By Gio Gennero | Sports Writer
The Voice of the Bears, John Morris, is no stranger to busy weeks for Baylor athletics. As someone who hasn’t missed a football game since the 80s, Morris’ work ethic is second-to-none, but he’ll be the first to tell you it never feels like a job to him.
“If you love your job, you’ll never work a day in your life,” Morris said. “My mom would tell you that when I was five or six years old. I was doing play-by-play into a walkie talkie in the kitchen.”
On any given week, Morris will have a packed schedule filled up with games for different sports, shows, dinners and press conferences in which he will have to attend. Through all of this, he still finds time in his office to do all his research in preparation for games on the weekend.
Morris keeps spotting boards of not only Baylor’s offense and defense, but the same for whomever their opponent is for the week. He writes notes on many individuals and digs up stories that he could potentially mention during the broadcast.
“If it’s a really good, close game, then the game is the story. The game carries the broadcast,” Morris said. “If it’s a blowout one way or the other, you know if we’re blowing out the other team or if they’re blowing us out, that’s when you have to dig deep and use pretty much everything you’ve prepared.”
Despite the demanding schedule Morris keeps, he believes it is important to have a good work-life balance. He credits his wife and family for helping him with this process. He said he wants to avoid getting burnt out and that she is the main factor assisting that.
“I have a life outside of here. I have a wife at home and she helps with that,” Morris said. “She’s a sports fan to a certain level but not a super fan. When I get home we watch what she wants to on TV and if I have an open weekend we’ll do something she wants to do, and I always try to keep that balance the best that I can.”
Similar to his writing counterpart, Jerry Hill, Morris has garnered a tremendous amount of respect in not only Baylor, but the entire Waco community. After decades of relentless hard work and dedication to the Bears, Morris has more than earned his title as the Voice of the Bears. However, Morris doesn’t see things this way and would never consider himself to have that status. In his eyes, no one will ever top his predecessor, Frank Fallon.
“It’s very nice, but I don’t think I deserve that, but what it says is that this position is one to be respected,” Morris said. “The guy I followed was Frank Fallon, do your research on Frank because he was the absolute best. In a professional sense and in a personal sense, Frank will always be the Voice of the Bears, because he was that good.”
