By Judy Clabes
NKyTribune editor
Mike Tussey has crammed a lot of careers into one very full life – and at 82 closing in on 83, he’s akin to the Energizer Bunny and not even thinking about throwing in the towel.
Tussey at ESPN+ calling Morehead and Jacksonville game. (Photo provided)
Tussey, who lives in Florence with his wife Jo, started his illustrious broadcasting career in 1961 at WIRO in Ironton, Ohio, near Ashland, where he grew up. That’s where he learned to do the skillful play-by-play he has perfected over the years.
“I like to make it fun,” he says. “I have a passion for it and the mental capacity. It really is good for my mental health.”
Ever considered the “mental capacity” it takes to get play-by-play announcing right?
As one of the oldest play-by-play announcers around, Tussey says he’ll continue to do what he loves “as long as the good Lord will let me.”
Over his career so far, Tussey has performed play-by-play of basketball, football and baseball for more than 2000 games involving high school, college, and professional baseball for radio and television.
Along the way from his Ashland beginning, he has been a radio and television personality, a police officer, a canine officer, an author, a teacher, a voice for documentaries, a speaker, a manager for his adult college age Stan Musial Baseball team that won the Kentucky AABC State Championship in 1988. He was active coaching baseball at all levels for over 30 year. He will be inducted into the Ashland CP-1 Baseball Hall of Fame this summer. He earned his way into the West Virginia Broadcasting Hall of Fame in 2010.
Clearly, his career is an example of the adage, “if one door closes, another opens.” Except in Tussey’s case, that would be several doors opening.
He racked up some impressive broadcasting experience in the Ashland area over 35 years – doing play-by-play for basketball and football, hosting a morning show for WIRO, becoming program director at WTCR, serving as Public Information Officer for the mayor, city manager and police chief, becoming Police Officer of the Year, serving as staff announcer for WCMI, hosting coaches shows for the cable TV station, serving as sports director for WTSF television and doing play-by-play for WLGC. He became the Voice of the Huntington Cubs Professional baseball and WRVC in Huntington, West Virginia. That’s just some of it.
He was a police officer in Ashland for 20 years and was named Kentucky Police Officer of the Year in 1989 for being Chairman of Ashland’s Crime Prevention Event, “National Night Out.” winning the National Town Watch of America’s title of the Best over 8,800 cities nationwide.
At NKU’s Mike Tussey Day in 2011
By 1990, as his three sons were grown and he had been at the Ashland Police Department for 20 years, he decided to get back into radio fulltime. That didn’t happen because of an ad in the newspaper for the NKU police force. But that did get him to NKY.
He became assistant Chief of Police at NKU and retired at age 65 in 2003, ready to work up steam.
While at NKU, Athletic Director Jane Meier asked him to do play-by-play for the women’s basketball team’s home and away games. It was his voice when NKU women won their second NCAA DII Womens National Championship in 2008. He was the voice of the Norse for seven years and was also “color analyst” for men’s basketball.
Some pre-game antics with broadcast partner Denny Wright at Thomas More.
In 2011, he published a memoir of his 50 years in broadcasting, “You’re on the Air.”
By 2016, he had written a second book, “Touchdown Saints,” about the Thomas More College football team. He says it tells the incredible story of human emotion and the Thomas More football team. He and his long-time partner from NKU, Denny Wright, started then-President Dave Armstrong’s “Saints on Radio” in 2014.“
His third book, “Baseball and me. . . Echoes of the Game” is underway.
Today, Tussey is doing play-by-play for Morehead State University’s ESPN+ telecasts.
“I work all week long, doing research and preparing for the live broadcasts,” he says. “I make a lot of 3×5 cards.”
As Mike Tussey sees it, he is just working toward his next 2000 games.
