Producer Made Most of Long Wait

Tim Keily of Dunwoody, Ga., the producer of NBA pregame and postgame shows on TNT and TBS, will again have shows to produce once the season gets underway.

Keily has discovered there is such a thing as too much time off.

“You know, in any job you pray for down time,” he said Wednesday. “Then you get it and don’t know what to do with yourself.

“Since we lost the NFL [to ESPN], we knew there would be a gap that wasn’t there before. We knew there wouldn’t be much to do for the two months after the Goodwill Games in July. We never thought the gap would last as long as it did.”

Keily, 38, the son of longtime Pittsburgh Steeler public relations director Ed Keily, didn’t merely sit around his house, even though he and his wife, Maureen, are the parents of 2-year-old twins, Olivia and Timothy. He made the 25-minute commute into the office in Atlanta most days.

“I worked with our new hockey team, the Thrashers, helping them get set up for next season,” he said. “I was in local television in Pittsburgh, so I could give them some advice. I also helped them audition some announcers. But that didn’t really take up much time.

“I spent a lot of time on the computers at work. . . . I was not too good on computers. Now I’m Mr. Internet.

“I’d spend hours reading newspapers. The problem was, around 2 p.m. each day we’d look around at each other and say, ‘Now what are we going to do?’ I’d usually say to myself, ‘Well, I guess I’ll go home and change diapers.’

“My wife loved having me around the house. I got a lot of ‘honey-do’ stuff done.”

There was lots to do too. The Keilys’ house was severely damaged by tornadoes last spring.

“We got blasted pretty good; we lost a roof and our house was a shambles,” he said. “Having the time to talk with insurance adjusters and workers actually helped out. I know my wife appreciated it.”

Keily is a 1982 graduate of Columbia.

“I was the worst player on the worst football team in the country,” said the former defensive back. “If you can’t be the best, then I guess you shoot to be the worst.”

As a producer, he is considered one of the best. He spent three years at ESPN before moving to Turner Sports in 1995.

Keily said he has always been someone on the go, and adjusting to a slower pace wasn’t easy.

“During the lockout, we were frozen and couldn’t hire anybody or do much of anything,” he said. “Now we’ve got a lot of loose ends to tie up, like taking care of satellite coordinates and stuff like that.

“I’m really ready to go back to work. I’m glad it’s over.”

Keily knows getting restarted won’t be easy.

“It will be like starting your car in 10-degree-below weather,” he said. “We’ll be a little sluggish. We’re lucky we have a month to prepare.

“But once we get going, we’ll be fine.”