Pat O'Brien (born February 14, 1948 in Sioux Falls, South Dakota) is a sports commentator and television show host. He currently hosts the Entertainment Tonight spin-off, The Insider. Prior to that, O'Brien spent 7 years as co-anchor of Access Hollywood.
Pat O'Brien is perhaps best known for his almost 20 year association with CBS Sports, which O'Brien joined in 1981. While at CBS, O'Brien covered the Super Bowl, World Series, NBA Finals, Winter Olympic Games, the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament, and the Final Four.
O'Brien is a graduate of the University of South Dakota. He also studied international economics at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University in Washington, D.C. He began his career as a production assistant for The Huntley-Brinkley Report.
He then served as an anchor and reporter for WMAQ-TV in Chicago and KNXT-TV in Los Angeles from 1977 until 1981 when he joined CBS.
In 2000 O'Brien returned to the sports world when he covered the Summer Olympic Games in Sydney for NBC, appearing on the CNBC channel. He also anchored the 2004 Games in Athens, Greece for NBC, this time appearing on both the Network and MSNBC.
Comedians began taking aim at O'Brien in recent years -- lampooing his nasally voice and bushy moustache. O'Brien has been parodied on shows like The Simpsons, South Park and by Jimmy Fallon on Saturday Night Live.
Also recently, O'Brien had a cameo appearance in P. Diddy's Bad Boy For Life music video.
On March 20, 2005, O'Brien issued a written statement announcing that he had been admitted to a rehab facility for alcoholism. Around the same period of the announcement of O'Brien entering rehab, a string of sexually graphic (and possibly embarrasing) voice mail messages that allegedly contain O'Brien's voice started to make the rounds.
External Links
