A Conversation With Johnny Kane
The Detroit Pistons have themselves a great broadcast team in George Blaha and Greg Kelser. I got to speak with the third member of the crew, Johnny Kane.
The Detroit Pistons have been very fortunate to have the services of Johnny Kane at their side. The Fox Sports Detroit sideline reporter has provided us with some intellectual insight during halftime & post-game interviews, and as a result of this, Pistons fans have grown to love him.
I was fortunate enough to interview the man we hold in such high regard.
(Though it may not need clarity, my questions will be prefaced with “Q” and Johnny’s answers will be “A”. )
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Q: So I know you went to Ohio University, you presumably majored in broadcast journalism?
A: Yeah, so I went to the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism, and I thought I wanted to be a writer, and then I got into the broadcasting side of things and I really started to dig that, so I went with that.
Q: Now once you graduated from school, what was the next move for you?
A: So I didn’t know that in order to graduate I needed an internship, so every year I would just go back home and work at our local pizza shop just trying to make money to live. So I’m getting ready to roll, about to walk and my adviser said: “Hey man, you need an internship in order to graduate.” So that was a pretty big thing I missed. I ended up going down to a news station called WKAG in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. I went down there for a 10-week post-grad internship, and I ended up being there for two and a half years after they offered me a job.
Q: What was your work day like while you were there?
A: Honestly it was around the clock, I never had days off. Which I know sounds crazy but we ran a Monday through Friday operation, but everything happened on the weekends. We’d either be covering college football or basketball and on Sunday’s we’d be driving down covering Tennessee Titans games.
Q: Did that job really start to open the door for you in this business?
A: I wasn’t exactly in a rush to get out of there. I know it sounds crazy but I was living with my buddy, and a girl I had started seeing had just begun reporting down there, and everything was going pretty good. Then they both received job offers elsewhere, and I got an offer from a station in Topeka, Kansas as a Sports Director, so I’d be in charge of the whole department. They didn’t have the money to fly me out, so I flew out there on my own dime and honestly I didn’t have too many dimes. From there I went to Kansas City.
Q: Is this where Fox Sports Detroit starts to take notice?
A: I was in Kansas City for about three years before I was asked if I ever considered moving. I didn’t exactly plan on retiring in Topeka so I said of course. I knew I had to get an agent because there comes a point where you can’t take the next step without representation. I kept being told that I had “it” and I was always like “Really? Me? Can I get a second opinion on that?”. While I was on the phone before I even signed with him he had asked what my interest level would be in Detroit. I said I had grown up on the Pistons just around 100 miles away from there growing up, and even though I had been gone for about 14 years and I didn’t have a great grasp on their current sports I thought it’d be a great fit.
Q: So with journalism being as competitive as it is, would you say Detroit is really the perfect city for you? With it containing that “grind it out” mentality that everyone holds.
A: Man that’s a great way to look at it because that is a lot of what attracted me to it. Detroit embodies everything that I want to be about. That blue-collar work ethic. The fans, although they haven’t had championships to celebrate recently, they still line up. There’s always that “well, show me a winner and I’ll show up” mentality. But Detroit fans are always interested.
Q: What keeps you competitive? What gives you your motivation?
A: For me, it’s a dream job. Those aren’t empty words. I really mean that. There are still nights where my head hits the pillow and I can’t believe I’m doing this. I’ve had people say directly to my face “I want your job.” So I just have to keep the same mentality I’ve always had.
Q: To backtrack a little, you mentioned: “well show me a winner and I’ll show up.” There’s obviously a strict dichotomy in the Pistons fan base in what direction they should take. Whether that’s tanking or making a playoff push. Is that something the players are paying attention to?
A: Yeah I definitely think so. The unfortunate part about it is that some voices are louder than others. So when I look at Pistons Twitter for example, when I say you guys are the minority it’s just because most of you guys don’t have the access to airwaves like others do. I know that there are just as many Piston’s optimists as there are skeptics who are being spoon fed this belief of “we’re supposed to be negative all the time.” We’re being spoon fed this type of rhetoric from certain channels. To me, that’s a lazy approach.
Q: Being around the team as much as you are, is there a bigger “championship mindset” going around with Dwane Casey in contrast to Stan Van Gundy?
A: I would say that Dwane has won a championship before as an assistant. What he did in Toronto, building a winning culture I really think that resonates with the guys. I think Dwane made his message clear from day one that not only is he about winning, but he’s been about it, and they need to trust him. Now I’m not saying there wasn’t trust with Stan, but with anything sometimes you just need a different message and a different vessel to carry that message. I really think we’re destined to see some great things here, hopefully in the short term.
Q: So that’s actually a good transition, is there any specific player that you’re eyeing in this upcoming draft?
A: That’s a good question and I thought that might come up, but unfortunately I’ve been so locked in trying to get up to speed with the Tigers that I haven’t had much time to look into that too much.
Q: It’s no secret that acquiring a player like Blake Griffin was something that the Pistons could only have done through trade. In the “Big Three” era of basketball that we’re in, Pistons fans desperately want to land another superstar. Is Andre Drummond someone that some are overlooking as a superstar?
A: I would look at the ability, age, and ceiling. So I would say the way the game continues to evolve, his greatest attribute is his rebounding. So does that play into today’s game? If you didn’t have his rebounding, which there were some games where it wasn’t. This team is completely different. So, do I think he is a completely finished offensive product? I don’t. Do I think he’s going to transcend his game and stretch the floor? I don’t know. But I do know that his offensive game will continue to improve around the rim. So, I would say maybe over half of the league is interested in Andre, and you have to ask if that’s someone you want to lose.
Q: I have a personal question for Pistons Twitter: Should Luke Kennard be in next season’s Three-Point Contest?
A: Heck yes he should! We all saw it, this kid is special. JJ Redick told he thinks Luke is better than he was at that age.
Q: Final question, you knew it was coming: Favorite interview moment from this season?
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A: I tell you what there was a game late in the season where I was interviewing Ish Smith. He was just so authentic and opened up. He was opening up saying “I want to thank god” and just saying how happy he was in Detroit and with the team, he wasn’t holding back. It was everything you love to see.