Colin Cowherd grew up in Grayland, Washington and attended Eastern Washington University. He began his career as the play-by-play voice for the Pacific Coast League's Las Vegas Stars. He eventually became a sports director at KVBC-TV in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he was named Nevada's Sportscaster of the Year five times.

He also served as sports anchor at WTVT-TV in Tampa, Florida. He moved to Portland, Oregon, in 1996, where he spent nearly two years at KGW Northwest NewsChannel 8, working as a sports anchor and hosting the thirty-minute 'A guy's take on baseball' program. In 2001 The Herd  moved from an afternoon time slot on all-sports radio KFXX  to the morning drive time.

In 2003, Cowherd was selected to replace Tony Kornheiser for the late morning time slot (10 a.m. - 1 p.m. (ET) on ESPN Radio.

His show, The Herd with Colin Cowherd is a syndicated talk radio show broadcast on ESPN Radio affiliates throughout the United States and online at ESPNRadio.com. In 2008, the Herd added a simulcast on ESPN's ESPNU. The show features commentary on sports news, perspective on other news stories, and interviews with popular analysts and sports figures. Demographics and regional preferences are frequent topics of his program.

The majority of his conversations primarily center around the National Football League (NFL) and college football with mentions of recent topics from Major League Baseball (MLB) and the National Basketball Association (NBA). He also has a featured segment, Spanning the Globe, during Sunday morning's SportsCenter special edition.

Cowherd, along with Michelle Beadle, co-hosts SportsNation; the show debuted on July 6, 2009, on ESPN2.