Phoenix — Jenny Cavnar has quite a baseball pedigree. She gets a chance to exhibit it in a new forum — and make some history — beginning Thursday night when the Rockies take on the Diamondbacks at Chase Field.
Cavnar, a sideline reporter and studio host for ROOT Sports Rockies coverage since 2012, will join Jack Corrigan and Jerry Schemmel in the KOA radio booth for Thursday, Friday and Saturday’s games.
Jenny Cavnar of Root Sports will join Jack Corrigan and Jerry Schemmel in the KOA radio both to call games during the Rockies series at Arizona. (Root Sports_
It was Corrigan who asked Cavnar to help out with the KOA broadcast. According to KOA, Cavnar is the first woman to do color commentary on the radio for a National League team.
Suzyn Waldman has been the color commentator for New York Yankees baseball, working with John Sterling on radio broadcasts, since 2005, first for WCBS-AM and currently for WFAN in New York City.
Corrigan and Schemmel will be splitting time with ROOT Sports TV coverage, filling in for usual play-by-play man Drew Goodman for those three games. Goodman will rejoin the ROOT broadcast team for Sunday afternoon’s game.
Cavnar won’t call play-by-play, but she will lend insight and analysis.
Suzyn Waldman has been the color commentator for New York Yankees baseball, working with John Sterling on radio broadcasts, since 2005, first for WCBS-AM and currently for WFAN in New York City.
“I’m really excited for the opportunity,” Cavnar said. “I’ve been around baseball all of my life and I’ve been covering baseball since 2009 (with the San Diego Padres). But this will be different.
“I’m used to working with the pictures, and making the transition from the sidelines or the studio. So I’m going to try and help Jack and Jerry paint that picture — something they do so very well. But it’s going be different being on the air for three or 3 1/2 hours.”
Although Cavnar won’t be calling the plays, she will provide insights into what’s happening on the field. And she’ll use her relationship with the Rockies players to provide stories and background.
“I’m going to try to mix in a little bit of storytelling and some anecdotes,” she said. “I’m not trying to suggest that I know it the games from the players’ perspective, but I think I’m capable of giving reason why certain things happen on the field.”
Cavnar’s love of baseball come from her father, Steve, who was inducted in the Colorado High School Baseball Hall of Fame in 2011. Steve Cavnar won state championships at both Smoky Hill (2001) and Regis Jesuit (2011).
“I don’t think I ever became a baseball fan, I was born into the game,” she said. “So I naturally picked it up. We were always talking baseball around the table, I was always at the baseball field with my dad. Sometimes I was the only girl there, but I got to know the game.”
Cavnar played softball at Smoky Hill and played lacrosse for the club team at Colorado State, where she graduated with a degree in communications and marketing.
Tags: Drew Goodman, Jack Corrigan, Jenny Cavnar, Jerry Schemmel
