Shane Sparks: "A Pretty Blessed Life"
The Big Ten Network and ESPN's Shane Sparks came from tiny Ripon, WI, clinging to and working towards a childhood dream. He now gets to live it.
ThrowBack: Continuing to move archived pieces to this new Substack platform. This piece - from February, 2024 - spotlighted one of college wrestling’s most popular media personalities.
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Shane Sparks remembers when he was first bitten by the broadcasting bug.
Sparks - one of the most recognizable personalities for the Big Ten Network and ESPN’s college wrestling broadcast team - frequently and purposefully looks back. Being thankful does that.
“It was 1984,” Sparks said. “Baseball’s All Star game. My mom always liked baseball; she’s probably the reason I fell in love with the game.
“I was sitting in the basement with her, I’m eight years old, and when they started doing the lineup, I started doing the lineups on my own.
“I can’t describe it. I loved everything about it.”
If Sparks’ childhood dreams were a garden, his mother, Bonnie, was perpetual, nurturing water.
“My mom was always supportive in all I did. I remember that night in the basement, and when I was done, she complimented the job I’d done. She told me I was actually good. That’s really where it started.”
The drama, specifically, captivated Sparks.
“I loved the show. I loved the presentation. I realized then and there I loved that stuff.”
Fast forward a few years. As Sparks recalls, he was 10 or 11.
“I got the chance to do my earliest baseball game broadcasting,” he said. “I kinda just stumbled into it. There was a baseball park not far from my house in my hometown of Ripon, Wisconsin. I’d walked up there to watch the games, and they ended up letting me do the lineups and a little bit of play by play behind the microphone for their 12 year-old youth baseball tournament. I think the people appreciated the passion of this 10 year old kid.”
“I loved it - I mean, I really loved it.
***
The late Skip Prosser, former head basketball coach at Xavier University and Wake Forest, once described the exuberance and inexhaustible work ethic of his assistant coach, Pat Kelsey.
“The guy makes coffee nervous,” Prosser said.
Prosser’s memorable quip applies to Sparks.
If energy were a small hill, Sparks is Mount Everest. His infectious zeal when calling a match - especially one with a few thunderous mat-returns - is evident. Sparks makes it all look easy. It isn’t. While enthusiasm is a palpable ingredient to his makeup, Sparks knows enthusiasm alone is insufficient.
For each assignment, Sparks prepares.
“I’ll call him to say hi or just to chat with him,” Bonnie said. “And we’ll talk a little, but a lot of times he has to say, ‘Mom, I really gotta get ready for this match.’ He’ll either need to get to bed because he’s waking up at two in the morning to study, read all the stats on each wrestler and (teams), or he’s already been awake since early in the morning working on things. He puts in so much time just to get ready for a match.
“One of his favorite sayings is, ‘Get the facts. If you don’t have the facts, don’t say it.’ He’s lived by that throughout his entire broadcasting career.”
***
While the first whisper of a career-calling may have taken place in his basement announcing All Star starters, Sparks remembers another pivotal day in his broadcasting journey only three years later.
The hometown Milwaukee Brewers were hosting the Detroit Tigers. Sparks remembers the exact date.
“July 1, 1987,” he said. “It was a Wednesday. I remember on the drive to the stadium, when the ballpark came into view. The excitement got me emotional. I can’t put into words the feeling I’d get as a young kid going to baseball games, the smells of the ballpark, all of it. We didn’t go to many - maybe one game a year - but I remember that game. And I’m telling you seriously here, right around the 6th inning, I went into a depression mode because I didn't want it to end.
“I remember my mom noticing and looking at me and asking if I was okay. And I remember telling her, ‘I’m gonna work at places like this someday.’ My mom said, ‘Yep, you are.’ That was a game changer for me. That was the kind of belief Mom had in me.
“A thousand gallons of gasoline was poured into those two examples: my trips to Milwaukee County Stadium and calling lineups and a little play by play at the youth ballpark. The fire in me was blazing.”
***
Moments of gratitude nudge Sparks to think of Don Gregor, his fifth grade teacher, and the lessons he imparted on the uncompromising necessity of effort. He thinks of Scott Grundahl, a senior teammate extending friendship to Sparks when he arrived as a freshman wrestler. Over three decades later, they remain close. He’s grateful for his on-air partners and “dear, dear friends,” Tim Johnson and Jim Gibbons for their guidance. He thinks of Mark Hulsey, an executive producer at BTN who Sparks describes as “a game changer” to his career, allowing Sparks to parlay his chops as a proficient wrestling broadcaster into working both football and baseball games for the network. He thinks of those who, unbeknownst to them at the time, merely gave Sparks joy, like former Iowa Hawkeye and 3-time national finalist, Chad Zaputil. Only recently was Sparks able to meet and spend time with his all-time, favorite college wrestler.
Mostly, Shane Sparks thinks of Bob and Bonnie Nebl.
“My dad was a barber, worked hard, and like my mom, always supportive,” he said. “I remember doing my first Big Ten finals and there was about 30 seconds before we went on. It all hit me, memories of my dad bringing me to my first Big Ten tournament in 1992. I started getting emotional. I had to quickly pull myself together.
“And Mom was always in my corner. She just put so much self-belief into my younger brother, Brandon, and me. With Mom, there was nothing we couldn’t do. I had to talk at a Hawkeye fundraiser last year, was doing great, and I got to this part, you know, talking about my mom.
Sparks’ voice trailed.
“That part choked me up.”
***
Sparks’ father, U.S. Navy veteran, Bob Nebl, died on March 11, 2018. His mother, Bonnie, lives in Wisconsin and tunes in to each of the matches her son calls.
“I’m proud of all he’s done, but I’m really proud of the person he is,” Bonnie said. “I’m proud of his strong faith. He’s a genuine, caring, kind person and always had that about him. He never wants to hurt anyone’s feelings. Ever.”
And Bonnie Nebl is proud of her son’s ever-present sense of gratitude.
“Shane will come back to Ripon and he will actually go to teachers’ houses,” she said. “Teachers who are in their 80s now, but who made a difference in his life. He visits them just to let them know. That’s just how Shane is.”
***
Sparks defers to his deepest beliefs when searching to explain where he is today.
“I mean this and I know this,” Sparks said. “God has been really good to me. He’s really taken care of me. He’s made a few things happen for me that there’s no way were coincidence. I’ve got four incredible kids who I love dearly. Austin, Logan, Lauren and Halle are gifts. Plain and simple. I’m proud of all of them.
“I hope I’ve been a good example for them to achieve whatever they want to do.
“When a guy can say that one of the worst things that’s ever happened in his life was losing an overtime match in the state finals, although it hurt so much at the time, that’s a guy who’s had a pretty blessed life. I’m that guy.”
Incumbent upon him, he believes, is a duty to pay the blessings forward.
“There’s a broadcaster out there, right now. He might be five years old, he might be 20. I don’t know. But, there’s a person out there who at some point will take my job. That’s a fact. And you know what? That person is gonna be treated so well by me because Tim Johnson did that for me, and I owe that future person the same. Tim and so many others have helped me along my path. I owe that five year-old kid out there somewhere the same grace.”
Gratitude.
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