Our next broadcaster profile is devoted to a man who has been around the game of hockey for 44 years and is a fixture broadcasting hockey on the radio from New Hampshire. Ken Cail is living his boyhood dream as the radio voice of the Manchester Monarchs. Having called well over 1000 games for Manchester, Ken's career was launched in 1970, when he seized an opportunity to become the statistician for longtime and legendary Boston Bruins radio voice Bob Wilson for no pay. This assignment would lead to Ken being transitioned to WBZ and an assignment as Guy Manila's producer for the Calling All Sports show, at Wilson's urging. He would go on to work for WTIC in Hartford, before settling in at WGIR in Manchester, where he was an on-air fixture for nine years. He also had stints at WFEA AM and WZID FM in Manchester. In 2001 the arrival of the Manchester Monarchs brought Ken into the broadcast booth to do their radio play by play, and he has not missed a beat since. His first game as a member of the Monarchs, in October 2001, was broadcast in Lowell, MA, a game in which Ken had to battle through a bad case of laryngaitis.
Anyone who has been around the New England sports scene has probably heard Ken's booming voice at one time or another. His storied history has included plenty of other sports- most notably baseball- as he has been the voice of the Lowell Spinners of the New York Penn League, the Nashua Pride of the Can-Am League, and the Manchester (NH) and West Haven (CT) Yankees.He has also covered major tennis championships, the U.S. Open Golf Championship, and many NASCAR races at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway, as well as scores of high school hockey, football, basketball, and baseball title games. He covered the Red Sox in the 1975 World Series for WBZ Radio as well.
Ken was inducted into the New Hampshire Legends of Hockey Hall of Fame on December 5, 2010. He was voted as the New Hampshire Sportscaster of the Year twice and has won three Golden Mike Awards for outstanding play by play in the state of New Hampshire. He also is the host of the very popular " Cail and Company" radio show which airs daily from Monday to Friday on WTPL radio in Manchester. Listen to Ken Mondays to Fridays from 3-5 PM live at http://www.wtplfm.com/.
Ken is one of my best friends I've ever had in this business. One of my favorite memories of Ken occurred in September of 2007. Ken was working with the Nashua Pride and I was the voice of the North Shore Spirit of the Can-Am League. In 2007 Ken did the PA for Pride home games and he did their radio for the road games. In that season the Pride and the Spirit met for the Can-Am championship. We sat side by side next to each other in that deciding game, with the Pride winning the game and the series. I remember shaking his hand when that last out occurred.
Ken ended his remarkable 14 year run with the Monarchs on June 13, 2015, calling Manchester's 2-1 win at Utica, the first Calder Cup Championship for the franchise, and the final game in Manchester Monarchs history, as the franchise relocated to Southern California for the 2015-16 season.
Here is a sample of Ken's outstanding work with the Monarchs:
https://archive.org/details/KenCailPlayByPlayManchesterMonarchs
Ken will be working with a new franchise in Manchester for the 2015-16 season in a new league. The Manchester Monarchs of the EJHL are coming to the Verizon Wireless Arena and Ken will have the call of every Monarchs game, home and away. You can hear the call of Monarchs hockey on WTPL 107.7 FM (the Pulse) as well as streamed on the Internet at www.manchestermonarchs.com.
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