After college he drew sports cartoons on a part-time basis for the Kansas City Star from 1986 to 1989 where his work also regularly appeared in the Los Angeles Times.

[2] His work regularly appears in many major U.S. newspapers, including The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, USA Today, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Washington Post and CNN.

He has appeared as a panelist discussing his cartooning on Fox News and has been a featured guest on Public Radio International's Michael Feldman's Whad'Ya Know?.

In 2009, he was named a finalist in the Great Plains Journalism Awards for a three-part essay he wrote for the Omaha World Herald titled "Ink and Ash".

Koterba is the lead singer, guitarist and songwriter for the Omaha-based swing and jump-blues band the Prairie Cats, who have released three albums.

In October 2009, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt published Koterba's memoir, Inklings, which deals with his dysfunctional childhood and his lifelong love of cartooning and music.

Past honorees have ranged from local politicians, business leaders and members of the press to national figures with Omaha ties such as Warren Buffett, Johnny Carson, and President Gerald Ford.

[8] In 2018 Koterba was nominated for a Heartland Chapter Emmy Award for his work in connection with KMTV television on a segment concerning the cartooning process.

Not only is Koterba the central figure in the movie, he penned drawings for the film and with his son Josh, wrote and composed original music for it.