|
Now entering his 11th season as the play-by-play television voice for the Hawks, Bob Rathbun will call games on the Hawks' FSN South/SportSouth package.
The 51-year-old Rathbun earned a Southeastern Regional Emmy from the National Association of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) as their outstanding sports performer of the year in 1999, one of four that he has helped garner at the network. He was also the 1998 Georgia Sportscaster of the Year as voted on by the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association.
Rathbun has served as the college basketball play-by-play announcer for the ACC Television Network through Raycom/JP Sports since 1988. Rathbun also announces Atlanta Braves games for FSN South and SportSouth.
With an extensive sports background, Rathbun's broadcasting career has earned him six Virginia Sportscaster of the Year honors (1980-82, 1985, 1988-89), a Distinguished Service Award from the ACC (1994), and a Distinguished Alumni Award from Catawba College (1988).
He has also worked with most of the major sports broadcast properties (including the NCAA basketball tournament for CBS and the College World Series for ESPN) at one time or another, in addition to handling play-by-play duties for the Detroit Tigers (1992-94).
In August 2004, Rathbun was hired to spearhead the Atlanta Spirit Speaker's Bureau, where he works on increasing the profile of the Atlanta Spirit properties Hawks, Thrashers and Philips Arena through speaking engagements with civic, community, religious and other local groups.
Rathbun, who graduated with a bachelor of arts in speech from Catawba College (1976), and his wife Marybeth have two children, Courtland John and Grace. He was born November 25, 1954 in Wakefield, Rhode Island. | 