Brad Michael Sham (born August 16, 1949) is an American sportscaster who is known as the "Voice of the

Dallas Cowboys The Dallas Cowboys are a professional American football team based in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. The Cowboys compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC East, East division. T ...

". Sham is currently the play-by-play announcer on the Dallas Cowboys Radio Network.

Biography

Sham has been with the Cowboys since 1976, when he was hired to be their color analyst alongside play-by-play man Verne Lundquist. Sham also held the position of Sports Director at former Cowboys Radio Network flagship station 1080 AM KRLD between 1976 and 1981. When Lundquist left for CBS in 1984, Sham became the lead play-by-play man, a position he has held ever since (save for three seasons in the mid-1990s). In 2003, Sham wrote ''Dallas Cowboys: Colorful Tales of America's Greatest Teams'' (). He also contributes weekly columns to dallascowboys.com. The 2009 season marked Sham's 30th year with the organization; the longest of any broadcaster with the team, albeit not consecutive due to his three-year absence from the club from 1995 to 1997. During his absence from the Cowboys, Sham called Texas Rangers games on the radio with Eric Nadel between 1995 and 1997. Sham has done NFL play-by-play for the ''

NFL on Westwood One ''The NFL on Westwood One Sports'' is the branding for Cumulus Broadcasting subsidiary Westwood One's radio coverage of the National Football League (NFL). These games are distributed throughout the United States and Canada (the latter through ...

'', the ''

NFL on Fox The ''NFL on Fox'' (also known as ''Fox NFL'') is the branding used for broadcasts of National Football League (NFL) games produced by Fox Sports (United States), Fox Sports and televised on the Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox broadcast network. ...

'', '' TNT Sunday Night Football'', and the ''

NFL on CBS ''NFL on CBS'' is an American television sports presentation show broadcast by CBS. It aired from September 30, 1956 to January 23, 1994. The show returned since September 6, 1998. The branding is used for the presentation of the National Foot ...

'' for one game in 2004. He has also worked games for

NFL Europe NFL Europe League (simply called NFL Europe and known in its final season as NFL Europa) was a professional American football league that functioned as the List of developmental and minor sports leagues, developmental minor league of the Nati ...

and 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 Arena Football League season, 1987 season, making it the third longest-runnin ...

's Dallas Desperados. Sham has extensive experience broadcasting collegiate sports, having done play-by-play for NCAA athletics, most notably the

NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship The NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, branded as March Madness, or The Big Dance, is a single-elimination tournament played in the United States to determine the men's college basketball national champion of the Division I level ...

and college football. He spent over a decade as the radio voice of the

Texas Longhorns The Texas Longhorns are the athletic teams representing the University of Texas at Austin. The teams are sometimes referred to as the Horns and take their name from Longhorn cattle that were an important part of the development of Texas, and ...

' football and basketball teams (mostly in the 1980s), which also aired on flagship KRLD and on the Mutual Southwest Radio Network. Sham has been in the booth for 26

Cotton Bowl Classic The Cotton Bowl Classic (also known as the Cotton Bowl) is an American college football bowl game played annually in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex since January 1, 1937. The game was originally played at its Cotton Bowl (stadium), namesake ...

s, calling play-by-play for 25 games and serving as the analyst for one. He has also served as a play-by-play broadcaster for the Big 12 Network basketball Saturdays, as well as for select

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 ...

Network Big 12 games. Sham has also worked

Major League Soccer Major League Soccer (MLS) is a professional Association football, soccer league in North America and the highest level of the United States soccer league system. It comprises 30 teams, with 27 in the United States and 3 in Canada, and is sanc ...

games for the Dallas Burn (now

FC Dallas FC Dallas is an American professional Association football, soccer club based in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. The club competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Western Conference (MLS), Western Conference. The franchise be ...

) and

North American Soccer League The North American Soccer League (NASL) was the top-level major professional soccer league in the United States and Canada that operated from 1968 to 1984. It is considered the first soccer league to be successful on a national scale in the ...

games for the

Dallas Tornado The Dallas Tornado was a soccer team based in Dallas, Texas that played in the North American Soccer League (NASL) from 1967 to 1981. Of the twelve teams that comprised the U.S. in 1967, the Tornado franchise played the longest–15 seasons. T ...

. He also provided color commentary for ESPN's coverage of the NASL in 1982. He also was part of the crew that covered the

1998 Winter Olympics The 1998 Winter Olympics, officially known as the and commonly known as Nagano 1998 (), were a winter multi-sport event held from 7 to 22 February 1998, mainly in Nagano, Nagano, Nagano, Nagano Prefecture, Japan, with some events ...

in Nagano, Japan. Sham made his acting debut in the 2008 movie, ''W.''

Honors

Sham has won the NSSA Texas Sportscaster of the Year award 11 times and is a member of the Texas Radio Hall of Fame. He was inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in 2020.

Personal life

Sham is

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

. Cory Provus, broadcaster for the

Minnesota Twins The Minnesota Twins are an American professional baseball team based in Minneapolis. The Twins compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) American League Central, Central Division. The team is named afte ...

, is his cousin. He graduated from the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou or MU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri, United States. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Univers ...

School of Journalism in 1970. He was a brother of the

Alpha Epsilon Pi Alpha Epsilon Pi (), commonly known as AEPi, is a college Fraternities and sororities, fraternity founded at New York University in 1913. The fraternity has more than 150 active chapters across the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Israel ...

fraternity. In the 1980s he owned a sporting apparel store named Brad Sham's Big League Threads.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sham, Brad Arena football announcers 1949 births Living people American Basketball Association announcers American radio sports announcers American television sports announcers American soccer commentators College basketball announcers in the United States College football announcers Dallas Cowboys announcers Dallas Mavericks announcers Jewish American sports announcers Major League Baseball broadcasters NBA broadcasters NFL announcers NFL Europe broadcasters North American Soccer League (1968–1984) commentators Mass media people from Dallas Texas Rangers (baseball) announcers Missouri School of Journalism alumni 21st-century American Jews Texas Longhorns football announcers Texas Longhorns men's basketball announcers