Bob Coldeen: It was time

Retired KSPN sportscaster Bob Coldeen poses at the terrace of his lovely Navy Hill home with a postcard perfect view of the Saipan lagoon. (MARK RABAGO)

“It was time.”

Longtime KSPN sportscaster Bob Coldeen nonchalantly said when asked why he put down the recording camera one final time last Oct. 29 after nearly three decades of being the face of local broadcast TV.

Along the way, the now 70-year-old former Peace Corp volunteer, Rota High School teacher, and PSS federal programs coordinator became a household name with his own catch phrase “Did you get that, Bob?”

“You do a thing 28 years in a row, you know, it was just time,” he said in an interview with Saipan Tribune at his picturesque Navy Hill home.

Coldeen said he’s excited but at the same time has no clue what to do next.

“It’s a new chapter and the first page is blank. After this interview I’m going to watch the World Series between the Atlanta Braves and the Houston Astro,” he said.

And he choose the right time to call it quits, as the weekend after he retired from covering sports, all events were, for all intents and purposes, cancelled on account of a reemergence of COVID-19 community cases.

“You have to understand, I went 120 consecutive Mondays with a show, meaning I went 120 weekends stressing what to do. Like this last weekend with so many stuff postponed whatever, I’d be stressing what to do tonight,” he said.

Coldeen began his sportscasting career in 1993 after he joined Marianas Cable Vision, but unbeknownst to many he was recruited a full year before that.

“MCV started in 1992 and I’ve always been the announcer for the baseball games. So they hear and they always know me as the announcer. So when they started MCV I was the first person they asked, but I had one more year to go to qualify for government retirement,” he said.

At that time, Coldeen was still working as the staff-of-one of then representative Stanley Torres, but in 1993 he finally retired from government service and traded in his suit and tie for a sports cap.

Being a sportscaster in the early 1990s was like a dream come true for the University of Florida alumnus.

“Those were really exciting days for sports because there was a lot of money coming in. There was a lot of excitement. Japanese professional baseball teams were coming in. Larry Hillblom invested $1 million into MCV. Those were heady days and everybody was like ‘oh, the future is going to be great,’” he said.

The party went on until the mid-2000s when the garment factories were shuttered, Japan Air Lines left, and then everything started going down including sports.

“Sports is just a microcosm of a larger society. There also a lot more people then and I’m sorry the quality of play back then was better. Our baseball was excellent and the basketball games inside the Ada Gym were packed. There were so much excitement,” he said.

Coldeen added that baseball was at its highest level back then with the likes of Tony Benavente, Tony Camacho, Chris Nelson, Mike “Rock” Guerrero, and John Reyes dominating the field. He said the CNMI’s Little League teams were also contending every year in regionals and even made it to the World Series.

During those years, Coldeen was not only busy covering sports, as he also served as manager for many Little League teams and to this day, he attests that those stints were his most memorable moments in sports.

“Going off-island and winning a tournament with your CNMI team is my proudest moment. We won tournaments in Guam, Palau, and in the Philippines and those were big. You’re with a team and it’s like everybody’s against you and so winning in some other’s home field was special,” he said.

Bob Coldeen inside his sports- and Hollywood-theme mancaves at his Navy Hill home. (MARK RABAGO)

While nothing tops taking the CNMI Junior League All-stars to the World Series, Coldeen also counts watching the sunrise at Banzai Cliff during fun runs, waking up at 6am on Thanksgiving morning to go up to Mt. Tapochao for the Turkey Trot, and covering golf tournaments as the other highlights of his sportscasting career.

Apart from the highs, he also admitted there were some lows during his nearly 30-year career in journalism. One such low was when he covered the basketball game when Jeremy Winkfield broke his foot after he was fouled while attempting a dunk.

“I put the camera down and missed it (the footage),” he said while conceding that’s probably the only time he was glad “he didn’t get it” in respect to Winkfield’s parents.

There was also the time when someone complained that he featured his son, Bobby, in one of his evening sports broadcasts.

“Someone got mad at me for putting my son on TV. My son had pitched a no-hitter and he was like ‘you always put your son on.’ I was only showing the good thing and he was an all-star so why not. That’s the ‘it’s not you, it’s them,’” Coldeen said while alluding to a KSPN newsroom mantra.

Now that he’s called it a career, Coldeen will have more Saipan sunsets to enjoy with his lovely wife, Martha, at the terrace of their lovely Navy Hill home.

“How many times you go home at 10 o’clock or you get up on Sunday morning at 6 o’clock to go cover something. So she’s very tolerant of being married to a sportscaster. I’m very happy to have a family, a home, and a career.”

Come to think of it, Coldeen said since leaving KSPN it’s the first time has hasn’t had a job in over 50 years.

“I’m excited. I went 54 consecutive years of not being jobless and the last time I filled out a job application was 1988 when I applied at PSS. So every other job after 1988 was somebody asking and so I never asked for anything. So, it’s going to be a big mental shock. Ask me what my plans are I’m going to watch the World Series and after that game is over ask me what I’m going to do I don’t know…I’ll probably mow the yard or whatever.”

In a serious note, Coldeen said his plans are to enjoy each day with family and friends now that he’s finally retired.

“I threw myself totally into sportscasting and I totally enjoyed it. So I was able to do that for a long time at a very high level of passion… But Cuki [Alvarez] said something, ‘you make it look easy but it’s not easy.’ And it’s all because of your aptitude. You ask me to draw something. I can’t draw anything…then you do something excellent for 28 years…then it’s just time!”