Darren Headrick Named Voice of UK Women’s Basketball, Baseball
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Darren Headrick, who has spent over a decade announcing collegiate and professional sports including being named a Baseball America Best MLB Broadcaster Prospect honoree in 2015, has joined the UK Sports Network team as the new voice of Kentucky women’s basketball and baseball.
Along with calling all the action on the court and on the diamond, Headrick will also serve as the host of the Matthew Mitchell Radio Show, Nick Mingione Radio Show, the Wildcat Sports Update (a daily radio feature on the network highlighting UK’s Olympic sports programs), Big Blue Weekly (a one-hour radio show focused on UK’s Olympic sports programs) and will help with all other UK Sports Network broadcasts. Headrick will host his first Big Blue Weekly show on Monday evening following the Coach Mark Stoops Radio Show.
Headrick comes to Kentucky after spending the past few years as the TV and radio play-by-play announcer for the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders, which is the Triple-A affiliate of the New York Yankees. With the RailRiders, Headrick called all 144 games on television and radio while also hosting the pregame and postgame shows, handling the team’s social media accounts, writing content for the team’s annual media game and coordinating the team’s weekly media relations duties.
The native of Maryville, Tenn., has also spent the past few seasons calling University of Tennessee basketball, baseball, softball and soccer games on the SEC Network+ and has worked with Friday Night Rivals/SPORTSFeverTV calling high school and Division II college football games.
Headrick has received multiple honors for his work. On top of being named a Baseball America Best MLB Broadcaster Prospect honoree in 2015, he was tabbed the Carolina League Broadcaster of the Year in 2013.
Since graduating from Tennessee in 2007 with a bachelor’s degree in communication and information journalism as an electronic media major, Headrick has been a part of award-winning broadcast teams at every stop in his professional career. He began his journey as an intern for the Vol Radio Network at UT where he worked as a pregame and postgame studio host, produced network coaches’ shows and women’s basketball broadcasts, assisted with the production of football broadcasts and recorded a weekly podcast for utsports.com.
While working with the Vol Radio Network, Headrick began his impressive professional baseball announcing career in 2008 as a broadcast assistant and play-by-play announcer for the Chicago Cubs’ Southern League Double-A team. He was named the assistant director of broadcasting for the Houston Astros’ Pacific Coast League Triple-A team in 2011, serving as the radio play-by-play announcer for all games and was tabbed the director of media relations/broadcasting in February 2012 for the Cleveland Indians’ Carolina League Advanced A team where he was the Voice of the Mudcats for three years until moving to Scranton in 2015.
Headrick has also been very involved in collegiate sports around his impressive professional baseball experience, including spending three years as the radio play-by-play announcer for East Carolina University baseball from 2012-2014. He also worked with Learfield Sports during that time calling North Carolina State and Alabama women’s basketball games.
Headrick replaces Neil Price, who spent 12 years calling UK women’s basketball and baseball for UK Sports Network before being named the Voice of the Mississippi State Bulldogs earlier this year.
