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Timing hasn’t always been kind to former Bangor television sports anchor Eric Frede, but it has been lately.
Almost 10 years after an errant relay throw in an adult slow-pitch softball game crashed into his head as he was running the bases and broke his skull, Frede is enjoying life and coming off two of the most successful, consecutive Boston Red Sox seasons ever.
This summer, however, the pace is much slower for Frede after he traded a job as New England Sports Network’s Red Sox studio host and reporter for a job with the Boston Bruins in the same capacity.
“I have to admit, I’ve had the best spring just being with my family,” said Frede, who has two sons (Ben, 8 and Sam, 4) with wife Beth. “Don’t get me wrong. The Sox job is great, but the travel takes its toll and it’s great to be home just being a dad.”
But he’s not just a dad, even at home.
Frede is still co-owner of Cod Rock Media Promotions with partner Dan Hannigan, the radio voice of University of Maine hockey and another alumnus of WVII-TV Bangor’s sports department. Cod Rock is a four-year-old, Kittery-based business that specializes in producing training, fundraising, marketing and promotional audio-video presentations.
“Cod Rock has never been busier,” said the 40-year-old Frede. “We’re doing some things during the summer that are different from our winter schedule in that we’ve worked with a mortgage company, a company that installs artificial turf … We’re also working on a season summary project for America East for all sports.”
Frede’s absence from Fenway and the NESN TV screen has been noticed by Sox fans, who wondered if he was still working for the regional sports network.
“NESN asked if I was interested in being the Bruins host and I’d already started wondering if I could keep making that full commitment to the Sox again,” said Frede, who made his first Fenway Park appearance since last season this past weekend while subbing for former Portland Pirates radio voice Tom Caron as studio host.
“I’ve gone out and done a feature or two and filled in for Tom a couple times,” Frede said. “I am a freelance broadcaster for NESN right now. I call myself the utility man.”
“I’m never technically full time. Even with the Bruins, I’m contracted with NESN, but I’m essentially self-employed. It’s very rewarding to call your own shots and have the variety. I get to do a little bit of everything this way as long as the phone keeps ringing.”
The phone has been anything but silent lately.
“It’s pretty much season to season with the Bruins on NESN, just like with the Sox,” he explained. “A lot of the stuff I do is kind of short notice and asking if I can do a piece or fill in for someone.”
Frede said this past season with the Bruins was a challenging one as they limped along with a sub-.500 record, no playoff appearance, and several transactions that were unpopular with fans.
“It was a challenge. A lot of nights, like the night before, were like Groundhog Day with the way events unfolded, many of which didn’t go the Bruins’ way,” said Frede. “It was just one of those years where no matter what the Bruins did, it just wasn’t going to work out as they hoped.
“But hey, if you can survive that, you can probably survive anything, so I think it will only get better.”
It has only gotten better since that chance encounter with the softball which left Frede totally deaf in his left ear.
“I suffer a little bit of vertigo if I do certain things, but I just have to watch that and overall I’m fine.”
Andrew Neff can be reached at 990-8205, 1-800-310-8600 or at aneff@bangordailynews.net
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