Murphy, Hanks, Smith and Gardner launch TV shows

If you happened to be cruising social media Friday night, you may have noticed Neuse News has branched out into the world of live sports broadcasting. If you're a high school football fan, you'll want to check us out on Facebook every Friday for live game coverage.

I listened to Junious Smith III and Graham Hill call the Arendell Parrott Academy/Rocky Mount Academy game on my phone and later watched Bryan Hanks and Jimmy Smith host a post-game show from Neuse News Headquarters, which also featured Keith Spence and Scott Cole. If all of that wasn't enough, Hanks and Smith also did the Kinston High/Farmville Central play-by-play for WRNS 960 AM/960TheBull.com.

Word is ESPN executives are working on an ESPN-Neuse News channel launch for the fall of next year.

Also returning this week was the pre-game show Bryan Hanks and I host for WRNS 960 AM/960TheBull.com. We assemble the show at Jon Dawson HQ in the media hub that is Bucklesberry, N.C., and I have to say I'd forgotten how fun it is to edit Hanks' coach interviews heavily before they go to air. If I didn't shave his interviews down a bit, the radio station would need to rent a second tower to broadcast the entire show.

Having produced podcasts and radio shows for Hanks going on a decade now, I have enough of his off-air meltdowns stored away to ensure my retirement years will be comfortable. You should hear Hanks berate an unpaid intern over the temperature of his venti iced skinny hazelnut macchiato, with sugar-free syrup, extra shot, light ice, no whip, served at 120F.

Apparently, Hanks' believes the drink was served at 121F, so he had no choice but to let the intern go. As I said, you should hear this, but as long as Hanks keeps his payments current, you never will.

Even though Neuse News is a relatively new endeavor, it's moving like a freight train. With the success of the post-game football show, I've been given the green light to let my readers in on some of the new shows we'll be debuting online in the coming weeks:

Wrestling with Reece - Legendary Lenoir County broadcaster, columnist and former bassist for Sly & The Family Stone Reece Gardner's new show will feature local dignitaries, celebrities, and political figures.

"Reece was a champion arm wrestler back in the 1970s," said Neuse News Publisher B.J. Murphy. "It's a little-known fact, but Reece was the inspiration for the Lincoln Hawk character played by Sylvester Stallone in the 1987 arm-wrestling drama Over The Top. On Wrestling with Reece, guests will have to beat Reece in arm wrestling before they can plug their upcoming project. If they cannot defeat Reece, they'll have to give him a dollar."

Junious before his handlers forced him to remove his glasses.

Jamming with Junious - Neuse News sportswriter supreme and flourish specialist Junious Smith III's upcoming series will allow him to indulge in his latest passion, canning fruit preserves.

"Whenever we have a staff meeting, Junious always brings down a box of his award-winning jams and jellies," Murphy said. "He's got a boysenberry preserve that's so good it can reroute traffic. On Jamming with Junious, we'll be utilizing Junious's knowledge of jammary while exploring the many ways fruit spreads affect the human condition."

Hanks For The Memories - Neuse News Editor Bryan Hanks' new show will focus on his notorious habit of misremembering historical events.

"There's really no tight format regarding Hanks For The Memories," Murphy said. "Hanks has been known to confuse past events, such as 'that time the Germans attacked Pearl Harbor'."

"I never understood why everyone was so scared of polio," Hanks said recently. "It's just guys on horses chasing a ball with a stick."

"On Hanks For The Memories, we're just going to quiz Hanks on random historical events to see how wrong he can be," Murphy said. "We already have a case of apology letters pre-written."

Beatboxing with B.J. Murphy - BJ Murphy has been tossing rhymes and dropping dimes in his spare time since Calvin Klein was just an enzyme.

BJ before he invented beatboxing.

"In my mind, B.J. Murphy WAS the Human Beatbox," said Darren Robinson of The Fat Boys in 1988. "I was visiting relatives in North Carolina when I was a kid, and one day in a Burger King parking lot I saw this little kid making this incredible noise with his mouth. He was bragging, too, because he kept jumping up and down and pointing at his face while he was making this great noise. I took that noise with me back to New York and in a few years turned it into a musical sensation."

"I wasn't pointing at my face to brag; I was choking on a french fry," Murphy said. "Darren asked for my contact information so he could give me a chunk of his recording royalties, but I couldn't imagine anyone would be gullible enough to think beatboxing was actually music, so I told him he could have it. I was bitter for a while, but in time I was able to listen to Fat Boys albums with a sense of pride. The other day my dog started sneezing due to allergies, so to be safe I sent a recording to all the major record labels."

Check your local listings and www.NeuseNews.com for show times.

Contact Jon Dawson at jon@neusenews.com and www.jondawson.com.