From staff reports
TRUSSVILLE – Beginning Aug. 19, The Trussville Tribune will present a new high school sports show called “Legacy Credit Union Tribune Sports Live driven by Serra Mazda,” Tribune publisher Scott Buttram announced on Wednesday.
The weekly online TV show features in-depth analysis of high school football at Hewitt-Trussville, Clay-Chalkville and Pinson Valley.
“There will be two shows,” Buttram said. “On Sunday afternoon the highlight show will be online. It will be similar to the highlights broadcast by local news stations on Friday night, but obviously with more content focusing only on our three high schools. The Tuesday night show will be more in-depth with live guest interviews, more feature-oriented and will broadcast live.”
Each show will be streamed live at TribuneSportsLive.com every Tuesday at 7 p.m. this fall. The show will be hosted by Pat Smith, a veteran broadcaster with more than 20 years of radio and TV experience covering high school and college football.
Smith will be joined by producer Dennis Washington and marketing director Pat Coyne.
“Our multimedia content has been popular with our readers in the past,” Buttram said. “To be able to partner with these guys to produce a television quality, and the experience and talent they bring to the table, is an incredible opportunity for the Tribune.”
Smith co-created, managed, produced and guest hosted ESPN’s “Paul Finebaum Show.” His radio work has earned him five Associated Press awards for Best Sports and he was named one of the “Top 40 under 40” by the Birmingham Business Journal.
Washington founded Cross Digital in 2013. Prior to that, he worked at WBRC FOX 6 as a meteorologist, storm chaser, photographer and director of digital content.
Coyne works for BRUM Advertising and is the founder of VenueStream. He’s spent the past 12 years in media and advertising sales, including eight at WJOX.
“We believe we cover three of the best high schools in the metro area,” Buttram said. “I think our readers will enjoy the in-depth coverage they’ll see on Tribune Sports Live.”
Smith, a Trussville resident, said he looks forward to using his experience to highlight local athletes.
“I live here and I’m very familiar with these teams,” Smith said. “I’ve been fortunate to develop a lot of national contacts over the years, which I hope to use to our advantage as we cover area high school athletes and watch many of them emerge as college prospects.”
Washington, who works with clients to brand their business through social media, said local content is the key growth area for media.
“Options for national and world news are growing every day through the Internet,” Washington said. “Local news, weather and sports are what consumers are really craving. We’ll be taking the local content that the Tribune is already providing and expanding it in a way that will be very appealing to the readers and viewers.”
For Coyne, it was the local connection that drew him to the project.
“I’ve worked with clients that are trying to make a statewide or regional connection with potential customers,” Coyne said. “But there are far more businesses looking to target the market at their doorstep through affordable advertising. The market saturation of the Tribune of northeast Jefferson and St. Clair counties is phenomenal and it’s perfect for so many businesses. The response from business has exceeded our expectations and we’ve only scratched the surface.”
The Tribune is considering future multimedia offerings in addition to the high school football program. The expansion of digital television quality programming via the Internet could lead to local news and weather reports as well as a show focusing on local businesses and industry.
