ESPN host Kevin Negandhi will have a big role in the upcoming SportsCenter “50 States in 50 Days” campaign to promote the launch of the network’s direct-to-consumer streaming service. The unique events he will be a part of include:
- July 3: Seattle, WA – Rubik’s WCA World Championship
- July 11: Wichita, KS – Dude Perfect World Tour
- July 14: Atlanta, GA – MLB Home Run Derby (with Elle Duncan)
- July 16: Los Angeles, CA – ESPYs (with Elle Duncan)
- July 25: Dyersville, IA – Youth Baseball Tournament at Field of Dreams
- July 31: Canton, OH – NFL Hall of Fame Game
- Aug. 16: Williamsport, PA – Little League World Series
It has been a whirlwind few months for Negandhi. He was on the road for NFL draft coverage with SportsCenter, emceed Dick Vitale’s annual charity gala (which raised more than $100 million for pediatric cancer research), anchored the NBA draft lottery for the first time, then did the same for the NBA draft. Amidst all of this work, his father, Sanat, passed away.
Negandhi opened up in a wide-ranging interview with Front Office Sports that covered his life and career:
Front Office Sports: One of the things you’re covering in the “50 States in 50 Days” campaign is the Rubik’s WCA World Championship in Seattle. Did you know this existed before you got assigned to cover it, and how excited are you for it?
Kevin Negandhi: I had no idea that they had something like this. I’ve heard that there are going to be close to 2,000 competitors! The details I’ve gotten are wild. There’s a blindfolded contest, there’s a three-by-three Rubik’s cube. There’s one-handed. I can’t wait for it as a father of 13- and 11-year-old boys and an eight-year-old daughter. We’ve got multiple Rubik’s cubes around the house.
I think it’s going to be a pretty cool experience. And it’s unique. To me, what this whole thing is about is sharing different stories and how they affect local communities with all these types of unique sporting events, and to kind of shine some light on Seattle that this event is going to be there is going to be pretty cool.
FOS: It’s been a few months of firsts for you. You had the NBA draft lottery in Chicago. What was it like getting to lend your voice to such an interesting event in the lottery?
KN: There were so many unique circumstances, and no matter what you do to prepare, you’re as surprised as everybody else was. There were so many scenarios, but nobody was expecting the Mavericks to get the No.1 overall pick and how much the top four changed.
There were so many machinations—like if this happens, it turns into that—and you’re thinking on the fly. Going through so many scenarios, it was such a unique experience.
There was a lot going on, I’d just gotten back from covering the NFL Draft for SportsCenter and then hosting the Dickie V. gala and raising $100 million for pediatric cancer research. Going right into the lottery and preparing for that—I was so excited to be a part of it and hope I am again down the road.
That first time, when you’re in the room and it’s getting bigger and bigger and more drama-filled, and then you see the surprise of the Mavericks winning the lottery—especially the Cooper Flagg lottery—it’s pretty cool.
FOS: Switching gears, you do the ABC college football studio show in the fall. How crazy is it when you’ve got that on top of SportsCenter in trying to stay on top of all your work, and stay present with your family?
KN: So it’s not crazy … I’m passionate about college football and I love Saturdays. Saturday in the fall, when you’re doing 15-17 of those days, and you’re working 12-15 hours, and you’re with the crew that you so genuinely love—it’s your family—Robert Lemley, our producer, Brian Lynch, our coordinating producer, Gil Bransford, my researcher, our directors Eric Discher and Mike Riley. And then Booger MacFarland and Dan Orlovsky. We’re a family! And we communicate constantly.
We text, we play golf in the offseason. It’s part of a group and a family, that our chemistry on TV, when we lean into each other and have fun—my wife jokingly tells me all the time, “Man, I don’t want to hear about your 13-hour days on Saturdays because you have fun! Honestly I’m jealous that you get to do something that you’re passionate about and get to call that work.”
She’s 100% right. When you love something, and you love the people you work with, it’s great. And then blending that to what you do on SportsCenter, it’s my seventh year on the 6 pm show. I’m really proud of watching Elle [Duncan] develop and our chemistry on the set has been great the last three years, and she’s a phenomenal teammate. We have a phenomenal team of people who genuinely care about the product.
FOS: You recently shared on social media that your dad passed. How did he inspire your career, and what did it mean to get to this level professionally where you did and be able to share it with him?
KN: I got into TV because of my father. I got into sports, my passion, because of my father. My father came to America in the late 1960s with very little money—less than $5 in his pocket. Then my mother came in 1971 with my brother from India. When my father had established an apartment and a steady job, they could come. And then I was born in 1975.
I was born in a Philly family, and my dad loved the sports teams. The connection I had with my father, as a young boy in America who understood Western culture because I faced it every day with my friends in school. But also I’d come home and it’s Eastern culture of making sure your grades are at a high standard. You’ve gotta do your dad’s extra homework, have you done this? Have you done that?
My connection to my father was watching sports together on Sundays. He would yell at the TV—watching the Eagles was his passion. Sports, and talking about sports, allowed me to basically have a relationship with my father that opened the door to so many other things with him to have a connection. I think any son wants a connection with their father.
With all of that, I could talk to him about something where he actually looked at me and engaged with me. It grew from there. My ability to educate and inform my father, to stop yelling at Ron Jaworski and Dick Vermeil, came from reading the Philadelphia Inquirer sports section on a Sunday morning and could give him the stats and information. It opened the door where it was like, “Hey this is pretty cool that I can educate someone on sports and we have a bond and no longer is my father the fan yelling at the screen. He’s understanding it better.”
It was kind of like a window for me to look at the big picture of things. And as I got older—listen, when I got into TV as a college student, my father didn’t understand what I was doing. Neither did my mom. I told my Dad, “Let me just do this for my 20s, and if I don’t make a certain amount of money I’ll get out, but let me just do this.”
For my father and mother to take the leap and say, “O.K., you can do it”—in my family and culture, they wanted a stable career. They didn’t see Indian-Americans talking about sports in the ‘80s and ‘90s, so they took a leap for me.
I bring all this up because my mom was the dreamer, she allowed me to dream big, but it was my father who taught me the work ethic. I saw him work seven days a week with his own accounting practice. I fell in love with numbers and stats because of his affinity for them.
When you have a dreamer on one side in your mom, who reached incredible goals and got her GED and then multiple master’s degrees, and then a father who shows you work ethic day in and day out, I was just beyond lucky with the two best role models.
My father took me to my first Phillies, Eagles, and Sixers games. And then I could take him to the 2008 World Series, and have him in club seats at Sixers games. I could take him to places where he would have never imagined. I could share the story that I’m going to the White House today because I’m a SportsCenter anchor, I’m going to meet the president of the United States.
For a son to see his father’s face light up, there’s nothing better, and I was pretty lucky to share those things with him.
He went through a lot. He moved back to India 15 years ago. I saw him in November and we were talking about the Eagles. When they won the Super Bowl, my brother and I called him up and had the chance to celebrate. Those bonds never change, here I am, a 49-year-old man, talking to my father about the Super Bowl, and it’s like I’m a 10-year-old kid! That’s the tie-in with sports with my father that I’ll always be grateful for.
He was pretty sick in late April while I was doing the NFL Draft on SportsCenter. It was tough. I was planning to go to India the day after the NBA draft lottery, and then within a couple days Pakistan and India broke out some tension and it escalated and they shut down airports.
Staying in America was really challenging for me not to be able to go to India and make sure he was O.K. My brother went and he had to fly back because they were shutting down airports. It was a stressful month of May but working is the best way I can go through it because that’s what my father taught me: Hey, go in and show up to work.
