Greg Brady (broadcaster)

Greg Brady is a Canadian-born, naturalized American sports broadcaster and phoneticist.

He was born and raised in London, Ontario and graduated from the University of Western Ontario with a degree in Political Science and Phonetics. He then completed Fanshawe College's journalism program. While at university he broadcast on Western Ontario Mustangs football games. His radio career began at CIXX-FM, the campus radio station of Fanshawe College. He came to the Metro Detroit market to work at CKLW in Windsor, Ontario.Brady first joined WDFN in the late 1990s and quickly earned the nickname "519" due to the fact he lived in London, Ontario - 519 is the telephone area code for Middlesex County, Ontario. He appeared in a variety of on-air roles at WDFN before he co-hosted the "Jamie and Brady" show, with Jamie Samuelsen, on WDFN radio in Detroit, from 2002 to 2007. He officially replaced Gregg Henson as Jamie Samuelsen's partner on the morning show when Henson left the station. The "Jamie and Brady" show put up the highest-rated morning show in WDFN's history. For several reasons - WDFN moving its studio from downtown Detroit to Clear Channel's Southfield studios, becoming a naturalized American and no longer living in Canada - the 519 nickname lost its currency. Brady became more often known as "one of the kids from the morning show", a nickname originated by "Stoney & Wojo" host Bob Wojnowski. In November 2007, he and Samulesen were unceremoniously laid off by WDFN as part of cut-backs by Clear Channel. In August 2008, Samuelsen quit WDFN after 14 years, leading many to speculate that the station will cease to exist as a sports station since its ratings have become anemic and they have lost the ratings battle badly to competitor WXYT. Samuelsen plans to continue working in Detroit radio.

He is notable for his life-long support of the Miami Dolphins, something he said he shared with his grandfather and his knowledge of NHL hockey. While with WDFN, Brady co-hosted a Red Wing focused NHL show called "Ice Time" with Sean Baligian, as well as post game call-in shows during Detroit Red Wings playoff games.

Brady has also done some freelance work for the BBC, including co-commentating for the Super Bowl [Cite web
url = http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2006/01_january/27/bowl.shtml
title = Seven hour extravaganza as Five Live goes to the Super Bowl
date = 2006-01-27
accessdate = 2007-03-26
publisher = Five Live Publicity] and being a reporter at Wimbledon. He is also a regular pundit on the BBC Radio Five Live show "Fighting Talk" where his "theme tune" was Put Your Hands Up for Detroit by Fedde le Grand as this was his abode. He is also famed for his distinct pronunciation of the Nigerian footballer Yakubu name, pronounced 'Yak-a-boo' and his nickname for English footballer Owen Hargreaves 'Shut-down Har-graves'.

On the 24 November 2007 edition of Fighting Talk, host Colin Murray introduced Brady as "the voice of Purina Cat Food" on Toronto AM 640 due to his recent redundancy from WDFN. His last win on Fighting Talk was Saturday 22nd March 2008.

Brady currently co-hosts the Bill Watters show on CFMJ in Toronto, and commentates on Windsor Spitfires OHL hockey games. He was the first voice of the Saginaw Spirit in the OHL, a job he held for five seasons, before jumping to the Spitfires to broadcast their games.

References

External links

*WDFN's bio page on [http://wdfn.com/pages/Brady.html Greg Brady]