2015 WFNY Author Spotlight : Best of Josh Poloha

WFNY is proud of our assortment of writers and are especially grateful to be blessed with its daily readership/viewership. As part of our year-end festivities, WFNY has put together an Author Spotlight series to allow the readers to get to know the writers a bit better by pulling back the curtain on their thoughts and pulling in some of their favorite pieces from the year.

We hope you enjoy a quick look back at Josh’s 2015 year and maybe find something you like that you missed the first time around. Have the Hap, Hap, Happiest New Year you can and we hope you continue blessing us by reading the site. Thank you.

Josh Poloha’s Quick Biography

A Cleveland and Ohio State sports fanatic since the day I was born, I ate, slept, and watched sports almost whenever I had the TV on (and I can now I can even watch them on-the-go because of technology). When I graduated from The Ohio State University in May 2013, I wanted to turn that passion into writing, which is when I began to write about both Cleveland sports and the Buckeyes. In December 2014, I took a chance and asked to join the WFNY crew, and they – Scott, Craig, and Andrew- decided to give me a chance after reading my previous work, something I am forever grateful for.

Whether it’s the scarlet and gray or anything Cleveland, I enjoy writing and don’t even think of it as a “job”. Due to the fact that I am mainly the headline guy for WFNY (and the anchor of the nighttime desk), my five posts to describe me are a bit different than everyone elses. I went with my five favorite posts, rather than the five works that describe the person that I am. Most are headlines, but a couple are features about the Buckeyes as well.

Five works that best describe Josh Poloha from 2015

Pure Comedy : Damon Jones opens photography studio — By far the funnest (and hopefully you found funniest) article I have written, this article was in conjuction with our “April Fool’s Day” comedy series of posts. Although I did poke fun at the fact that Amon Ones (aka Damon Jones) was most likely LeBron James’ photographer at times during the 2014-15 season, it was all in good fun.

Jones had been rumored to open his own studio in light of the incredible (and #nofilter) pictures he has captured on planes, in hallways, and in locker rooms. Now he wants to broaden his skills and actually make money off of his work, so he has opened his own photo studio – Amon Ones Photography, Inc.

Ambitious : Quarterback competitions and Braxton Miller’s future: Ohio State Buckeyes Preview —
Looking back, it’s amazing to think of the quarterback competition that took place prior to the 2015 Ohio State football season. This piece was my first “feature” and was by far the post that took the longest to write at the time, but I loved every second of it. While looking back on it, I wish head coach Urban Meyer didn’t have such competition and just stuck with one quarterback, hindsight is 20-20 and I wouldn’t have gotten the opportunity to write about it and Braxton Miller if there weren’t such competition. But, either way, the talent that was behind center for the 2015-16 Buckeyes was truly superb.

Whether Miller is running, catching, or throwing the ball in a trick play, his new role will bring a whole new dimension to an already explosive Ohio State offense that will aim to light up the Horseshoe and venues across the country every Saturday in the fall.

Pure Love (of winning) : Ohio State releases incredible National Championship video — Time and again, the Ohio State video and graphic team proved that they are one of the best in the country. Obviously, the inaugural College Football Playoff Champions hype video was the best due to the fact that the Buckeyes were national champions. But, I loved writing this so much because it was a perfect way to (basically) start writing about Ohio State with WFNY. The saying might be that you “started from the bottom”, but I think for this one, I definitely started from the top.

The viewer can not only hear sounds from the game, but also get a “behind the scenes” look at some of the pregame festivities. It helps you regain the great memories of the extraordinary run the young Buckeyes went on in the 2014-15 season.

More than just a game : Indians players and coaches shave heads in support of Mike Aviles’ daughter — Stories that show that sports are more than just playing the game are the best, and that’s exactly what this was. When a team does something like this in support of a player and his family, it truly shows how close a team is and puts sport in perspective. The Indians may have underperformed in 2015, but the team was close, and the headline I wrote about a lot of the team shaving their heads truly shows how close they were. By the way, be sure to read Michael Bode’s “For Adriana,” because it is an incredible read on Avile’s and his daughter and could get you emotional of if are a parent.

For Cleveland Indians infielder Mike Aviles, baseball became an afterthought earlier in May, when his four year-old daughter, Adriana, was diagnosed with leukemia.

Best in the game : Listen: Tom Hamilton makes perfect call of Santana RBI, Gomes slam —
When it comes to baseball, there is no radio announcer better in the game than Cleveland Indians’ own Tom Hamilton. When I listen to his walk-off calls, I truly gets chills and goosebumps, which is part of the reason why I loved writing this quick headline so much. With just a few months to go until the Indians start their 2016 campaign, I can’t wait to hear more of Hamilton’s walk-off calls this summer.

Tom Hamilton is arguably the best play-by-play guy in baseball but there’s no argument at all among Cleveland Indians fans.

Last Word

While I may just be the “headline guy” for the majority of the time, I truly do love writing about anything and everything Cleveland and Ohio State for WFNY. I not only love writing about something I love, but the rest of the crew at WFNY have made me a better writer in my first year with this fantastic group as well. I can’t wait to see what Year 2 has in store for me here at WFNY and like I previously said, I can’t thank Scott, Andrew, and Craig enough for giving me a chance, and for the rest of the WFNY crew to be as cool and nice as they are.

Oh and by the way, one of my favorite parts of WFNY is definitely our internal Slack conversations, they are not only informative, but even funny at times as well.