With just a couple weeks remaining before the season opener – and the debut of the Minot Honeybees softball program – the organization didn’t have a broadcaster to call its games. The most sought after position each year, one that receives more than a hundred applications, was vacant and needed to be filled quickly.

That’s when 18-year-old Owen Patterson got the call from the bullpen to enter in relief. The Washburn native who had just completed his freshman year at Minot State became the new voice of the Hot Tots and Honeybees and has more than proven during his two years behind the microphone to have been the correct choice.

“We always try to hire interns from Minot State, but we don’t always have a ton of people who apply for our internships who are from Minot State,” said Monica Hocking, Hot Tots and Honeybees General Manager and Managing Partner. “So we wanted to give someone who was a little more local a shot at this and our VP of Operations Nate Maddox had listened to some of Owen’s stuff, so he knew he could do the job. We already thought he was great, but the position wasn’t open at the time. It was just giving this local guy a shot and it turned out to be so awesome. We wish we could keep him around forever. It was the right decision.”

Patterson’s opportunity was the result of good fortune, as he was hired a couple weeks earlier for a different internship position, although he had applied to be the organization’s broadcaster. Patterson had spent months throwing his resume all across the country looking for any broadcasting job he could find. He applied to roughly 30 different teams, ranging from a start-up baseball league in Texas to one in Wisconsin, but no luck. So instead, he took an internship with Minot’s summer baseball organization as a camera operator in May 2024 with the hope that it would get his foot in the door.

Submitted Photo Play-by-play announcer Owen Patterson has called more than 100 games with the Minot Hot Tots and Honeybees in his two years with the organization. He’s also called games for Minot State and the PSP Network. Photo provided by the Minot Hot Tots.

He didn’t have to wait long to get his opportunity and showcase his talents, as the broadcaster the organization had hired informed the front office that he had received another opportunity elsewhere and would not be accepting the position, leaving an opening with just a couple weeks left before the start of the season.

The decision was made to name Patterson the new voice of the team with Maddox’s blessing. Hocking co-signed the decision and Patterson has broadcast more than 100 games between the Hot Tots and Honeybees over the past two seasons.

“Extremely thankful,” Patterson said. “I had applied to nearly 30 teams and hadn’t got a response from any of them that summer. For them to give me any sort of shot, I figured I had to make it pay off and make it worth it for them to give me an opportunity at 18 years old.”

His work behind the microphone isn’t just getting attention locally, but he’s received critical acclaim across the entire Northwoods League landscape. Patterson was named the 2024 Northwoods League Softball TV Announcer of the Year and earned the honor again in 2025. He also shared the 2025 Northwoods League Baseball TV Announcer of the Year award with Wausau’s Matt Clark. Patterson was part of the broadcasting crew for the 2024 Northwoods League Home Run Derby and called postseason games for the Great Plains Division this season, including the Summer Collegiate World Series between the Duluth Huskies and the Green Bay Rockers.

“I was kind of surprised getting both of them,” Patterson said. “Last year I got the softball one, but this year to get both, it’s pretty cool. I’m really just proud of the opportunity I’ve been given and seeing that I’ve made literally the most of the opportunity was the payoff in the end hearing that news.”

Patterson – now a 20-year-old junior at MSU studying professional communication with a focus in sports media – isn’t struggling to find broadcasting gigs anymore. His voice can also be heard on the PSP Network calling Minot High football games in the fall and Minot High basketball games in the winter. He’ll also call the occasional volleyball match or fill in whenever needed. Patterson is also the voice of Minot State home football and basketball games.

“He’s just great and it’s so cool to see him get additional opportunities from the opportunity we were able to give him,” Hocking said. “We take a lot of pride in it and it pushes us to even have a better broadcast because he does such a great job as well. He is absolutely awesome to work with. We have a ton of pride in what he’s been able to do. We’re in talks with him now. I’m sure he’s going to get a job in minor league sports soon and probably professional sports eventually, but we’d love to keep him around as long as we can.”

Before Patterson ever got behind a microphone, he grew up a big sports fan, with baseball being his first love. He would listen to the Twins broadcasts with Cory Provus leading the play-by play. Provus is one broadcaster Patterson said he takes influence from when calling a game. From playing sports himself, whether it was through organized baseball leagues or pick-up games with friends, Patterson quickly discovered that there was a career in sports commentary.

“I was always listening to a Twins game on the radio and latched on to what the announcers were saying and the stories they were telling and found out like any little league game I would be playing, there would be commentary going on about the game or any sort of driveway basketball game I was playing had some sort of commentary going, so it always kind of fit for me,” Patterson said. “Once I found out I could do it for a living, I figured I might as well chase this.”

Patterson’s first dabble into the media business came during his senior year at Washburn High School. There was a school radio station based out of Linton that he got in touch with and they allowed him to cover a few games at the 2023 Class B boys state basketball tournament in Bismarck. He’ll never forget it, not because it was his first taste in broadcasting, but because his halftime show was disrupted by an address from former North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum. Patterson said the Class B state basketball tournament remains his favorite event to cover due to the atmosphere surrounding the three-day competition.

The love for broadcasting is far from a family trait. In fact, it might be the furthest thing imaginable. Patterson’s dad works in construction, framing houses and doing renovation projects, white his mom works for McLean County. Patterson said they are the last people who would want to talk into a microphone.

While baseball and softball are his two favorite sports to broadcast, he’s well-versed among various other sports. According to Patterson, the key to finding success in the industry is the willingness to put the time in days before a broadcast. In a world filled with potential broadcasters, it’s the ones who take preparation seriously that separate themselves from the rest of the pack.

“First thing you learn when you’re trying to become a broadcaster is preparation,” Patterson said. “Those that do a lot of preparation, they’ll succeed. Those that don’t will probably kind of lose a lot of love for the trade pretty early on. Also just how comfortable you are on the mic. Once you have done enough games where all it is is just a conversation with maybe your color commentator and the audience, it feels free and easy and a lot of fun.”

Patterson said he’ll start preparing for games days in advance, gathering names and player information like height, grade level and basic statistics. He’s also a film buff – not movies, but game film.

“I don’t want to be surprised when I show up to a gym or show up to the field as to what a team is going to run or what player is going to play where,” Patterson said. “I watch a lot of film on these teams days prior and then day of, especially with PSP where I’m kind of like the camera operator, director, replay tech, audio engineer and everything all in one, it’s an hour and a half or so setting up the entire broadcast, and then once the game begins and we’re live on YouTube, we just get to have some fun.”

What stands out the most to Hocking is Patterson’s professionalism on the microphone, noting that the results of the hometown team isn’t influencing his ability to do the job.

“He just loves what he does,” Hocking said. “He absolutely loves baseball and softball and one thing at his age that’s so impressive is a lot of broadcasters that are around his age are calling for the home team, so they can be really upset if the team loses. With Owen, no matter what happens, we could get crushed on the field and at the end he could say something like ‘Wow, that was a good game of softball.’ No matter what, he’s so professional. It doesn’t matter what team wins or loses, which is exactly what you want from a broadcaster because then they are providing so much more information about both sides of the ball, which is incredible for someone his age.”

Hocking and the rest of the organization never doubted Patterson’s abilities behind the microphone, but they will admit that there was one aspect of their new play-by-play man that took them off guard and isn’t a label someone in the business of speaking usually gets assigned: Patterson was incredibly quiet. When he first joined the organization, Patterson was a guy of few words when he wasn’t wearing the headset. His answers tended to be one or two words and he kept to himself.

Patterson was aware of this, so much so that in a survey that the organization has all its interns complete both in the middle of the season and at the end to help the front office get a better sense of how they can improve the experience for their employees, when filing out his answer to the question “What do you want to learn during the rest of the internship? Patterson simply wrote “Talking.”

That was during his first season with the organization and Hocking has seen plenty of growth in that area since.

“We were just wowed by how amazing he was, how professional he was and he’s really grown a lot the last couple of years,” Hocking said. “He’s very quiet off the mic, so it’s been cool to see him grow on the mic, but also off the mic as well.”

Among the dream events Patterson would love to call one day is either the World Series or the Summer Olympics. But for the immediate future, Patterson is looking to start broadcasting professional baseball, looking into minor leagues like the American Association of Professional Baseball, home to the Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks.

Whatever Patterson opts to do this upcoming summer, the Hot Tots and Honeybees organization will be following his career. Even if he never became the camera operator he was originally hired to be, he more than made up for it during his time as their award-winning broadcaster.