Although there are many different types of interviews a reporter may conduct depending on a given situation, the importance of preparation carries through. Andrea Kremer has studied interviewing throughout her stellar journalistic career and employs various principles of the craft on a daily basis. Moreover, she teaches a graduate course at Boston University in which she teaches the art of interviewing and, as a result, scrutinizes her own proclivities in the process.
While Kremer values being prepared and has garnered a reputation of being a relentless, determined reporter, she also knows how to convey empathy and actively listen. Within many occurrences, journalists compile scrupulous notes and utilize them to form effective, compendious questions. Continuously analyzing the notes throughout the conversation, however, can cause a conversation to become trifling or futile due to sacrificing a level of focus.
“The objective is to hear from the subject,” Kremer explained, “and the shorter and tighter you can ask your question and get out of the way and let them speak, and then you kind of come in and do the heavy lifting with, ‘What do you mean by that?’ I call it peeling back the onion – get back details; keep them in the moment; let them express how they really think about something [and] take it past the superficial.”
When Kremer conducted an interview with Cincinnati Reds infielder Pete Rose, he observed that she did not glimpse at her notes once despite having them at the table. During this conversation, they served as a security blanket and resource if absolutely necessary. Leading up to a different interview, Kremer asked her boss at ESPN, John Walsh, if there was anything missing. In reply, he stated that she would know the subject of the conversation better than they know themselves, an epigrammatic remark underscoring the preceding nuance.
Combining her acumen with affability were innate characteristics Kremer worked to develop throughout her youth, even though she had no clear picture about a career in sports media. There was a paucity of women in the business at the time, and she does not remember any bonafide role models in the space. In fact, her penchant for sports was something she regarded as an anomaly.
While in high school, Kremer was a member of the Philadelphia Civic Ballet and contributed to the group while attending college at the University of Pennsylvania. Balancing her dance commitments with a triple minor in English, sociology and anthropology required focus and dedication. Because of her schedule, she would be unable to make certain Eagles games and ended up listening to the action on her Walkman.
Upon taking a leave of absence from law school at Fordham University after one year, Kremer applied her acumen of the humanities to writing dance and theater reviews for The Main Line Chronicle based in Ardmore, Pa. Because she enjoyed sports, the publication would occasionally let her write a sports story, and the first interview she ever conducted came after Dick Vermeil resigned as head coach of the Eagles.
Once the sports editor left the newspaper, she was appointed to the role and had to give up ballet in the process. Part of the role entailed her physically laying out the newspaper with an Exact-o-Knife to determine article placement. From there, she helped transform coverage of local sports from a broadsheet to a separate pullout titled SportsWeek Magazine. One of the stories she wrote centered on NFL Films, the production arm of the National Football League.
“When I was done interviewing the guy who would become my boss, he says to me, ‘Oh, would you like a tour?,’ and I’m sort of trying to play it very cool. ‘Yeah sure – I’m doing you a favor,’” Kremer recalled. “I’m walking around and my mind is getting blown by walking around NFL Films. When he walked me to the car when I was leaving, he said, ‘You’re just the person that we want to hire – somebody who knows how to write and really knows football.’”
Upon informing her mother of his emblematic statement, she compelled her to apply for a job at the outlet. Kremer wanted to wait until the completion of the 1984 Olympics to consider other roles though since she had interviews and coverage planned beforehand. After displaying an indefatigable work ethic that left her sick with mononucleosis while watching the Olympics from home, she remembered her experience at NFL Films and decided to try for the job.
“Like a semi-idiot, I apply right at the beginning of the football season – it doesn’t occur to me everything’s going to be done,” Kremer said. “But sometimes lightning is in a bottle because right at the time, NFL Films had started to produce rock videos, and so a lot of their producers were being moved over to do the videos, and they had an opening to produce for football.”
Following an interview and proficiency examination, Kremer was hired exactly one week later and started learning about television production. Entering broadcast television as a writer and producer helped bolster her skillset, allowing her to more effectively transition to doing on-camera reports three years later for This is the NFL.
Kremer served as her own producer, a recommendation she made to executive Steve Sabol in order to better facilitate her transition into the role. Previous experience performing in front of an audience also rendered her more comfortable overall and permitted her to compartmentalize the multitudinous array of responsibilities she possessed.
“Ballet gave me the discipline – it’s just that simple,” Kremer said. “That was hugely important to all that I was doing then and of course all the juggling that I continued to do throughout my career.”
ESPN demonstrated interest in hiring Kremer as its first female correspondent in 1989, and she originally operated out of Chicago, Ill. where she filed reports for programs such as Sunday NFL Countdown and SportsCenter. While she covered plenty of live games across various leagues, she fastidiously worked on longform, enterprise reporting that spanned beyond the final score. Conversations about her joining the network came from a lunch she had with executives John Walsh and Steve Anderson while at Super Bowl XXIII in Miami, Fla.
“To this day, I tell [John] Walsh – I said, ‘I’m the best draft pick you ever made,’ because what do you do with a draft pick? You project, right? They may be really good, but you’ve got to project how they’re going to be at the next level,” Kremer articulated. “Here I am at NFL Films essentially working for house organ; working for a league, and now I’m going to be a real journalist.”
Recent reports have indicated that The Walt Disney Company is in advanced discussions with the NFL that would have the league sign on as a minority stakeholder of ESPN. As part of the deal, the NFL Media portfolio of brands would reportedly be placed under the control of Disney. The NFL accounted for 93 of the top-100 most-watched television programs last year, according to data from Nielsen Media Research, and reportedly earns more than $12 billion per year on its media rights alone. ESPN serves as the home of Monday Night Football, which recently attained its most-viewed season since 2000 placing games across broadcast (ABC), cable (ESPN/ESPN2) and digital platforms (ESPN+/Hulu).
“Now you may have ESPN, which has some terrific journalists there if they’re allowed to really do their job, and you have to wonder if that’s the case if they’re going to be in partnership with an actual league that they’re supposed to cover,” Kremer said. “I just shake my head at how that would work.”
Prognosticating what the future of objective, unfettered journalism could look like amid consolidation and augmented content is considered by many people to be an arduous task. There are signs though that point to its endangerment, such as a record number of layoffs in media last year and emphasis on abbreviated storytelling that can lack necessary context.
“I’m not naïve to the economics of it,” Kremer added. “The economics – it may be a great deal for both, but from a journalistic standpoint, how can anybody just not wince and kind of put your hands up [and say], ‘Oh my gosh, what’s happening here?’”
As means of instant gratification rise in prominence within the media ecosystem, long-form storytelling that examines an issue in-depth are at risk of becoming extinct. Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, the Emmy award-winning investigative series on HBO, was canceled after 29 years, but it made an immeasurable impact in many different facets of the industry.
“Without getting political in any way, I don’t care what genre you’re in – sports; politics; whatever – it’s still about speaking truth to power and having accountability, and I hope I’m not becoming a dinosaur in feeling that way, but I have to,” Kremer said. “I have to think that there’s still going to be room for this and it’s just not going to go away.”
During her 17 years as a correspondent for the program, Kremer traveled around the world to report on various different stories related to sports. The final report she filed with the show involved Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay, who discussed his struggles with addiction, a DUI arrest and his experiences in rehabilitation. A recent police report revealed that Irsay had been found unresponsive in his home last month and was struggling to breathe, something that may seem prescient because of the timing just after the interview.
“I did a story again on marijuana use in the NFL and legalized sports betting before it became legalized here,” Kremer said. “We did all these stories, and the number of stories the correspondents have done where six months later; a year later; whatever it is and we had it first – we were looking into these issues well before they came into the rest of the mainstream media. It’s really kind of amazing, and just the ability to delve into these things and to really, really, really take your time to tell the best story.”
Sideline reporters within a live football broadcast enhance the overall storytelling surrounding the game at hand by rapidly delineating information to the audience. In the week leading up to a game, they often have conversations with players, coaches and other team personnel to provide context and garner additional information. Kremer worked in this role for Sunday Night Football during its first five seasons on NBC, but it was a job that she was not sure she wanted to take. Although Kremer would get to work with play-by-play announcer Al Michaels and analyst John Madden, both of whom moved from ABC/ESPN to NBC, she had never done sideline reporting in the past and informed her agent of such.
“He said, quoting Dick Ebersol, ‘Dick wants the best reporter and he thinks you’re the best reporter,’” Kremer recalled. “What it also enabled me to do was to work with the Olympics, and that was, I would say the primary reason to take the job.”
Kremer embarked on a six-month period that included assignments that she knows some people never get to do in their careers. In the summer of 2008, she was in Beijing and covered swimmer Michael Phelps as he won eight gold medals. She was then on the sidelines for Sunday Night Football, which led up to NBC’s broadcast of Super Bowl XLIII six months later. The Pittsburgh Steelers sealed the game on a touchdown pass from quarterback Ben Rothlisberger to wide receiver Santonio Holmes in a moment that lives in football lore.
Throughout her career, Kremer stayed true to herself as a journalist and has had a reverence for her colleagues. In the modern media environment though, some on-air talent are establishing themselves independent of a network wherein they have latitude in their discourse and conduct. When Kremer and Hannah Storm had their broadcast of Thursday Night Football canceled by Amazon Prime Video ahead of the 2023 NFL season after five years, she was disappointed but did not have a visceral reaction.
“I can be bitter, but I don’t know where that gets you,” Kremer explained. “I can say pretty unequivocally it wasn’t personal to Hannah and me – it’s the business, and this is how things are. A person can get all bent out of shape about it and you can get angry, but I feel that relationships are the key to success in any profession. It’s just that simple.”
Following the cancellation of Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, Kremer took time to reflect on how she feels about the profession at this point in her career. Asking herself questions pertaining to her own motivation, work ethic and skill level, she was able to retain her sanguinity despite the disappointment yielded from the outcome.
“I feel that I’m still at the top of my game, and more than that, I’m still challenged,” Kremer said. “I’m still learning, and I still want to get better.”
Kremer continues to appear on the CBS Sports Network original program We Need To Talk, now in the midst of its 10th year on the air. The program analyzes the world of sports from the perspective of women, and it includes many respected, accomplished professionals such as Tracy Wolfson, Lesley Visser and Amy Trask. Various athletes also contribute to the monthly program, including Renee Montgomery, Swin Cash and Lisa Leslie. The show derived from an idea that there needed to be a show similar to The View for women discussing sports.
“There is a tremendous esprit de corps with all the women, and that just makes it extra fun – it really does – to work with people that you genuinely like,” Kremer said. “I think that we’re not just out there screaming. I think we have really thoughtful commentary [and] informed opinions.”
While there were no examples for Kremer in sports media when she was younger, she has secured a different reality for women interested in building careers in the industry. Whether it is through her storytelling or power to penetrate boundaries and achieve unprecedented success, she is cognizant of the impact she has had on people. Through her vast experience and dedication to the job, she was able to embark on a journey that catalyzed progress and inspired countless aspiring professionals.
“Right before our first Amazon game, I got an email from a guy,” Kremer said. “…He basically says, ‘Good luck to you women. Know that when young girls wake up Friday morning, they’re going to know that an entirely new dream is possible,’ and Hannah and I look at each other like, ‘Oh my gosh!’ That’s pretty powerful – that’s pretty powerful.”
Kremer is one of three women who has been inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, attaining the honor as the recipient of the Pete Rozelle Radio-Television Award in 2018. The award is granted to a media member for outstanding contributions to the sport through modicums of communication. She will soon receive another accolade as the only woman to be inducted as a member of the Class of 2024 into the National Sports Media Association’s Hall of Fame. Kremer greatly values being able to share the distinction with her family, affirming that they helped make her career possible.
“It’s like what I said in my Pro Football Hall of Fame speech to my son,” Kremer explained. “I said, ‘I always told you that mom goes away because she has to, not because she wants to, and hopefully you realize that me being away was worthwhile to an extent.’”
As a pioneer in the industry and an inspiration to journalists everywhere, Kremer hopes people realize that the honor spans beyond a mere popularity contest. Additionally, it is meaningful for her to accept the award and praise while she continues to work on a variety of projects with entities such as NFL Network and CBS Sports, all of which are geared towards candid reporting and unfeigned journalism.
“It’s just a reflection on my work, and that’s what I hope resonates for young journalists,” Kremer said. “Today they call it ‘building your brand.’ I never thought about building my brand, but I built a brand and I didn’t even know it – as somebody who takes journalism seriously. And it’s not like I set out to do that – that’s for darn sure – but that’s what happens.”
Women in sports media have had to fight through many uphill battles over the years and still face levels of unwarranted criticism because of their gender. The poise and strength of women in the space spans far beyond the misogynistic commentary and impugning rhetoric perpetuated on a daily basis, and Kremer is honored to have played a part therein.
As Kremer and countless other women continue to shatter the proverbial glass ceiling and eradicate stereotypes, they have firmly placed a doorstop at the foyer of opportunity. Despite many attempts to slam it shut, the door is simply not moving, cemented into the ground and kept accessible to all.
“When I was a kid, there was nobody I could look up to and say, ‘I want to do what she does. I want to be what she is,’” Kremer conveyed. “Now hopefully, myself and so many other women out there are in a position where young girls can say, ‘I want to do what she does. I want to be who she is.’”
Derek Futterman is a contributing editor and sports media reporter for Barrett Media. Additionally, he has worked in a broad array of roles in multimedia production – including on live game broadcasts and audiovisual platforms – and in digital content development and management. He previously interned for Paramount within Showtime Networks, wrote for the Long Island Herald and served as lead sports producer at NY2C. To get in touch, find him on X @derekfutterman.
