May 31, 2012
Waldorf=Astoria
New York, New York
Bob has been with NBC Sports since 1979. He has covered nearly every major sport, though he is perhaps most identified with the Olympics and baseball. He has anchored NBC’s primetime coverage of the last five summer Olympics – Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996, Sydney, Australia, 2000, Athens, Greece, 2004, and Beijing, China, 2008. He also hosted the winter games in Salt Lake City 2002, and the winter games in Torino, Italy 2006. Bob hosted NBC’s coverage of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games, and is scheduled to host the 2012 London Summer Games.
From 1983 through 1989, Bob teamed with Tony Kubek on NBC’s “Baseball Game of the Week” telecasts. In the mid 90’s, Bob returned to baseball, handling play-by-play for NBC’s All-Star, Playoff and World Series coverage. He first teamed with Bob Uecker and Joe Morgan, and then with Morgan alone. Bob’s book, “Fair Ball, A Fan’s Case for Baseball” published in 2000, earned excellent reviews and remained on the New York Times best seller list for several weeks. Bob has been involved in the coverage of ten League Championship Series, and seven World Series for NBC.
In early 2009, Bob signed a long-term contract to join the new MLB Network. As part of his new deal, Bob has left HBO, where he hosted the critically acclaimed “Costas Now.” He had previously hosted HBO’s “Inside the NFL” for six seasons.
In the 80’s and 90’s Bob was a fixture of NBC’s NBA and NFL coverage. He now hosts the networks “Football Night in America” program. With his recent hosting of Super Bowl XLIII, between Pittsburgh and Arizona, Bob has now anchored five Super Bowls for NBC. He has also hosted, or called play-by-play, on eight NBA Finals.
Bob has won twenty Emmy awards – sixteen for outstanding sports host or play-by-play, two for writing, one for his late night interview show, “Later…with Bob Costas” on NBC, and one for feature reporting. Uniquely, Bob has been nominated for Emmy’s in five different categories: play-by-play, hosting, writing, interviewing, and journalism.
Bob has also been named “National Sportscaster of the Year” an unprecedented eight times by his peers – in 1985, 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, 1995, 1997, and 2000.
Bob is a native of Queens, New York and grew up on Long Island. He attended Syracuse University in New York, where he majored in communications. He began his professional career at WSYR-TV and radio in 1973 while studying at Syracuse before joining KMOX radio in St. Louis in 1974.