A young Rich Waltz decided to make the transition from being a college baseball player to a play-by-play broadcaster, and the first professional sport where he found work was minor league hockey in Spokane, Wash.

Growing up in California, Waltz had only watched hockey on television, never live.

But he took the gig, and now more than 30 years later, he’s still in the biz. Waltz and his color commentating partner, Aaron Taylor, will work Friday’s BYU-Utah State football game in Logan on the CBS Sports Network.

“All the sports I played in high school – I was a wide receiver in football, a point guard in basketball and a shortstop in baseball – I’ve been able to call,” Waltz said. “I love it.”

Waltz played baseball at Cal Davis. When his college career was nearing its end he worked on the student radio station and started to do play-by-play for Aggies football and basketball. He was the voice for the Spokane Chiefs hockey club, which led to play-by-play with the Spokane Indians minor league baseball team. Then came more college basketball and football for Eastern Washington University and he worked his way up the ladder in minor league baseball. He was calling Big Sky and Pac-12 football and basketball. He also worked for ESPN for six years doing college football and basketball.

What Waltz really wanted was to be the voice of a big league baseball team. He realized that dream when he took the TV job for the Florida Marlins and did play-by-play for 13 years. Living in the south, he was able to do SEC and ACC football and basketball.

Waltz said he admired the work of national announcers such as Bob Costas and Al Michaels, as well as local talent such as Bill King, Lon Simmons, Hank Greenwald, Vin Scully and Bob Stark, When he took that first radio hockey job, Waltz called Bay Area personality Ted Robinson and asked for advice in calling that sport.

“I cold-called him and he was so gracious,” Waltz said. “We’ve become really close friends and he’s someone who has really mentored me, especially early in my career. I am quite thankful for his help.”

For the last 2 ½ months, Waltz has been doing television play-by-play for the Anaheim Angels and he’ll continue to call college football and basketball this year for CBS.

Last week, he and Taylor did Boise State at Utah State. Next week, it’s Wyoming at Air Force.

Waltz’s preparation for the BYU-Utah State game began last week, setting his DVR to record both teams games. He starts reading about each team and preparing his spotting boards with lineups for both offense and defense. On Thursday, Waltz and Taylor get the opportunity to meet with both head coaches and both sets of coordinators. Often there are players made available as well.

“That’s the best part, the coaches meetings,” Waltz said. “The coordinators tell you what areas they are working on and some of the strategies they’ll use. You get a good idea of personnel as well as strengths and weaknesses. The head coach gives you the big picture stuff, the state of the program, how last week went. Those interviews usually last about 1 ½ hours. The most interesting things they tell me, I put notes on my boards so I can use that during the broadcast.”

Waltz and Taylor then sit down and go over the whole show with the production team.

“There’s an immense amount of work to do with football,” Waltz said. “But to get paid to go to games, I don’t know if you can find a more fun job than that, Hopefully, nothing surprises you on game day. You can just relax and call the game.”

Relaxing isn’t easy in the booth, especially with most teams going with no-huddle, hurry-up offensive schemes.

“You really have to mirror the tempo of the game,” he said. “This day and age you really just have short bursts of play-by-play and short bursts of analysis. We’re like the teams that are trying to defend the hurry up. You’ve got to stay in front of the game.”

Waltz said the BYU-Utah State series certainly feels like a big rivalry matchup, though the Aggies probably come in with more of a chip on their shoulders.

“My impression of the BYU program is that it has so much momentum right now,” Waltz said. “Not only are they beating teams with a really good schedule but they are also headed to the Big 12. They are young in key spots, but Kalani Sitake really seems to have found a sweet spot. The program is really impressive. BYU is uniquely prepared to make that jump to the Big 12 and everything will improve – recruiting, fund raising, facilities and enrollment.”

Waltz and Taylor will spend three to four hours in the booth at Maverick Stadium on Friday night and go into it with a plan.

“The first thing we want to do is be ahead of the game,” Waltz said. “Being in front of the strategy is telling the audience things they don’t know. In this day and age, everyone can find a lot of information on the internet. What they don’t have is access to the coaching meetings. It’s incumbent on us to illuminate and display the information they can’t find anywhere else.”

Waltz added that he is looking forward to seeing BYU and Utah State tangle on Friday night.

“I’ve called this game before and I remember it being nuts. When you have two teams like this in same state from different conferences, this game is as barometer for the programs. No fan or player or coach wants to go the entire year hearing from the other side that you lost that game. That’s enough skin in the game and enough on the line to make it a real spicy deal.”

CBS Rich Waltz of CBS Sports Network will the play-by-play announcer for the BYU-Utah State football game on Friday. (CBS Courtesy Photo)

BYU PhotoBYU football players celebrate after sophomore running back Lopini Katoa (4) scored a touchdown during the 42-14 Cougar win at Utah State on Saturday, Nov. 3, 2019.

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