That doesn't mean that there won't occasionally be a personality who gets dropped into the role of emcee who takes to it well enough that they're well-regarded for their talent and perhaps considered for another game show when the one they're doing peters out, but the notion that there's a stable of Bill Cullens, Tom Kennedys, Peter Tomarkens, and even Tom Bergerons that networks will regularly draw from is plain fanciful at this point. The reason you have people like Elizabeth Banks, Leslie Jones, Joel McHale, and Rob Lowe hosting game shows today (or very recently) is because they need to work every possible angle to draw viewership to their shows, and the host is one of those angles. Some of these names, like Jay Pharoah or Damon Wayans Jr., might seem like they don't have much name recognition, but Pharaoh is an SNL alum and the Wayans name has 30 years worth of pedigree, and that means something when the time comes to choosing who represents the show and what they put in promos. The only exception I can find to this rule in prime-time or major syndication is Sara Haines hosting The Chase, but that show gives the Chasers top billing anyways.
To be a bit provocative, one could argue that, with game shows in prime time, it was always thus.
Let us look at the Goodson-Todman programs of the 1950s and 1960:
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What's My Line?, often seen as the classiest of the programs, had a host in John Charles Daly whose career had been in journalism- and, for the first decade or so of the run, was hosting ABC's nightly news program simultaneously.
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I've Got A Secret may have been the most popular of these series- its first host, Garry Moore, had been involved in game shows since
Beat The Band in the early 1940s, but had also been of prominence as a radio comedian turned television variety show host, and in certain regards was the sort of light entertainment personality who bounces between the genres that is seen overseas but hasn't been that common in the United States.
-Bud Collyer, who seems to have been among Goodson-Todman's first choices for new programs during this time, had been highly active as a radio actor/announcer before turning to game shows in the late 1940s- and didn't give up work in the former immediately after starting with the latter.
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Two For The Money is a case in point in two regards- it was originally meant for Fred Allen (whose reputation had been as hostile to the genre), and, when his health made him unable to host, it went to Herb Shriner, at a point where he was seen through his radio, television, and stage work as a rising comedian.
-Even
The Name's The Same, an ABC program when they were very much the third network, demonstrates this point- there was a massive continued push during the late 1940s and 1950s to establish Robert Q. Lewis as the next great variety star on both radio and television, though it never quite took.
Moreover, an examination of other prominent primetime game shows by other producers suggests that this isn't just a Goodson-Todman thing:
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The $64,000 Question's host, Hal March, had been an actor/comedian before turning to that series- and, when the scandals hit, largely spent the rest of his career as a comedian.
-Jack Barry had turned to producing and hosting game shows after first obtaining a reputation as a producer/moderator of panel programs (
Juvenile Jury,
Life Begins at 80 and then as a broader television personality (
Winky-Dink and You).
-Even something as second-tier as
Masquerade Party demonstrates this- among its string of hosts were the host of CBS's nightly news program, one of Fred Allen's associates, and a movie star of the previous decade.
I make no claim that my list is exhaustive, and I am aware of counter-examples (
The Price Is Right being a key one with Goodson-Todman)- but I believe this point demonstrates that there was no real history during the era when game shows were commonly in prime time of basing who was hired to host on prior experience in and chief association with the field, and that, if anything, the sort of approach with game show hosts of hiring the field veterans is some something that develops when it becomes more chiefly something programed in the daytime (though, even there, we can all point to various times when producers or network executives have decided on other approaches).
