Another fixture of DFW sports media has left the scene; WBAP’s Steve Lamb has retired
Steve Lamb has one of those voices that God made, and it requires no adjustment or modification for a microphone.
The pipes never corroded, and Lamb’s voice remains radio-worthy. You just won’t hear it on the air any more.
Lamb’s decision to step away from the mic’ was not entirely his. The long time sports director of WBAP, and a fixture next to Hal Jay in the morning, recently retired-ish.
In late November, Lamb was informed that he was being let go as part of what continues to be a steady staff reduction company wide; radio is going through the type of decline that has beset the newspaper industry amid changing technology and consumer habits.
Newspapers, radio, and local news television once comprised nearly all of the media pie; now, those three essentially are a few slices.
In an interview this week with the Star-Telegram, Lamb, 69, said he had planned to retire next year. After nearly 39 years at the station, his only disappointment is how the exit was handled.
“After it happened, you walk out and say, ‘What the heck just happened?’” Lamb said of his dismissal. “But I’ve also said, ‘What a journey for me..’”
Lamb was a part of a crew that was the face, and voice, of the DFW sports media scene when it became a giant in the late ‘80s and throughout the ‘90s; Lamb ran with the likes of Randy Galloway, Eric Nadel, Chuck Cooperstein, Chris Arnold, Jim Reeves, George Dunham, Craig Miller, Gordon Keith, Mark Holtz, Dale Hansen, Norm Hitzges, Greg Williams, Mike Rhyner, Brad Sham, Bill Jones, Tim Cowlishaw, Kevin Sherrington, and there are a few others in there, too.
It was an era of sports media where those involved benefited from big travel budgets, which allowed them to jump all over the world to cover every event, big or small.
Lamb was inducted into the Texas Sports Radio Hall of Fame in 2019, a high point to a career that was never planned as much as it just happened.
The son of a preacher, Lamb said he was raised in “Nowhere, Oklahoma” and went to the University of Oklahoma not sure of what he wanted to pursue. He thought about following his father’s path, but the OU radio station looked more fun.
This path included an internship at KMOX in St. Louis, when he was in his early 20s. Part of his duties included preparing notes and highlights for the anchor on Saturday, who talked about the University of Missouri football.
“It was for Bob Costas,” Lamb said. “This is before I knew what ‘networking’ was. Probably should have stayed a little bit more in touch with him.”
Lamb wound up in DFW, working for WBAP to cover sports. This was when WBAP was a monster all over the United States. Its signal was so strong that, at night, its shows could be heard from Colorado’s Rocky Mountains to Tennessee’s Smoky Mountains.
Lamb was one of the first to have a sports talk show in the market. It was his idea to use then Dallas Morning News sports columnist Randy Galloway more frequently on air, which unintentionally created one of the most recognized voices throughout the Southwest.
“I told management if you want to move past (competitor KRLD 1080) you need to use this guy,” Lamb said.
This was at a time when games were only sporadically televised, which allowed the radio voices to be the stars.
Eventually, WBAP morphed into more of a news talk format that leaned heavily right. Lamb was moved to the morning show, and became a constant next to one of the longest tenured voices in the area, Hal Jay.
For those who have the pleasure of not knowing the routine behind morning news and sports talk shows, they are life altering. It’s a sleep deprived, coffee-crazed world. It’s going to bed at 7:30 p.m. to wake up at 2:30 a.m.
The happiness and smiles that you see and hear from the hosts at 5:30 a.m. is an acquired skill. Hal and Steve mastered it.
“It was so much fun to listen to; Hal was driving the boat on it,” Lamb said. “We all grew up listening to somebody, and they’re no longer there. It’s just changed.
“Hal and I have been together for 35 years. Fortunately I married a lady who understands the routine.”
Along the way, he met an ambitious graduate of Trimble Tech, and finally got the nerve to ask her out. Steve has been married to NBC 5 anchor Deborah Ferguson for 31 years, and the couple reside in Fort Worth.
An avid motorcyle rider, hunter and eager but horrendous fisherman, Steve is not exactly sure what he will do with a schedule that is now radically changed. He can stay up to watch all four quarters of his beloved Oklahoma Sooners without fearing an alarm clock that will ruin his next day.
The final seconds to his 39-year career were not what he envisioned. But he didn’t envision the first 39 years, either, and those were just so much damn fun.
“I can’t tell you that I knew in high school this is what I wanted to do,” Lamb said. “I had an English teacher in high school who asked me, ‘Steve, what do you want to do with your life? Do something with your voice. Maybe look at being at a pastor, or being on TV, or do radio.’”
The TV people wore makeup. The writers worked too much.
And he already had a voice that God made for radio.
