{"id":15283,"date":"2019-02-25T17:20:35","date_gmt":"2019-02-25T22:20:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/?p=15283"},"modified":"2019-02-25T17:20:35","modified_gmt":"2019-02-25T22:20:35","slug":"mickey-charles-wcau-radio-philadelphia-inquirer-dial-sports-pioneer-dead-at-83","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/2019\/02\/mickey-charles-wcau-radio-philadelphia-inquirer-dial-sports-pioneer-dead-at-83\/","title":{"rendered":"Mickey Charles, WCAU Radio, Philadelphia Inquirer, Dial Sports Pioneer Dead at 83"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Mickey Charles, who founded <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/chalk\/story\/_\/id\/13423573\/the-rise-dial-sports-pre-internet-american-sports-betting-chalk\">Dial Sports \u201c976\u201d scorephone network<\/a> passed away late last year. Born Charles Tucker, he also wrote a gambling column for the Philadelphia Inquirer and hosted a gambling-oriented sports talk show weekends on WCAU radio in the late 1970s and early \u201880s.<\/p>\n<p>Charles later formed The Sports Network wire service, selling it to STATS in 2015. Charles also created the FCS legacy awards including the Walter Payton and Eddie Robinson awards.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/charles.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-15284 alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/charles-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/charles-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/charles.jpg 640w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Joe Duffy, CEO of <a href=\"http:\/\/offshoreinsiders.com\/\">OffshoreInsiders.com<\/a> said bluntly, \u201cCharles was not the most universally-loved person, but my first industry job was working for him. I was a scorephone announcer in 1986 and worked again for Dial Sports in the summer of 1987 while completing my degree. It was the most important job I\u2019ve ever had because it was the stepping stone to being a pro handicapper.<\/p>\n<p>It was appropriate that he would own the first company I worked for in sports handicapping. I was a lifelong sports fan, but his radio show (on WCAU) got me obsessed with sports handicapping.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One of his earliest and most loyal employees, Will Springer noted, \u201cHe always pushed us to be better, faster, greater. I learned a lot from Mickey and thank him for giving this young Temple U. guy a chance.\u201d Springer rose to Managing Editor of TSN.<\/p>\n<p>Mickey Charles Tucker is survived by a wife, Rosiland, three children, and four grandchildren. He was 83.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mickey Charles, who founded Dial Sports \u201c976\u201d scorephone network passed away late last year. Born Charles Tucker, he also wrote a gambling column for the Philadelphia Inquirer and hosted a gambling-oriented sports talk show weekends on WCAU radio in the late 1970s and early \u201880s. Charles later formed The Sports Network wire service, selling it &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/2019\/02\/mickey-charles-wcau-radio-philadelphia-inquirer-dial-sports-pioneer-dead-at-83\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Mickey Charles, WCAU Radio, Philadelphia Inquirer, Dial Sports Pioneer Dead at 83<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1450,1449,1451],"class_list":["post-15283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports_betting_news","tag-dial-sports","tag-mickey-charles-death","tag-the-sports-network"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15283"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15285,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15283\/revisions\/15285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}