Meet the Man of the Year
With the pandemic a year in this week, a lot has changed, and in Starkville lawyer and sports broadcaster Charlie Winfield has been able to give the people in the community some sense of normalcy.
Winfield was voted as Man of the Year by Starkville Daily News readers for the Best of Starkville, and he is a Starkville native who embodies the saying, “You’ll always find your way back home.” While he left Mississippi for his law degree and spent some time in Texas, eventually he ended up back home could not be more content.
“It’s a real honor. I grew up in Starkville and lived most of my life here,” Winfield said. “I went away for a while and then was living in Dallas and ultimately just woke up one morning and decided I wanted to move back home, and I’ve been here about 16 years. Starkville is a place that means a lot to me, means a lot to my family, my kids were raised here. I am very humbled and appreciative that anybody would think of me for an award like [Man of the Year].”
While Winfield practices law, many around Starkville know him for his broadcasting, which he does for both Mississippi State University and the area high schools. At the beginning of the pandemic, sports were at a complete standstill, but in the fall, they picked back up with limited to no seating available. Because of this, more people were tuning into broadcasts of games, and Winfield said part of being a broadcaster is making people feel at home and like they are friends talking about a game.
“The thing that we’ve always tried to do in our broadcast is to basically have a conversation with people,” Winfield said. “One of the phrases we sometimes use when we’re starting is,’we appreciate you hanging out and watching a game with us.’ And it is important to us that we just be able to not take ourselves or take the subject too seriously that it turns people off, but basically to treat people more like we’re just friends hanging out and watching the game.”
Winfield was originally approached by the former MSU Women’s Basketball head coach Vic Schaefer to see if he would be interested in broadcasting games, and since then Winfield has been able to call incredibly emotional sports moments.
“I was on the broadcast for Mississippi State’s game win Morgan William made the shot to beat Connecticut and that was an interesting game because I worked so hard the entire time to keep my emotions in check and to stay calm, not to get out of the moment, not to get nervous, not to become too much of a fan,” Winfield said. “When that shot went through, I completely lost all respective ability to remain calm. One that’s also very meaningful to me is that I got to broadcast my son’s high school football team winning a state championship on a goal line stand and had a bit of the
same reaction, unfortunately, because so much of trying to stay professional.”
One common phrase is something along the lines of sports are the ultimate unifier across the globe, and Winfield definitely brings many together through his broadcast while adjusting to the times. He’s seen a lot of the community side with his law practice though, and he recognizes sports as an escape from focusing on more harrowing topics we face today because it is nice to be able to step away for a little bit.
“Sports is supposed to be an escape. It’s supposed to be fun, it’s supposed to be something where you can appreciate what other people can do that you could never dream of doing.” Winfield said. “It seems like we have an entire industry now that’s built not on celebrating what people can do but instead about criticizing what people do. I view broadcasting very much as a hobby. I don’t hunt, I don’t fish, I don’t play a ton of golf because when you do those types of things, you always have time to be thinking about work. When I broadcast, it really is an escape for what I do every day.”
People have been struggling because of the pandemic, but Winfield is happy to be a part of a community where neighbors are so willing to help others out without seeking a big fanfare for their generosity.
“With the law firm, you see firsthand what a lot of people are dealing with. A lot of times people believe if someone is having a tough time it means they aren’t working hard enough, they’re not smart enough, or they aren’t trying enough,” Winfield said. “What we’ve seen over the past year is a lot of people are really in difficult spots and they are ready, willing, and able to work, they just simply aren’t allowed to through nobody’s own fault. The thing that’s been really rewarding, though, is the degree to which there are a lot of really good people in this community doing a lot to help, and they’re doing it anonymously.”
Charlie Winfield is a man who is woven into the community of Starkville and cares deeply for the people and pastimes it offers. It is easy to see why the community voted him Man of the Year.