Until somebody tells me to slow down I’m going to keep going. And nobody’s ever told me to slow down.
I met Beau Estes, walking human highlight reel narrator, before I was ever familiar with his voice — that is, the far-reaching impact and love for his voice. Chalk that up to American broadcasts never making it over the border, but in a roundabout way which I’m glad of because it meant I could learn about this other very storied side of Beau as an entirely other entity, separate from the regular one who had become my colleague and friend.
Probably you do know Beau, or at least Beau’s voice, from his infamous NBA.com Top Tens. Highlights in which what he’s going to say, and how he’ll say it, sometimes overshadows the high-flying and cause for pause plays he’s scripting. So much so that there was a Reddit thread mapping how Beau’s voiceovers, specifically how he said “top ten”, were getting faster over time. The reason, it turns out, was just crummy equipment.
We talked about how he found the ultra specific niche in basketball that he has, what it feels like to be in so many people’s brains, the process for turning highlights around and how he comes up with them, plus leaning into an alter ego. We also talked about his biggest professional surprises or lessons, how no one ever feels like they’ve made it, the way media coverage and how we talk about the difficult things in sports, like intimate partner violence and turning a critical lens on the NBA, has changed.
Plus: How do we come up with a forum for people to ask dumb or tough questions in, a lot of good stories (when Beau says, “Here’s a story”, or, “I’ve got something for you”, you know you’re getting a good one), and the magic of Summer League.
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