Jason "Jay" Crawford (born July 4, 1965) is an American TV news and sports anchor, who is best known nationally for his time at

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 ...

. Crawford anchored the live 11 p.m. edition of ''

SportsCenter ''SportsCenter'' (SC) is an American television sports news broadcasting show broadcast by ESPN. Originally anchored by Chris Berman, George Grande, Greg Gumbel, Lee Leonard, Bob Ley, Sal Marchiano and Lou Palmer, it premiered on Septem ...

'' with Chris McKendry until April 2017. Prior to that, Crawford spent nine years hosting ESPN's morning show ''

Cold Pizza ''Cold Pizza'' was an American television sports morning talk show that aired weekdays on ESPN2 from 2003 to 2007. The show's style was more akin to ''Good Morning America'' than ''SportsCenter''s straight news and highlights format. It included ...

'', its successor '' ESPN First Take'', and ''First Take'' spinoff '' 1st and 10''. He is currently a news anchor for

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

affiliate

WKYC-TV WKYC (channel 3) is a television station in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, affiliated with NBC and owned by Tegna Inc. Its studios are located on Tom Beres Way (a section of Lakeside Avenue in Downtown Cleveland named after the station's longt ...

3 in

Cleveland Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–U.S. maritime border and approximately west of the Ohio-Pennsylvania st ...

, seen on the station's 5 p.m. newscast since January 2020.

Biography

Early life

Born in

Sandusky, Ohio Sandusky ( ) is a city in Erie County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Situated on the southern shore of Lake Erie, Sandusky is located roughly midway between Toledo, Ohio, Toledo ( west) and Cleveland ( east). At the 2020 United Stat ...

, Crawford graduated from Perkins High School in Sandusky, Ohio in 1983. He went on to graduate from

Bowling Green State University Bowling Green State University (BGSU) is a Public university, public research university in Bowling Green, Ohio, United States. The main academic and residential campus is south of Toledo, Ohio. The university has nationally recognized progr ...

with a bachelor's degree in Radio, Television, and Film in 1987.

Career

Prior to joining

he was the local sports director for WFTS-TV in

Tampa, FL Tampa ( ) is a city on the Gulf Coast of the U.S. state of Florida. Tampa's borders include the north shore of Tampa Bay and the east shore of Old Tampa Bay. Tampa is the largest city in the Tampa Bay area and the county seat of Hillsboroug ...

from 1998 to 2003. Prior to that stint he had a similar role at WBNS-TV in

Columbus, OH Columbus (, ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities in Ohio, most populous city of the U.S. state of Ohio. With a 2020 United States census, 2020 census population of 905,748, it is the List of United States ...

from 1993 to 1998. He was a weekend sports anchor for WTIC-TV in

Hartford, CT Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. The city, located in Hartford County, had a population of 121,054 as of the 2020 census. Hartford is the most populous city in the Capitol Planning Region and the core city of ...

from 1992 to 1993. He started his sports career in 1987 at WYMT-TV in

Hazard, Kentucky Hazard is a home rule-class city in, and the county seat of, Perry County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 5,263 at the 2020 census. History Local landowner Elijah Combs Sr. laid out the town in 1824 as the planned seat of the ...

. Crawford made three appearances as a minor league baseball pitcher in 2005, splitting time between two independent teams, the St. Paul Saints and the Long Beach Armada. He registered ad with a 2.25 ERA, and in his final outing, Crawford threw two hitless innings, striking out each batter he faced using a change-up that reached a top speed of 62 mph, while his fastball was recorded at 93 mph. On May 21, it was announced via Twitter that in July 2012, Crawford will co-anchor ''

'' in the noon slot with Chris Mckendry replacing John Buccigross who moves to the 11:00PM slot. In 2004, he hosted some

horse racing Horse racing is an equestrian performance activity, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its bas ...

telecasts for

. On April 24, 2017, Crawford was laid off from his role as ''Sportscenter'' host in a string of cuts including over 100 ESPN employees.

Returning to Ohio

On September 26, 2017, BGSU announced that Crawford would join the university as an executive in residence. Crawford will be sharing his expertise with students and faculty in the School of Media and Communication, in the Department of Sport Management and with student-athletes. On April 11, 2018, the

Cleveland Browns The Cleveland Browns are a professional American football team based in Cleveland. The Browns compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC North, North division. The team is named after ...

announced that Crawford, alongside former Browns quarterback

Tim Couch Timothy Scott Couch (born July 31, 1977) is an American former professional American football, football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for five seasons with the Cleveland Browns. He played college football for the ...

, would call the team's preseason games. On May 28, 2019,

Tegna Tegna Inc. (stylized in all caps as TEGNA) is an American publicly traded broadcast, digital media and marketing services company headquartered in Tysons, Virginia. It was created on June 29, 2015, when the Gannett Company split into two publi ...

owned

affiliate

WKYC WKYC (channel 3) is a television station in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, affiliated with NBC and owned by Tegna Inc. Its studios are located on Tom Beres Way (a section of Lakeside Avenue in Downtown Cleveland named after the station's lo ...

channel 3 in Cleveland announced that Crawford would become the 5 p.m. news anchor when it started broadcasting in January 2020. In October 2019, he began to host an informal-style noontime show for the station, ''Lunch Break with Jay Crawford''. In January 2020, Crawford became channel 3's 5 p.m. news anchor alongside chief meteorologist Betsy Kling. In May 2022, Crawford began co-hosting on the Ultimate Cleveland Sports Show, a daily

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

talk show discussing Cleveland sports.

References

External links

Jay Crawford ESPN Bio

''First Take'' Show Information
* http://deadspin.com/a-running-list-of-espn-layoffs-1794664091 {{DEFAULTSORT:Crawford, Jay People from Sandusky, Ohio Bowling Green State University alumni 1965 births ESPN people Living people American television sports announcers American horse racing announcers Television anchors from Tampa, Florida Baseball announcers