Famous wrestling announcer Jim Ross going 'legit'

Jim Ross will leave his trademark cowboy hat home when he makes his mixed martial arts commentating debut on Oct. 3.

The hat symbolized the pro wrestling character of "Good Ol' JR," made familiar to millions of fans who tuned into World Wrestling Entertainment broadcasts over the past two decades.

The 62-year-old Oklahoman is semi-retired after 40 years in the wrestling business. While he's proud of his body of work, the popular longtime broadcaster has long wanted to call an MMA event.

He'll get that opportunity next month, when he serves as the play-by-play announcer alongside color commentator Chael Sonnen for the BattleGrounds MMA one-night tournament in Tulsa, Okla.

"This is a bucket-list item for me," Ross told Yahoo Sports. "This is something I've always wanted to do."

Ross is destined to go down as a beloved figure within his realm. While the characters in the ring came and went, Ross was the omnipresent voice of the proceedings, making him easily identifiable to both hardcore wrestling fanatics and those casual viewers who like to pretend they don't watch wrestling, but secretly tune in.

But Ross feels he still has something to prove: He wants to be known as a great announcer, period, without the word "wrestling" necessarily attached.

This isn't Ross' first foray out of sports entertainment into the world of legitimate competition. He served a stint on the Atlanta Falcons' radio commentary team in the 1990s; announced games for the ill-fated XFL; and most recently has ventured into boxing broadcasts on Fox Sports properties.

"This is personal to me," Ross said. "People attach a stigma to wrestling and say he's 'the wrestling guy,' but I'm a professional broadcaster. Wrestling just happens to be the area in which I'm best known. If I had an opportunity to do cricket, I might not be a fan of cricket, but I would see it is my duty to the viewers to go out of my way to learn the game and learn the players and give real cricket fans that sort of broadcast they deserve."

In this case, though, Ross won't have nearly as steep a learning curve. He's been a fan of mixed martial arts since the early days of the UFC.

"I've been watching ever since the days of Emmanuel Yarborough and Royce Gracie," Ross said. "It's evolved from then and the UFC has done a fantastic job bringing it from where it was to where it is today. I'm not going into this thinking I'm going to reinvent the wheel. I'm also not going into this just trading off my name and going through the motions to collect a paycheck. I'm passionate about the sport and I want to do it right."

That's not to say Ross doesn't have ideas about the state of MMA commentary in and of itself. When he's sitting at home taking in an MMA event, he's usually hearing the sort of things only a fellow announcer can pick out.

"When I watch MMA events, I'm usually listening to the broadcast from the perspective of the announcers," Ross said. "It's who I am. If there was one thing I'd critique, it seems like sometimes they take the audience's level of knowledge a bit for granted."

Ross feels it's an announcer's role to let the viewers know why the two fighters on their screen are competing, as much as describing the action.

"Sometimes two fighters will be out there and they don't really get into why they're on our TV screen," Ross said. "Why are they there? Don't assume a casual viewer is up to speed on a fighter who is fighting on TV for the first time. Tell us why we should care about him, and his opponent, and this fight."

Sonnen will be along to help out on that front. The pay-per-view event in Tulsa will mark the controversial Sonnen's first MMA appearance of note since announcing his retirement this summer in the wake of a pair of failed PED tests.

While Sonnen is known as much for bluster and hype as he is for his fighting accomplishments, there's little disputing that Sonnen is deeply knowledgeable on the subject matter at hand. As a bonus, he has a knack for taking complex technical matters and presenting them in a manner that's easy for the average fan to understand.

"I'm like the point guard here," Ross said. "From an announcing perspective, Chael is the star of the show. If I'm doing my job right, Chael will shine."

The way Ross says it, the combination of a famous pair of commentators, along with the throwback, one-night elimination tournament — competitors include veterans such as Cody McKenzie, Luigi Fioravanti, Brock Larson, and Jesse Taylor, with a $50,000 check going to the winner — should be enough to make fans who have plenty of options give BattleGrounds MMA a look.

"I think it's going to be an interesting night," Ross said. "I think you've got, the promoters are giving an interesting hook by going to the old-school, one-night tournament format. That differentiates them from the rest of the options out there. Throw in, I'd like to think we'll bring in some of the wrestling fans, to, who want to see how I do trying something different, and Chael's being pushed out of his comfort zone, too — he's been a studio analyst, but not a live commentator — I think that all adds up to a package worth giving a chance."

Of course, while Ross is trying something new, some habits do die hard. A diehard Oklahoma Sooners football fan, Ross plans on attending every Sooners game, home and away, this fall. Had the show landed on a college football Saturday, calling an MMA card would have been out of the question. Instead, Ross made arrangements to call the fights in Tulsa, then see the Sooners play at Texas Christian University the next morning.

"As soon as the show's over, I'm leaving and they're driving me to Fort Worth so I can get in town in time for the game," Ross said. "It's in my contract. There was a window to get this done and we made it work."

After 40 years on the road, Ross has earned the right to make such an arrangement. But will it become a familiar one? While the gig stands as a one-night commitment for now, if things go well who knows? Maybe we're getting towards the end of the book, but there's still time to add another chapter.

"Maybe this will work," Ross said. "You never know. It could turn out for something. But for now, it's a chance to get to do something I've always wanted to do, and that's good enough for me."

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