Originally published at: https://discgolf.ultiworld.com/2020/02/27/thomas-became-host-disc-golf-pro-tour/
Avery Jenkins, left, and Jamie Thomas at the 2018 USDGC. Photo: USDGC
I have a wonderful opportunity in front of me. I recently struck a deal with the Disc Golf Pro Tour to host live broadcasts for the 2020 season. I’m extremely excited to join my dear friends Nate Doss and Valarie Doss (Jenkins), or as they’re more simply known amongst their peers – “Nate and Val.”
Recently, I’ve experienced an uptick in my stock as a broadcaster, which has come as a pleasant surprise to me. From the USDGC Pay-Per-View debut with Champ’s legendary call just before Nikko Locastro’s albatross on hole 13, to signing a last-minute agreement with freshly-minted DGPT Tour Director Jeff Spring to share on-course reporting duties at the 2019 Tour Championship with the stalwart presence of Terry Miller, to now sitting in a booth every DGPT weekend to talk golf with the sport’s most iconic and decorated athlete-couple, the last four months of my life have been a whirlwind I have not reflected upon until now.
To be honest, this career angle was never my goal. I intended to be a behind-the-scenes guy.
I was working towards my Masters in Film Directing at the time I began making disc golf content. I intended it to only be a side hobby that would sharpen my camera and editing skills, because in the words of my cinematography professors, “Directors? You mean future insurance salesmen? You’d better get a tangible skillset, nobody is going to pay you to make your own ideas, and you’re not related to anyone famous enough to take a chance on.”
Keep in mind that this was 2010, so it was still easy to doubt YouTube and the whole “digital camera fad.”
As Disc Golf became more interesting and work began to trickle in, my desire to move to LA and try my hand at Hollywood dimmed. I also don’t want to pat myself on the back too hard, but everyone in the industry has known about the Weinstein-style stuff that has persisted since the dawn of time, even among low-level operators who are essentially gatekeepers to the decision makers. Comparatively, disc golf was full of people with genuine passion who were in the beginning steps of seizing the opportunity presented by this new medium for posting videos online. My decision became easier after a couple of crew gigs out in The Valley.
My first try at post-produced commentary was with Simon Lizotte, for the 2014 Texas States NT coverage on SpinTV. Coincidentally, I met a couple of young video upstarts at that tournament named Jonathan Gomez and Michael Fouche who were just taking a crack at round coverage on their channel, Jomez Productions. Look them up if you aren’t familiar.
About a month later, while still touring with my brothers Simon and Avery (Jenkins) in the Discmania RV, I operated the live camera for Terry Miller and Jonathan Van Deurzen’s first attempt at livestreaming disc golf – the Final 9 at the Bowling Green Amateur Championships. My fee? A pitcher of beer, to share of course.
My first hosting duties would come a little over a year later at the 2015 European Open. I was asked to host a live aftershow, The Insider Show, and the first episode was on my 27th birthday. Watching it back I’m laughing at how nervous I was; my heart was in my throat the entire time! That tournament was also the first of many live performances with Avery Jenkins. The YLE (Finnish ESPN) crew built us a makeshift studio in the cab of their production truck, and we called the final four holes of the tournament for the English-language version of their show.
One year later, I was blessed with the offers from both the DGPT and the now-defunct DGWT to play roles in their livestream aspirations for their newborn tours. Through that experience I was able to officially work with Terry Roddy, John Deusler, and the rest of the crew most known for their DiscGolfPlanet.tv venture – the OG disc golf livestream that was frankly ahead of its time from a technical aspect. Ten years later we’re really not doing a dramatically different show than they were putting on.
I write all of this, not with the intention of saying, “Look how great I am,” but rather just in the reflective headspace of this moment. Upon telling family and close friends about this role, I realized how much more of a relatable title this is to the general public, compared to the multitude of roles I’ve played on a variety of teams over the last 10 years. In my head, this is just an opportunity to get back together with some very talented friends of mine to create something that will hopefully be a great experience for everyone out there who loves disc golf as much as we do. It’s not my first show with anybody involved, but it certainly is the biggest opportunity for us as a group. To those not steeped in the disc culture it’s the gravity of the commitment of an organization called the Disc Golf Pro Tour to both livestreaming all of their shows, as well as their commitment to me as a host, that makes it hit home. People get it instantly, negating the necessity of any further explanation.
I also have never sat down and considered how intertwined I’ve been with the livestream game in this sport, and maybe “accidentally intertwined” is an appropriate description in light of the fact that it was never my main purpose. It was just working with my friends to do the best version of the job for the moment. The way I saw it, I was just pitching in until the real pro broadcasters came along to snatch up those spots, then I could help them succeed from a role I was more familiar with behind the camera.
At the end of the day, but at the dawn of the season, I’m incredibly grateful to everybody along the way who has taken a chance on me so far in my career. I’m looking forward to the challenges ahead, and to balancing my new reality where I’m regularly playing roles both as a producer and as talent. As I told Nate and Val on a recent phone call, my mentality is just like theirs when they go to compete at a Tour event – take it one moment at a time and just try to give the best of me each and every round, then wake up and do it again until there’s no more golf to be played or called. We will have our ups and downs throughout the season, just like golf it won’t be perfect, but the effort will ultimately be worth undertaking.
Here’s to what will hopefully be an effort worth watching, and a fantastic 2020 season for everyone in our little world of frisbee sports. Let’s. Go.