Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame 2023: Tony Petitti, the Renaissance Man of Sports Media By Jason Dachman, Editorial Director, U.S.
Friday, December 1, 2023 - 2:06 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
Leading up to the 2023 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame ceremony on Dec. 12 at the New York Hilton, SVG is profiling the nine inductees in this year's class. For more information, CLICK HERE
In the storied history of sports broadcasting, few stories are as expansive as that of Tony Petitti's career. With key roles overseeing programming and production, running TV networks on the local and national level, in Major League Baseball's front office, in corporate America, and, now, as commissioner of the Big Ten Conference, Petitti has seemingly done it all in more than three decades in the business. And he has done it all while maintaining his status as one of the most respected and esteemed figures in the industry.
I don't know of anyone in our industry who has the combination of street smarts and management skills that Tony does, says CBS Sports Chairman and Hall of Famer Sean McManus. Above all else, you will never find a better father, son, or friend. No one deserves to be inducted into the Hall of Fame more than Tony.
A 14-time National Sports Emmy Award winner, Petitti has played a vital role in the success and evolution of the sports-broadcasting business while serving in senior executive roles at CBS Sports, ABC Sports, MLB Network, the MLB Commissioner's office, and the Big Ten Conference.
Tony has had an unbelievable career spanning more than three decades, says The Montag Group's Sandy Montag, a close friend and advisor. From working in production to starting a network, to being a deputy commissioner, and now as a commissioner, he has been a dedicated, hardworking, and loyal teammate who has a great reputation and will leave a lasting legacy on our industry.
Learning the ABCs' of Sports Television The son of first-generation American immigrants, Petitti grew up in Queens, NY, playing baseball and regularly heading to the ballpark with his father, a New York City police officer. He went on to play Division III ball at Haverford College, catching behind the plate for four years before heading to Harvard Law School. After receiving his law degree, Petitti served a short stint at the law firm of Cadwalader, Wickersham and Taft before kicking off his career in broadcasting in 1988 as a general attorney for ABC Sports.
I came into it with no background in [broadcasting] at all, recounts Petitti. I was learning as fast as I could over those first couple years. That's when I learned what went into creating a telecast in terms of programming, production, sales, and so on. Plus, I loved the ABC Sports broadcasts as a kid, and, suddenly, I was going into an office every day with pictures of Jim McKay, Howard Cosell, Frank Gifford, and Keith Jackson on the walls. Just to be in that space that early in my career was pretty remarkable.
Petitti's legal career would come to an end when he took a position in the programming department at ABC Sports, eventually working his way up to VP of programming. He oversaw the acquisition and scheduling of college football and basketball, track and field, and NASCAR events and led the charge to expand coverage of the Little League World Series on ABC and the ESPN family of networks.
His biggest contribution at ABC Sports was likely his work alongside Southeastern Conference Commissioner Roy Kramer in creating college football's first No. 1 vs. No. 2 postseason championship game. After years of tireless negotiations with college commissioners, presidents, and athletic directors, the vision became reality in 1998 with the formation of the Bowl Championship Series to determine college football's national champion.
The biggest issue was that the Rose Bowl had an enormous tradition of having [exclusively] the PAC 10 and the Big Ten involved. He was able to bring them to the table to at least listen, says Kramer. It changed everything we had known as far as the postseason was concerned in college football.
The Tiffany Network Revival: Rebuilding CBS Sports into a Powerhouse
In 1997, Petitti joined CBS Sports, teaming with newly appointed President Sean McManus to rebuild the Tiffany Network sports portfolio after it lost its NFL rights package. As senior VP, business affairs and programming, his management responsibilities included all contract negotiations and future acquisitions. In addition to playing an instrumental role in returning the NFL to CBS, he built up such core events as The Masters, NCAA March Madness, SEC football, the PGA TOUR, and US Open tennis.
Sean was essentially charged with rebuilding CBS Sports, and the way to do that was to get the NFL back, says Petitti. I helped to lead the team and worked closely with Sean, spending every day for more than a year [strategizing about] how to get the NFL back and make CBS Sports stronger. It was an amazing experience to be part of that CBS Sports resurgence. With Sean leading the way, we changed the course of CBS Sports from that point forward.
In 1999, Petitti's career took an unexpected detour when CBS Television CEO/President Mel Karmazin asked him to take over as VP/GM of WCBS-TV New York despite his having no experience in local television. Though new to the local-news game, Petitti went on to oversee the transformation and reshaping of the CBS flagship station, including acquiring the over-the-air rights to broadcast New York Yankees games and helping to guide he station through the tumultuous days of 9/11 in 2001.
Though continuing in a special advisor role to McManus during three years at WCBS-TV, Petitti would return to CBS Sports full-time in 2002, serving as executive producer and, eventually,
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
28/08/2025
IBC stand 5.F81
Wowza to Reveal Next-Gen Video Streaming Innovations at IBC 2025
Amsterdam, August 28, 2025 Wowza, a leader in video streaming infrastructur...
Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame 2023: Tony Petitti, the Renaissance Man of Sports Media By Jason Dachman, Editorial Director, U.S. 
