarily broadcasts factual-based and adventure-related reality programming aimed at male audiences. OLN is wholly owned by Rogers Sports & Me ...

, Versus and NFL Network. From 2005 to 2009 Wolfe was the play-by-play man for

Louisville Cardinals The Louisville Cardinals (also known as the Cards) are the NCAA athletic teams representing the University of Louisville. The Cardinals teams play in the Atlantic Coast Conference, beginning in the 2014 season. While playing in the Big East Co ...

football and men's basketball games. It was while working with the Cardinals in 2005 that Wolfe won his first

Sports Emmy The Sports Emmy Awards, or Sports Emmys, are part of the extensive range of Emmy Awards for artistic and technical merit for the American television industry. Bestowed by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS), the Sports E ...

for Outstanding Play-by-Play and his overall composite work. In addition to play-by-play at Louisville, Wolfe also hosted Courtside with Rick Pitino and Kickoff with Coach K. Wolfe's impressive resume led ESPN to hire him as the play-by-play man for the Madden Challenge in 2007, shown on Super Bowl Sunday on

ESPN2 ESPN2 is an American multinational pay television network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hearst Communications (which owns the remaining 20%). ESPN2 was initially ...

. He was also hired as one of their play-by-play men for the Big East Conference. In 2009, Wolfe was hired by

Universal Sports Universal Sports was an American sports-oriented digital cable and satellite television network. It was owned as a joint venture between InterMedia Partners (which owned a controlling 92% interest) and NBCUniversal (which owned the remaining 8%). ...

as the play-by-play announcer for events including World Cup of Rowing, the Women's World Ice Championships, and the World Table Tennis Championships. His work at Universal led

NBC Sports NBC Sports is an American programming division of the broadcast network NBC, owned and operated by NBC Sports Group division of NBCUniversal and subsidiary of Comcast. The division is responsible for sports broadcasts on the network, and it ...

to use him as their play-by-play announcer for Table Tennis at the 2012 Summer Olympics. Wolfe returned to NBC in 2016 to call Table Tennis for the Rio Olympics, and subsequently called for the Women's Table Tennis World Cup on ESPN in the fall of 2016. During 2014, Wolfe worked for NFL Network, ESPN, CBS, Root Sports, Time Warner Cable Sports Net, Campus Insiders and the Mountain West Network.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wolfe, Ari 1971 births Living people American radio sports announcers American television sports announcers Arena football announcers ArenaBowl broadcasters College baseball announcers in the United States College basketball announcers in the United States College football announcers Emory University alumni Minnesota Vikings announcers National Football League announcers NFL Europe broadcasters Olympic Games broadcasters Philadelphia Eagles announcers Sportspeople from Madison, Wisconsin Sportspeople from Philadelphia USC Trojans baseball announcers USC Trojans men's basketball announcers USC Trojans football announcers University of Southern California alumni