Every four years or so, Steve Kornacki becomes a reluctant internet celebrity.
Comedian Leslie Jones called him “the sexiest nerd on TV.” People magazine agrees. His go-to outfit of glasses, white dress shirt, tie and khaki or dark pants is a trendy Halloween costume for some Washingtonians.
“I don't know if you really understand it, but it's an honor,” said Kornacki, a national political correspondent for NBC News. Mr. Kornacki has become a coveted figure during election campaigns for his skillful use of large touch screens and election analysis. Maps and voting data.
At one point in November, Kornacki broadcast for approximately 17 hours straight. That was easy compared to 2020, when the presidential election was not held for four days. That week, he took several naps at his desk, totaling 10 hours of sleep.
After that exhausting stretch, NBC Sports asked Kornacki to put his data presentation skills to use analyzing National Football League teams' playoff chances on Sunday night's in-studio show, “Football Night in America.” I asked please. Kornacki, who grew up in Massachusetts as a New England Patriots and Boston Celtics fan, accepted the additional responsibility and said he would have been watching football anyway.
Just like on election night, Kornacki explains in his football corner when explaining which states a candidate could reach 270 electoral votes, an absolute must for a team that is mathematically still in playoff contention. Unraveling the best path forward, including games that must be won.
Permutations can be complex. The Los Angeles Rams won the division championship last weekend on the strength of a winning tiebreaker. This is the combined record of the 10 teams they have defeated so far.
“We're looking at scenarios, we're looking at variables, we're looking at probabilities. That's exactly what I'm doing with my campaign,” Kornacki said.
Kornacki graduated from Boston University and worked at various stations before co-hosting the MSNBC show in 2012. Mr. Kornacki became a mainstay of election coverage in 2014, but his social media stardom came in 2020, when viewers flocked to TVs for important elections. coronavirus pandemic.
Kornacki said the report likely resonated because he and his viewers were absorbing the onslaught of information together.
“It's really a shared experience for me to see something on screen for the first time, and for them to see something on screen for the first time,” he said.
Mr. Kornacki prepares for elections throughout the year, but the preparations intensify in about six months. He said it's especially important to study demographic data in battleground states and counties. He uses spreadsheets and maps to memorize information so he can recall it quickly when discussing voting patterns on television.
Kristen Welker, anchor of NBC's Sunday morning public affairs program “Meet the Press,” said in an October segment that Kornacki pointed to the growth in the Latino population between the 2012 and 2020 elections. He said he was impressed when he outlined how Pennsylvania's Democratic Party lost support in those counties. . A few weeks later, Republican candidate Donald J. Trump won a coveted battleground state.
“In many ways, he's holding up a mirror to the country and saying, 'This is who we are and this is where we need to go,'” said Welker, who moderated the 2020 presidential debate. ” he said.
Politics enthusiasts and avid sports fans may seem to have little overlap, but they are both avid television viewers.
“It's hard to ignore,” Kornacki said. “At a very basic level, these are both contests where there is a winner at the end of the day, and the winner is the result of the numbers that are put into it.”
Mr. Kornacki's job in Stamford, Conn., home of NBC Sports, is much easier than analyzing elections from 30 Rockefeller Plaza. Pro Football Focus, an analytics company, provides networks with countless predictions for NFL teams vying for 14 playoff spots. The final seed in this bracket is often not determined until the final week of the regular season and can depend on winning percentage and tie-break format.
Sometimes the analysis is simple. Whichever team wins Sunday night's matchup between the Detroit Lions and Minnesota Vikings on NBC will clinch the conference's top seed for the playoffs.
In addition to his football work, Kornacki has contributed analysis to NBC Sports about the Olympics, the Kentucky Derby and even the National Dog Show. NBC is scheduled to begin broadcasting National Basketball Association games next season, but Kornacki said he hasn't heard whether he will be involved.
Although sports are a fun escape, Kornacki's day job remains politics.
This fall, he asked to work on the Breeders' Cup, a prestigious horse racing event in Del Mar, California. But with the presidential election just days away, network executives were looking for fresh talent in him. There was a map to decipher.
