Rising Stars: Meet Carrie Gillaspie

Today we’d like to introduce you to Carrie Gillaspie. 

Hi Carrie, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I was a girl jock in high school and set my sights on playing division 1 college basketball until a career-ending injury hit me my senior year. I was devastated, but it forced me to think of my identity as a person outside of being an athlete. I wasn’t ready to give up my love of sports so I decided sports journalism was my way to stay close to what I loved and use my knowledge of sports I had gathered all those years being an athlete. I spent a summer as a game-host for the Eau Claire Express baseball team in Wisconsin, and another summer game-hosting for the AAA team of the Boston Red Sox in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. I enjoyed sports journalism, but in 2017 after I married my husband, Casey, a professional baseball player, I decided that I was ready to try other things. I started shifting over to hosting lifestyle-based content – morning shows, and lighter interview style pieces and features. It was less script work reporting and more just me having the freedom to talk with people on-air and share their stories with an audience in an authentic way. It was my perfect type of work, and I thrived at it. At the end of 2020, my husband and I moved to Kansas City, and in the Spring of 2021, I got the job as the Kansas City Monarchs game host. 

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It has definitely NOT been a smooth road. There has been a lot of ups and downs along the way. Because of my husband’s baseball career, we have lived in 9 different states, so we have moved A LOT. Early in my career, this was hard for me to grasp because the uncertainty of baseball kept me from being able to get a traditional news job at a local station. I would find myself upset, or thinking how am I going to progress and get jobs when I’m never in the same city for more than 6 months? 

The truth is I can see in hindsight that while it was hard at the time, all that moving made me gritty and scrappy. It would have been easy for me to just stick myself in the box of being a sports reporter, but because we moved so much, I was in no place to turn down any kind of work. I said yes to anything that came my way because I knew we’d be moving soon enough and I didn’t know when my next job would come. It forced me to expand my skills and try new aspects of being a journalist and a host. 

You need someone to interview the zookeeper about a new bear coming to the zoo? I’ll do it! You want someone to host a show about invasive bug species killing off native trees? I’m your girl! 

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I always tell people what makes me good at my job is that I am just naturally a curious person, and I genuinely love storytelling in all its forms. I was the child that was always writing short stories and skits and dance routines and making my family watch me perform them. I always had a million questions, and I wanted to know about and understand EVERYTHING. Really to this day I am still this same way, just in adult form. 

A lot of the times, the people I’m interviewing have no formal on-air training so they are nervous. They have story to tell, but they may not know how to tell it with cameras in their faces. As the host, it’s my job to be a conduit to them being able to properly and thoroughly tell that story. It’s my job to guide them through, relax them, and ask the right questions to get that story out of them in the most authentic way possible. 

The best feeling in the world is when I start an interview or a between-inning game at the field with someone who was really nervous beforehand and they look over at me at the end and say, “that was fun!”. That statement is always my “job well” done signal and my proudest moment. 

What quality or characteristic do you feel is most important to your success?
I feel like people can smell inauthenticity a mile away when it comes to hosting and being in the media. Hands down, the thing that has been my best characteristic has been my ability to have a firm handle on my authenticity in whatever I do. Curiosity, tenacity, and grit have also served me very well. 

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.carriegillaspie.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carrie.gillaspie/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarrieGillaspie
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/carriegillaspie
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvZf8VVgb25eyrfb6zEuzzA/videos
• Other: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/candidly-speaking-with-carrie-gillaspie/id1399792463