Dobbo's 15 minutes

Howard Dobson, presenter of TV3's Sports Tonight. Picture / Amos Chapple

"Hey, Howard."

"Call me Dobbo, mate," says Howard, the jock-like, jovial sports guru of TV3.

If you don't love sport, then Dobbo's Sports Tonight is for you. And if you are a die-hard fan, there's something for you too. It's a quick-fire programme of the best shots, hits, Hollywoods, crashes and goals of the sporting day. Plus all the best stories from sport's past. And it's all done in 15 minutes, sometimes 20, if Dobbo can wangle it.

He had to push the bigwigs at TV3 hard to convince them a programme like Sports Tonight would work. "I've waited 10 years for this show," he jokes. And he confesses that when the 11pm show first aired on February 15: "They had a sweepstake in the office to see how long we'd last."

"But on our 13th episode, March the 3rd, little wee Sports Tonight at 11 o'clock, not a prime time show, out-rated the multi-million dollar six o'clock news," he proclaims proudly.

"We got hauled into the office and they basically said the trial period was over — it'll work."

It was one of TV3's highest-rating debut shows and it continues next year, something Dobbo is pretty damn proud of.

He had a vision for a sports show that was interesting to the non-sporty — and the sporty — and he knew the perfect way to do it.

"You have to break the mould. At 11 o'clock, 85 per cent of New Zealanders are either asleep or not watching. If you do it with scoreboards and graphics you're going to put people to sleep. We had to be provocative – by that I don't mean breaking broadcasting standards, but we had to push the boundaries. If you can't grab them in the first minute then you've lost them."

That's why each night's opening segment — essentially a mix of streakers, knock outs, and crashes — is different.

"Our first show screened on John McEnroe's birthday, and he'd just been in the country. So I dug up 20 years' worth of his tantrums, and we interviewed him. Perfect.

"I'll give you one trade secret, and that's it. Shows have got to have signatures, something that's synonymous to the show. So we've got 'Plays of the Week', 'the Sin Bin', 'What the hell are they thinking?', 'Play of the Day' — I mean, anybody can do that, but no one's really doing it here. So just coming up with different signatures.

"The challenge is finding the mix between giving the passionate sport lovers what they want but also trying to tailor it to your mum, your grandma, or Mary-Jane who's a 17-year-old who's never seen one end of a bat."

Growing up in Hamilton, Dobbo knew the right end of a cricket bat after playing age-grade cricket. But he laughs about the fact he spent more time recuperating from growing 33cm (13 inches) in his third-form year, than actually playing sport.

At the age of 17 he worked at Hugh Wrights men's and boy's wear store to make extra money.

"To cut a long story short, I got into radio over a ripped staple. I sold a pair of trou' to the big cheese of [radio network] IBC and he cut his hand on the staple that holds the price. There was blood everywhere and 45 minutes later, after we'd sponged it off, he offered me a job.

"And I got into TV over a Coke bottle," he continues. "In '94 when the Pakistan cricket team toured here, there was a player called Ata-ur-Rehman who got hit by a Coke bottle. I was working for IRN [Independent Radio Network] and I went out on the field and one of the TV3 guys asked me, 'Who was the guy that got hit by the Coke bottle?' So I pointed him out and the next minute I ended up doing the interview for TV3. It got edited out, but a day later I got offered a job."

His passion for sport extends further than just the 80 minutes of rugby, or the one-day cricket experience. For him it's about the stories, the personalities and the "defining moments".

His All Black "awakening" was the team's 32-31 win over the South African Barbarians after being 9-31 down. That was 1976 and he was 6. His cricket "enlightenment" was when New Zealand beat England for the first time in a test at the Basin Reserve in 1978.

"We got them all out for 64 in the second dig," he says.

He's full of the great sports stories — some known, some not so well-known. Most recently he reckons the Boston Red Sox win at baseball's world series had it all.

"It was more than just two American clubs, it was theatre, history, the curse — it was just a great yarn."

We suggest that the golf shots he selects for Sports Tonight aren't exactly great yarns, but they're inspirational. "There's not a week goes by that I'm not looking for a play in golf and quite often that'll make the top three," he agrees. "But golf, unless it's brilliant, it ain't gonna make it."

As well as the latest sport, Dobbo's team — made up of producer Curt Jones (formerly of sport channel ESPN) and reporters Rod Cheeseman and Mike Hall — also try to give viewers something they've never seen, or something that they want to see again.

"Like the Babarians try of '73. I've seen it a million times but I still want to see it again."

Another example is the heavyweight title fights from the 90s which TV3 had the rights to. It was a decade that had some of the most famous and craziest fights in history, according to Dobbo.

"Guys being disqualified for not punching and one guy was disqualified for crying in the ring. Ear bites."

The highlight of this year for Dobbo was talking to former heavyweight champion George Foreman. Foreman is getting back into the ring early next year at the age of 55. He was the oldest heavyweight champion of the world at 45.

"I've never met him in person but to talk to him on the [satellite] dish is the next best thing."

But don't talk horse racing. He knows nothing about it and he's quite happy about that.

The show Sports Tonight
The time Weekinights, 11pm; end-of-year special The Morning After The Year Before, Monday December 27 at 5pm
The place TV3