Tuesday is newsday, but not really
Johjima catching on quickly with M’s [Times]
The M’s had a real off day Monday. [PI] (Now there’s news, folks)
Also from the PI, I found these two Chicago links, in which the Everett-White Sox feud continues (but remember, he’s a team player and everyone who’s ever played with him loves him and has nothing bad to say).
Sun-Times
Tribune
The PI Answer Guy reveals that, as you probably noticed:
The team is experimenting with a new broadcasting format, in which the play-by-play announcers (Dave Niehaus, Rick Rizzs) do half the game on TV and half the game on radio, but the color commentators (Fairly, Dave Henderson, Dave Valle) stay either with the TV broadcast or the radio broadcast for the entire game.
(Advance warning: any comment with those names wrong gets nuked)
Comments
81 Responses to “Tuesday is newsday, but not really”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
I agree that Fairly is the most likely to bring SOMETHING to the table, but it is simply not worth the Captain Obvious stuff. And the Captain Obvious stuff wouldn’t be so bad (I completely understand that there is a casual fan base that some of it isn’t as obvious to) if it wasn’t the same stuff every stinking night!
You have to move runners over, you have to think up the middle or the other way, you want to swing quick not hard, in order to win you have to score, over and over and over again.
I’m getting irritated just thinkin’ about it!!
I have found myself occasionally agreeing with Hendu this year. That can’t be a good sign. For me I mean…
Would it be possible to get Curto and Joe Morgan into a booth together?
“Ron Fairly, a broadcaster of Giants games, once said, ‘Bruce Sutter has been around a while and he’s pretty old. He’s 35 years old. That will give you an idea of how old he is.'”
-George Will, “Men at Work”, 1990
That is an excellent way to put it. Curto will need to find an Oakland, because with the local broadcasting mega deals, the M’s are probably less of a Moneyball organziation in the broadcast booth than in the front office.
Has anyone tried to quantify Niehaus’s financial value to the organization? Next to the Safeco Field lease, he might be the team’s biggest asset.
While I’ve never heard Curto on the radio, exposing us to more Joe “Inanity” Morgan borders on criminal. Really. ๐
I think Paciorek is one of the funnier announcers around. But I’m easily amused.
The thing is, Niehaus probably isn’t going unless he dies or has a stroke or something. The top baseball broadcasters are often like Supreme Court justices รยขรขโยฌรขโฌย they have their jobs for life (see Caray, Harry; Harwell, Ernie, Brickhouse, Jack, etc.).
He’s in his early seventies now … we could easily have him in the booth for 10-15 more years.
I gotta agree with Tad…Fairly’s Captain Obvious stuff gets kinda old cause it is the exact same lines every game “Well you have to score more runs than the other guy AND give up less.” Even casual fans get annoyed by him.
I can suffer thru Valle but Hendu just bugs me and I don’t know why. Probably because of the lovefest Rizz puts on for him every game. My perfect team? Kevin Calabro for the play by play (even if someone had to feed it to him) and Buhner for color commentary with Niehaus throwing out his random thought here and there. Then let them do both the TV and Radio simultaneously.
probable pitchers for the week ahead….
Washburninator/Cliff Lee
Meche/Noted Mariner Killer Paul Byrd
King/Jason Johnson of the .000 era
Moyer/Schilling
Piniero/Wakefield
Too bad Bill Walton is an announcer for the NBA and not MLB, that’d be awesome.
“The Pacers would be winning if they scored more points then the Bulls during the first 3 quarters.” (I think it went something like that)
-Bill Walton, at the start of the 4th quarter
Is Al Leiter doing anything? I thought he was terrific in his stint during the postseason awhile back.
Really, yeah, they just need to wipe the slate clean. Like, now.
I like Hendu’s insights, and Valle’s inflection bothers me, so I like the new setup, as I watch TV more than listen on radio. Fairly has actually gotten better in my eyes, as he’s cut way back on the stories from The Old Days that he used to tell during the games.
Dave’s great, especially now that he’s correcting more of his mistakes (probably with prompting).
As far as travel goes, the mention of the early, Sunday departure did make me think of one thing. Free agent players (and wives) that dislike all the time away from their families and long plane rides have one more reason to stay away from Seattle. That said, anything that helps this team win a game or two is OK by me.
Uh-oh – msb just failed the name test [THWAP!]
Beltre back in front of Everett and Borchard hitting 8th tonight.
niehaus is a classic, but he’s slipping. hopefully, he’ll be inducted to the hall of fame, and retire before he hits harry caray land. rizzs isn’t all that bad. his voice is fine, and you can tell what’s going on. fairly is terrible, both as color and play by play. he’ll repeat the same point all year long, and say it each time like he’s never said it before. his main move as a color guy, is to say “well, … ” and then repeat exactly what dave said. hendu is bad, valle’s voice is bad, buhner is bad. i think that bill krueger is better than any of them.
Let’s play the infamous Player X and Player Y:
Player X: 4 ABs, 2 HRs, .500/2.0/2.60
Player Y: 24 ABs, 0 HRs, .167/.167/.426
P.S. – Player X has also posted a line: 2 W, 1.98 ERA, 13.2 IP, 11 SO
Boy, isn’t it fun to look at stats after the first weeks of the season?
Ooh! Ooh! How about just getting the guys formerly from ESPN’s Sunday Night Football? Paul Maguire? Steal Theismann away from MNF? Those guys rock!
Blow up the broadcasting crews and begin anew. Listening to or watching baseball should be a pleasure. Is timely, insightful, sometimes humorous commentary coupled with a pleasing voice and cadence too much to ask for…? A broadcasting crew should make you WANT to watch or listen not pump deer slugs into your 50 inch plasma or bose wave…
And another thing…someone should step on Beltre’s toe again so he doesn’t keep swinging at crud two feet off the plate…
On the pre-game, Shannon Drayer talks about the “big change” Jeff Pentland has made in Joe Borchard’s stroke.
dirka dirka,
is it possible to have a 2.0 OBP? He must be amazing on getting on base ๐
#61– “The YES Network formally announced the addition of Al Leiter to its Yankees broadcast team Wednesday. Like Murcer, O’Neill and Justice, Leiter will primarily serve as a game analyst and appear in the YES studios for select games. Leiter’s television resume includes guest analyst work on ESPN and FOX’s postseason baseball coverage. Following his retirement on March 19, he expressed interest in pursuing a broadcast career and admitted to receiving offers from both ESPN and FOX, but the combination of staying home with his family and his familiarity with the YES team led him to remain affiliated with the Yankees. Should the Yankees reach the postseason, Leiter will be included in YES’s coverage. However, if the Yankees miss the playoffs or are eliminated prior to the World Series, he is free to work with another network.”
It’s a little hard to go .500 on a 7 game road trip, isn’t it?
Uh-oh – msb just failed the name test [THWAP!]
dammitdammitdammit.
and I know it is Pine/Pineiro and Pin/Piniella.
and speaking of dammit, I forgot sunday’s match-up:
Washburninator vs Beckett (14IP 10H 2R 0HR 5BB 7SO 1.07WHIP 1.29ERA)
Well, technically, Joel’s name wasn’t in Derek’s list, so it shouldn’t really count ๐
That Dick Fairhaus, he’s a bum. Can’t stand ‘im.
I think Niehaus and Fairly are the best pairing by far. I enjoy old baseball stories.
-Rizzs’ sickeningly constant upbeat attitude makes me want to bash his skull in with a souvenier ‘Refuse to Lose’ bat. He will never tell it like it is. And somebody please let him know.. it’s OK to have an occasional 5 second gap of silence. Stop talking once in awhile! And he ain’t foolin’ anybody with that hairpiece. ๐
-Dave Henderson needs to master the english language before he continues any more professional broadcasting. He makes words up and stumbles over the real ones. He’s flat out horrible. I understand maintaining ties within your organization, but Hendu needs something OFF the airwaves.
-Dave Valle is OK. He at least has a fluidity to his voice and knows what he’s talking about. He’s coherent. But damn, someone needs to tell him it’s pronounced “especially”.. NOT “EXPESIALLY”!
-Niehaus IS slipping. He used to be able to catch his play x play miscues quickly. Now he just continues on as if nothing happened. If they’re not doing so already, they should feed updates to him through his earpiece right away when he misses something.
I really really REALLY hope they aren’t passing the baton to Rizzs when Niehaus retires. They should definitely clean house completely when that comes down.
Rizzs is displaying one of my pet peeves– pretending an at-bat is happeneing, when you know (and can hear from the crowd reaction) that it occured during the commercial break or the traffic report…
re: #70
Haha, sorry about that. I put the slugging where the OBP should be. It should read:
Arroyo: 4 ABs, 2 HRs, .500/.600/2.60
Beltre: 24 ABs, 0 HRs, .167/.259/.426
After another o’fer (0/3), Beltre’s should dip even further (despite reaching on Boone’s error). Seriously, it seems that even the few times where he guesses right regarding pitch selection, he doesn’t even hit the ball solidly, but tops it or gets underneath it.
I wish I could pick up flaws in batting stances with greater accuracy, but it really seems to me that the major problem with Beltre and hitting is that he looks like a AAA callup who has never seen a major league changeup…or curve…
Betancourt looks more comfortable at the plate than Beltre.
I know that we’re still in 2006 small sample size theatre, but if Beltre continues to hit (or the lack thereof) the way he has been, can the USSM “blog gods” do a write-up on him?
Curto had a pretty funny comment (I thought) in tonight’s broadcast, when he noted that vice president Dick Cheney threw out the first pitch in some MLB game. Curto said ‘and there were no reported casualties’. You gotta love THAT.
That’s another thing I love about Curto’s broadcasts — he’s got a sense of humor, and it’s smart and funny in a way you don’t get from any other broadcaster.