Voices in the Night

This is nice, thought Tom West, standing atop the Westlake High press box last week, microphone in hand. The evening was warmer than expected and the wind had died, leaving only high-charged high school football in the air.

Right about then, a barbecue grill below began sending thick plumes of smoke directly at the five-man KNJO radio team.

West, the play-by-play man, didn’t blink, giving listeners the straight scoop on Westlake and its opponent, Newbury Park. Color commentators Dave Wheeler and Tim Heyne chimed in with analysis, and sound engineer Tom Thompson and statistician Jerry Garon kept their heads down, focusing on their jobs.

“I smelled like a tri-tip sandwich when I got home,” Garon said. “But we’ve been in worse conditions.”

These guys don’t blow smoke.

For a small-time team that drums up its own advertisers and works under conditions that give new definitions to adaptability and inventiveness, Wild West Productions fills the air with a remarkably professional broadcast.

It’s not much different at Santa Clarita-based KBET. Alan Epstein and Mark Ceccanese broadcast Foothill League games and sports director Barry McKeever hosts a popular two-hour postgame show.

The team traveled to Compton Dominguez to cover Hart’s playoff game last season, and discovered there was no press box and no phone line. Epstein did play-by-play on a cellular phone while sitting in the stands until the phone’s battery died.

“I did the second half from my car phone,” he said. “I pulled up between the snack bar and stands, and ran back and forth from the car to a spot where I could see the field.”

Anyone unable to see the big game of the week in the Santa Clarita Valley or Eastern Ventura County can tune in to KBET or Thousand Oaks-based KNJO, the only stations in the region that regularly broadcast high school football.

Another station, KAVL in Lancaster, picks up the KBET postgame show and broadcasts late-season games, beginning tonight with a Golden League game between Antelope Valley and Palmdale.

“You aren’t going to get rich, but you enjoy what you do,” said Epstein, 42, who also broadcasts Pepperdine basketball games on Simi Valley-based KWNK and teaches sportscasting.

“It can be a training ground for sportscasters. Maybe you begin to develop your style. It takes a long time to do that.”

It’s been six years since West, 45, a former Cal Lutheran player and coach at Royal and Simi Valley highs, founded Wild West Productions after discovering he enjoyed doing play-by-play of sorts while scouting games as a coach.

“I’d describe the formation and the play while another coach wrote it down,” he said. “I always had a little ham in me. When I got out of coaching it hit me that no one was broadcasting high school games.”

West went to a sports broadcasting camp and in 1991 convinced KNJO to air three Simi Valley games.

Then West talked Wheeler, a former Royal linebacker and assistant coach, into doing commentary. Garon, a former high school volleyball coach who teaches with West at Hillside Junior High in Simi Valley, agreed to do statistics. Thompson, a friend of Garon’s sister, learned sound engineering from scratch.

The persuasion didn’t end there. After buying air time from KNJO, West made the rounds selling advertising.

The work worked. Wild West Productions has broadcast Marmonte League games on Friday nights ever since.

Cal Lutheran games were added three years ago and this season a handful of Moorpark College games were broadcast.

“We’ve being doing this for five solid years, and I think we have a strong advertising and listening base,” West said.

The precise audience is unknown because neither station subscribes to a ratings service. But community feedback and the eagerness of advertisers make it clear somebody is listening.

Catering to a market similar to that of KNJO’s, the owners of KBET believe local sports broadcasts can make money in close-knit, sports-crazed communities.

“We’ve had a great response from advertisers, every game is sold out,” said Jeri Seratti-Goldman, who with her husband Carl own KBET and four small stations in Ventura.

West Ventura County, in fact, is the next frontier for local sports broadcasts. One of Seratti-Goldman’s Ventura stations, KKZZ, broadcast five Channel League games last year, and although ad sales were too slow to continue, she will try again.

“In Ventura, junior college basketball is big,” she said. “We’ve got some ideas.”

A little ingenuity is a must for the sportscasters. No plush press boxes or sophisticated equipment await them at the high schools and small colleges they call a workplace.

“It’s radio and it never goes smoothly,” said McKeever, son of USC All-American Mike McKeever, whose twin, Marlin, played for the Rams. “You have to adapt to the environment.”

For Thompson, KNJO sound engineer, that meant stringing nearly 300 yards of phone extensions from a nursery school to the press box at Cleveland High a few years ago. The line stretched across a parking lot, and was propped up by tree branches to keep it higher than passing cars.

“We broadcast from a card table in the stands,” Thompson said. “The amazing thing is, we never went off the air.”

Whether or not the broadcast is actually a broadcast is a question Vin Scully probably never asks himself. West does.

“That’s our major concern,” he said. “Are we on the air?”

Actually, a more pressing concern can be, “Are we safe from electrocution?”

Larry Thornhill, who along with color commentator Henry Schindel have broadcast games on KAVL for 10 years, faced that question last week while broadcasting Antelope Valley College’s game at Mt. San Jacinto College in Hemet.

“The press box was too small, so we set up outside because the skies were clear,” Thornhill said. “It began to pour in the third quarter, and we did the game in the rain with electronic equipment all around.”

Other problems are less dangerous, but annoying nonetheless. Frantic print reporters needing to file stories on deadline yank out phone lines. Coaches on the sideline have done the same.

Once, when sound mixing equipment malfunctioned, West and Wheeler simply passed a phone back and forth.

“Midway through the first quarter the producer asked, ‘Which one of you have a ring on? Every time you pass the phone, I can hear it clicking against the receiver,’ ” West said.

Most broadcasts simply click. All three local teams get high marks for professionalism and football knowledge.

“These guys have a real love of community,” said Heyne, an artists’ manager who donates his time doing pregame, halftime and postgame commentary on KNJO. “They know every kid who has done anything and gone anywhere. The kids can tape it and it sounds like big-time play-by-play.”

The coaching background of West and Wheeler is apparent in their analysis. They recognize formations, coverages and adjustments most spectators miss.

And they keep in mind that underneath the helmets and pads are teenagers. When a defensive back is burned, they comment on the receiver’s speed. When a runner fumbles, they comment on the jarring tackle. Rarely are coaching decisions second-guessed.

“Any time someone makes a good play, someone makes a bad play,” West said. “We keep in mind these are 16-17 year-old kids and focus on the good play.

“A coaching decision may look bad from the stands, but as ex-coaches, we recognize that there might be a reason for the call that isn’t obvious.”

West might toughen his stance should he move on to a higher level--which he hopes to do.

“I would like to broadcast some major sporting events,” he said. “That is a dream of mine. It’s more realistic all the time because we have a good experience base.”

Until then, West is content with being the voice of the Marmonte League.

“I love calling a high school game,” he said. “It still exciting and compelling. The human error element, the emotional swings, it’s fun. And it’s doing something in the community that people can enjoy.”

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Tuning in to high school football:

KNJO, Thousand Oaks: 92.7 FM

KBET, Santa Clarita: 1220 AM

KAVL, Lancaster: 610 AM