WEBQ broadcaster Sherman Owen (1987) has been working with Southern Illinois sports for the last nine years, quickly becoming one of the voices of the Bulldogs.
Owen has been a Bulldog all of his life. After high school, he did some classes at SIC, but did not finish college.
After humble beginnings selling auto parts, he began his radio journey after seeing an advertisement online.
“I was sitting at home with my wife one night and there was an ad on Facebook talking about WEBQ needing sports announcers,” Owen said. “She (said) ‘You’ve wanted to do this forever, so you need to go down and fill out an application’.”
Working as an announcer is not the only responsibility that Owen fills as part of his job.
“I’m working for Withers Broadcasting now selling ads,” Owen said. “I get to sell the sponsorships and things for Bulldogs sports. Whether we make commercials or I do reads during ball games we just try to help grow their business.”
In his youth, Owen discovered his love for sports with NASCAR racing.
“When I was growing up, I loved every kind of racing,” Owen said. “I had dreams as a kid of racing in Indianapolis and that’s where I wanted to end up.”
This love for racing helped inspire him to start his job as a sports broadcaster.
“I always grew up listening to these broadcasts on the radio and listening to these people describe it,” Owen said.
Besides racing, Owen loves all kinds of sports.
“I love racing number one. I love baseball, high school basketball, high school football, I love NFL football,” Owen said.
Within the NFL, Owen has three teams he always roots for.
“I root for the (Chicago) Bears, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and the Miami Dolphins,” Owen said.
Owen has also been a ride-or-die Chicago Cubs fan since he was young.
“I love the Cubs, I always have,” Owen said. “I was at Wrigley Field before I was one.”
Outside of work, Owen does not have much time for hobbies and other activities.
“A lot of times there’s no room for hobbies,” Owen said, chuckling a bit.
Despite how busy he can be with work, Owen tries to spend as much time with his family as he can.
“I have a 24-year-old son with autism. It’s not a hobby, but spending time with him and doing things with him, I love,” Owen said. “He loves coming to high school basketball games, he’s a huge fan of sports.”
Owen loves his job and strives to find the fun in pursuing it.
“It’s a fun profession,” Owen said. “There’s things out there that I would love to do in this business, and I’m not giving up on that.”
It took Owen a long time to finally discover what he loves to do, and he wants to do it as long as he can.
“The best advice I can give is sometimes it takes someone 35 years to figure out what you want to do,” Owen said. “I’ve been doing this almost 10 years now, I don’t want to stop doing it until they kick me out.”
