Muskegon Catholic Central alum Joe Pallas has accepted a position with the media company Learfield, to serve as Senior Video Editor focusing on University of Michigan athletics.
By Nate Thompson
LocalSportsJournal.com
MUSKEGON – When he attended Muskegon Catholic Central and Central Michigan University, Joe Pallas knew he wanted to be involved professionally in sports media.
But along the way, his career vision shifted from a potential on-air talent such as a broadcaster or TV host, to a role not so much in the spotlight. But in Pallas’ mind, it better fit his strengths and was equally rewarding.
And Pallas surely has made the most of going behind the camera as a cinematographer and director and in the cutting room as an editor. Although brief in tenure, his accomplishments are surely eye-opening, as Pallas has won 10 Sports Emmy awards for his work in the National Football League documenting the often whirlwind days and nights of athletes, coaches, ownership and fans of the Houston Texans, and for the last four years, the Washington Redskins / Commanders.
Now, with an opportunity to be closer to friends and family in Michigan, Pallas accepted a similar position with the media company Learfield, where he’ll serve as the company’s Senior Video Editor focusing on the University of Michigan athletics.
In his five months on the job with U-M, he’s helped edit a Name, Image and Likeness video series with U-M football standouts Will Johnson, Mason Graham and Colston Loveland, and was involved with an advertising campaign with Michigan legend Charles Woodson, promoting his brand of whiskey with his own moniker.
“It’s going to be the official spirit of University of Michigan athletics,” Pallas said.
Growing up heavily involved in sports and as a member of MCC’s state football championship teams in 2014 and 2015, Pallas said his work in the NFL, and now at Michigan, has been a dream come true.
“I’ve been a die-hard Michigan fan since I’ve been a kid,” Pallas said. “They said you should never work at a place you love because you may discover some things that ruin those feelings, but so far, so good.
“You know, I always thought it would be cool to be able to work in professional sports,” he added. “At Central, I knew a guy who started an internship with the Kansas City Chiefs, and I thought to myself, ‘Doing something like that would be so cool.’”
The 2015 Muskegon Catholic Central graduate majored in broadcast and cinematic arts at CMU, and during his time in Mount Pleasant, got his feet wet in sports media by working as a director and graphics operator on ESPN3 broadcasts for Chippewas’ football or basketball games on the school’s Chippewa Sports Network. He also scored an internship with Triple A minor league baseball team, the Great Lakes Loons in Midland, where he helped with the team’s game-day video production.
That led to the same type of “cool” opportunity that his former CMU classmate had earned – a year-long internship in the NFL.
Starting in May of 2019, Pallas was a video production intern with the Texans, where some of his duties included capturing game-action at every contest, home and away. With that content, he helped create feature stories, hype videos and even content for in-stadium video boards, or it would be used on the team’s social media sites, or TV network or corporate advertising partners.
“I was taught a lot of new things very quickly,” Pallas admitted.
Aside from the action on the field, he also helped produce, shoot and edit a series on the Texans’ cheerleaders and also edited episodes of their off-season program called Texans 360.
While a job in the NFL may sound glamorous, Pallas said there’s plenty of long days involved. And the challenges that media professionals often face is keeping their audience captivated, even when the team may have a dreadful record.
“You sometimes have to work on (a player’s) schedule, so if they show up at 7 a.m. for lifting, we were there,” Pallas said. “And it’s definitely a severe time commitment. Win, lose or draw, you still have to be there, and you have to find a way to always be positive. We have to be a ‘Force for Hope’ as we call it. As we experienced in Washington, even though they were losing, we still have a job to do and we have to find a way to make the fans engaged.”
After a year with the Texans, Pallas took the next step up with a full-time job in the nation’s capital, as the team’s Manager of Content Production. Much like the HBO series “Hard Knocks,” some of Pallas’ favorite work with the Commanders focused on activities off the field.
“The thing I’m probably most proud of in my time in Washington was a series I started called “Commanders Log,” which is an all-access series following the team,” he explained. “For (an) episode last season, we traveled to Minneapolis to film an interview with Josh Harris the day he officially purchased the Commanders, and then continued to roll the cameras behind the scenes for his first few days as owner. For this, I was the director, cinematographer, and editor.”
The series allowed Pallas other unique opportunities, such as the process of re-naming and re-branding the franchise from the Redskins; being in the middle of the team’s war room during the NFL Draft; creating a hype video with the team’s former star quarterback, Heisman Trophy winner Robert Griffin III; and documenting special moments with current players off the field, many of which Pallas has become friends with during the past four years.
A video that went viral and drew an astounding 12 million views on Twitter was one that Pallas filmed and edited with Commanders’ special teams ace Jeremy Reeves. Reeves had been cut five straight years before he caught on with the Commanders two years ago. Pallas and his crew set up fake 1-on-1 meetings with then head coach Ron Rivera and members of the team walking through the locker room.. Instead of the typical coach speak, Rivera informed Reeves that he had been selected to the NFC Pro Bowl.
“Coach Rivera really did a good job selling it, hamming it up, but then he broke the news that he made the Pro Bowl and it was very emotional,” Pallas said. “The water works started. It was a great moment. It was even more special because Jeremy’s mom had died just before the season.”
Pallas is not 100 percent certain what his future holds, but for now, he’s thrilled to be back in Michigan, and doing most of his editing work remotely from his home in Royal Oak.
“I accomplished a career goal at working in the NFL, which was fantastic, but I’m really happy where I’m at now,” he said. “If anything, I’d love to become a shooter for NFL Films, which is a pinnacle for many in our profession.
There’s a lot of freelance opportunities to work with NFL Films, so I’d love to be able to do that down the road. That’s a dream of mine.”
LocalSportsJournal.com
MUSKEGON – When he attended Muskegon Catholic Central and Central Michigan University, Joe Pallas knew he wanted to be involved professionally in sports media.
But along the way, his career vision shifted from a potential on-air talent such as a broadcaster or TV host, to a role not so much in the spotlight. But in Pallas’ mind, it better fit his strengths and was equally rewarding.
And Pallas surely has made the most of going behind the camera as a cinematographer and director and in the cutting room as an editor. Although brief in tenure, his accomplishments are surely eye-opening, as Pallas has won 10 Sports Emmy awards for his work in the National Football League documenting the often whirlwind days and nights of athletes, coaches, ownership and fans of the Houston Texans, and for the last four years, the Washington Redskins / Commanders.
Now, with an opportunity to be closer to friends and family in Michigan, Pallas accepted a similar position with the media company Learfield, where he’ll serve as the company’s Senior Video Editor focusing on the University of Michigan athletics.
In his five months on the job with U-M, he’s helped edit a Name, Image and Likeness video series with U-M football standouts Will Johnson, Mason Graham and Colston Loveland, and was involved with an advertising campaign with Michigan legend Charles Woodson, promoting his brand of whiskey with his own moniker.
“It’s going to be the official spirit of University of Michigan athletics,” Pallas said.
Growing up heavily involved in sports and as a member of MCC’s state football championship teams in 2014 and 2015, Pallas said his work in the NFL, and now at Michigan, has been a dream come true.
“I’ve been a die-hard Michigan fan since I’ve been a kid,” Pallas said. “They said you should never work at a place you love because you may discover some things that ruin those feelings, but so far, so good.
“You know, I always thought it would be cool to be able to work in professional sports,” he added. “At Central, I knew a guy who started an internship with the Kansas City Chiefs, and I thought to myself, ‘Doing something like that would be so cool.’”
The 2015 Muskegon Catholic Central graduate majored in broadcast and cinematic arts at CMU, and during his time in Mount Pleasant, got his feet wet in sports media by working as a director and graphics operator on ESPN3 broadcasts for Chippewas’ football or basketball games on the school’s Chippewa Sports Network. He also scored an internship with Triple A minor league baseball team, the Great Lakes Loons in Midland, where he helped with the team’s game-day video production.
That led to the same type of “cool” opportunity that his former CMU classmate had earned – a year-long internship in the NFL.
Starting in May of 2019, Pallas was a video production intern with the Texans, where some of his duties included capturing game-action at every contest, home and away. With that content, he helped create feature stories, hype videos and even content for in-stadium video boards, or it would be used on the team’s social media sites, or TV network or corporate advertising partners.
“I was taught a lot of new things very quickly,” Pallas admitted.
Aside from the action on the field, he also helped produce, shoot and edit a series on the Texans’ cheerleaders and also edited episodes of their off-season program called Texans 360.
While a job in the NFL may sound glamorous, Pallas said there’s plenty of long days involved. And the challenges that media professionals often face is keeping their audience captivated, even when the team may have a dreadful record.
“You sometimes have to work on (a player’s) schedule, so if they show up at 7 a.m. for lifting, we were there,” Pallas said. “And it’s definitely a severe time commitment. Win, lose or draw, you still have to be there, and you have to find a way to always be positive. We have to be a ‘Force for Hope’ as we call it. As we experienced in Washington, even though they were losing, we still have a job to do and we have to find a way to make the fans engaged.”
After a year with the Texans, Pallas took the next step up with a full-time job in the nation’s capital, as the team’s Manager of Content Production. Much like the HBO series “Hard Knocks,” some of Pallas’ favorite work with the Commanders focused on activities off the field.
“The thing I’m probably most proud of in my time in Washington was a series I started called “Commanders Log,” which is an all-access series following the team,” he explained. “For (an) episode last season, we traveled to Minneapolis to film an interview with Josh Harris the day he officially purchased the Commanders, and then continued to roll the cameras behind the scenes for his first few days as owner. For this, I was the director, cinematographer, and editor.”
The series allowed Pallas other unique opportunities, such as the process of re-naming and re-branding the franchise from the Redskins; being in the middle of the team’s war room during the NFL Draft; creating a hype video with the team’s former star quarterback, Heisman Trophy winner Robert Griffin III; and documenting special moments with current players off the field, many of which Pallas has become friends with during the past four years.
A video that went viral and drew an astounding 12 million views on Twitter was one that Pallas filmed and edited with Commanders’ special teams ace Jeremy Reeves. Reeves had been cut five straight years before he caught on with the Commanders two years ago. Pallas and his crew set up fake 1-on-1 meetings with then head coach Ron Rivera and members of the team walking through the locker room.. Instead of the typical coach speak, Rivera informed Reeves that he had been selected to the NFC Pro Bowl.
“Coach Rivera really did a good job selling it, hamming it up, but then he broke the news that he made the Pro Bowl and it was very emotional,” Pallas said. “The water works started. It was a great moment. It was even more special because Jeremy’s mom had died just before the season.”
Pallas is not 100 percent certain what his future holds, but for now, he’s thrilled to be back in Michigan, and doing most of his editing work remotely from his home in Royal Oak.
“I accomplished a career goal at working in the NFL, which was fantastic, but I’m really happy where I’m at now,” he said. “If anything, I’d love to become a shooter for NFL Films, which is a pinnacle for many in our profession.
There’s a lot of freelance opportunities to work with NFL Films, so I’d love to be able to do that down the road. That’s a dream of mine.”
