Moron, I said. You tuned into the Mets game. The Master just recently took time off: He missed a series before the break to build up lung-power for his critical, second-half WinWarbles, driven by Jeep. You're completely wrong. John Sterling doesn't just miss a game here and there, certainly not at home. He's the radio voice of the New York Yankees - the legendary radio voice of the New York Yankees. IT IS HIGH does not truly exist without Sterling bellowing, "IT'S GLEYBER DAY!" or noting, after the 15th out, that 15 minutes can save you a bundle on car insurance. The Death Star needs someone basking over the Hebrew Home at Riverdale: It's like a college campus, you know!
Alas, my friend was right. The Master was not there.
This is bad. This is really bad.
Throughout modern history, our greatest writers - Hemingway, Malamud, Lardner, Bouton - often have metaphorically linked baseball to life. But it's Sterling who gave us the greatest explanation of all: "You cannot predict baseball, Suzyn." And he's right. You can't predict this world, you cannot predict your life, you cannot predict much of anything... but until last night, Suzyn, you sure as hell could always predict the sound of a Yankee victory.
Folks, it's time to worry.
Twelve days ago, John turned 81 - 16 years past a worker's traditional sell-by date. Over that time frame, he's been as close to a certainty as anything in America. Last week, when John stayed home - ending a proud streak of more than 5,000 games - the Yankees publicly assured us he'd rest up and be fine. Now, he misses another game - repeating, for those who are hard of hearing - at home. Something's wrong. The old work horses, the people of John's generation, they don't just call in sick with a cold sore. Something is dreadfully wrong.
Listen: I claim no inside information on The Master's health. But I've seen enough to know that when a person of his age and stature suddenly starts missing games - at home - you better take notice. No matter what they say, no matter how they pooh-pooh this, the Yankiverse must take this matter seriously. They can replace Brian Cashman. They can replace Aaron Boone. But nobody is going to just step in and replace John Sterling. It will take years, maybe decades, for the memories to form.
Be afraid, folks. Be very afraid.
(Note: I am soon to begin an annual tradition: The IIHIIFIIc drunk blog. I will spend five days with old college buddies, some of whom are ardent Mets and Redsock fans. My communication skills will be compromised, if not entirely sabotaged. I leave you to Alphonso, Hoss, Mustang, the Bargain Jerk, and all others with the access key. I will attempt to chime in, daily. I might be incoherent. I will surely be crazed.)
In the meantime, I hereby call upon the Yankiverse to do the right thing, and to rally behind one urgent and supreme human cry:
IT IS TIME TO LET JOHN STERLING
MANAGE A GAME!
Posts
65 comments:
I'm worried, too. I went to bed early, after catching the bottom of the seventh on the radio, and thought, where the heck is John? Lingering aftereffects of his procedure? What kind of procedure has lingering aftereffects? Wasn't he a smoker? Is this the end, my friend?
Imagine John at home, watching the game, sadly thinking of home run calls as Judge and Didi saved the day. Was he alone? Does he have any pets to share the moment with?
When is he coming back?
Also very concerned. There's nothing like John, with Suzyn by his side. I watch the Yankees with no sound and have the radio on. The only way to do it. No offense to the entire TV crew but John is like your favorite easy chair with your slippers on after having had a good dose of your favorite comfort foods. And yes, it would be terrific if he managed one game- a fitting testimonial to a career without peer.
It is like a college campus ...
I always and only listen to the game with John and Suzyn calling it. I was shocked when I tuned in and they announced that he would not be there. I'm very VERY concerned! First off, I want the best or him so here's hoping it's not something too serious, and second, it's not the same game without his warmth, enthusiasm, and his idiosyncrasies warts and all. I've only known the Yankees in the Sterling Era, and I don't want to fathom the game without him!
Get Well John!
LONG LIVE THE MASTER!!!!
I haven't recovered yet from the loss of Phil Rizzuto. We need a juju intervention because this will put me over the edge
@ Ceeja,
Absolutely 100000000% agree! !
First off, Duque, Great pantheon! Way to give Bouton his due.
Second, Saw a recent photo of John. He looks old. And Frail. Because he is old. And Frail. It's sad. (I accidentally typed "It's dad" and then changed it. I call that a Freudian finger slip(TM).)
Yes, Ceeja, I too miss Phil but when he passed (the mic, and then from the Earth, it didn't feel like, "Who's next? It it me?" So many things I loved are starting to fray and potentially disappear, from Democracy to who sits next to Susan.
Even if he only retires it will be a blow. And, not to trivialize, but Rizzuto was a great impression to do, as is John, but you know Susan, and I'm not really and impressionist, but I just can't imagine getting a laugh with my Ryan Ruocco.
Doug K.
Just a note; no one can replace John.
We have already seen what they did on the TV side to replace M. Kay. And Michael is no icon. He is just a guy who elbowed his way in, mostly relying on his height and former connections, earned by writing about sports.
MIke Cucco or whomever it was..is just another voice. Just another guy who majored
in " sports journalism" at UCONN and worked for the FAN.
John is John. There is no substitute.
If his swan song bells are ringing, so our ours.
There will be a distraught Suzyn for a while, carrying on valiantly with some 33 year old former intern.
And then Hal will step in and put in an enthusiastic, unbiased young team from FOX network. Radio broadcasts will die on the vine. It will be painful, as the new voices will try to initiate their own iconic techniques, to peak interest and
establish "their brand."
It will fall flat.
But we here at (insert initials for this blog ) shall soldier on. We must.
John would want us to.
There must always be warriors to carry on the mission.
Time for some elemental honesty: both Ryan Ruocco and Chris Carrino are MUCH better radio play-by-play announcers than Sterling. I hope that pompous, incompetent jerk goes on the IL and stays there. Sorry guys--but you know that's true. You can joke and jive all you want--but Sterling is one of the worst radio guys in the business, a self-promoting blowhard who thinks his inane patter is more important than the game, a disgrace to a team that once featured unparalleled talent in the broadcast booth.
Oh come on. It's an entertainment business not brain surgery. So what if he lays on some schtick?
Most of his baseball observations and stories are spot on.
My one criticism is that he can get negative and pissy sometimes.
For me the best was rizzuto and bill white. As for sterling, I've listening to him since he was on WMCA in the early 70s. You get rather attached to a guy after 40 years
ceeja -- Most of Sterling's baseball observations are spot on? Which observations? The fatuous "insight" that you can't predict the outcome of every at-bat and every game, which no one anywhere has ever claimed? Such gems as "The Yankees of course would like to hold off the Twins and then hand off the game to El Chapo?" Crap like that? What's more to the point is his chronic sloppiness and ineptitude as a play-by-play announcer. He seldom gives the score. About half the time he doesn't give the count after a pitch. Descriptive details such as who the relay throw went to? Was that a called or a swinging strike? When he says, "Two on two out," does that mean first and third? First and second? Second and third? Mostly we never find out. And do we need not one but two or ever three asinine "signature" home run calls for each player, calls that are designed to call attention to the announcer rather than the achievement? Do we need an asshole so insufferable and abrasive that he has driven away every competent play-by-play associate who has tried to work with him, such as Joe Angel and Charlie Steiner? Sterling is the WORST. An unlistenable boor and incompetent. You should listen to the Mets radiocasts a bit if you think Sterling is remotely qualified for his job, which he won by assiduously kissing up to Steinbrenner rather than by impressing anyone with his skills. I once had the chance to chat with Richard Sandomir, at one time the sports-media columnist for The New York Times. When Sterling's name came up, he simply rolled his eyes. That's the professional consensus on this jerk. But you're entitled to your masochistic pleasures if you enjoy his broadcasts.
FIRST WE LOSE THE MASTER, NOW WE LOSE MR. DUQUE FOR 5 DAYS?
THIS IS HARD TO TAKE...
I GOTTA AGREE WITH CEEJA...
BILL WHITE AND PHIL RIZZUTO WERE THE BEST.
Duque...enjoy your 5 day Big Chill!
This from the NY Times on Sterling:
The reason for the time off: his health. In interviews this week, Sterling has said he feels a bit under the weather. But before Wednesday’s game against the Mets, Sterling insisted he wasn’t sick.
“I’m just run down,” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”
He later said his doctor had set three goals for the respite: “Eat to put back on the weight I’ve lost, drink a gallon of water a day, and sleep.”
So I should listen to Mets games because of their announcers? I'm sure if I were a Mets fan, I'd prefer their announcers and would hate Sterling.
You are missing the point. It's a fan's game and I get a good picture of the game and my team from this announcing crew.
You're not a yankee fan so you dont like sterling.
By the way, you want bad, super-boring baseball announcing? Try Boston's version. Joe Castiglione has to be the dullest, most lackluster radio "personality" that I've EVER heard.
" High fly ball to right field....Red Sox lose" (spoken in that drab nasal tone). Listening to him is like watching paint dry. No matter who he has been paired with over the years, he is the worst. Period.
I actually like Castiglione over the rest of the Boston announcers. He roots for the team, but doesn't lie about it. He's especially enjoyable when they are sucking, as he makes it clear he's depressed. Orsillo and Remy were the worst (and Remy is the second worst human (sic) on the planet after his murderer son. All of Remy's kids are convicted felons). Remy is the epitome of the racist townie asshole red suck fan.
Bill White was great and great with Scooter. It seemed like he was the only one who dared to give Scooter shit, and boy did he dish it. Nightly shots of the GWB and White picking out Scooter's car leaving in the 7th. Fucking priceless.
And stat baby's hatred of the Master just highlights his rectal cranial inversion. He probably thinks Yogi was stupid also, what with his tired adages. Personally, I enjoy that the Master gives me two games in one -- the one I'm watching and the one he's describing in his dulcet tones between show tunes and baseball truisms.
John Sterling regularly states that baseball teams lie about injuries. Under the weather in John’s case obviously means near death.
Vin Scully finally retired at age 88 after broadcasting 9,000 games. I figured John was going to attempt getting to 88. I think the London trip took a lot out of him and his body is telling him to slow down. Now if it's more serious than that, I don't think I could handle a John Sterling Day like the one the Yanks had for Lou Gehrig. John is old school male and would never reveal his malady(s) unless it became so obvious that he couldn't continue working.
No game tonight. It's not raining, but a storm is supposed to be heading this way.
Hard to get used to Buck Showalter on YES. Weird.
I like the TV crew lately. Singleton, Cone, O'Neill. O'Neill has to keep his stupid in check, and they all know the game very well. Good combo.
I love John (obviously) but, pound for pound, think Eric Nadel of the Rangers is the best announcer. That voice! I don't give AF about the rangers but sometimes tune in just for him.
Ceeja--You're wrong, I AM a Yankee fan. And there's no doubt that Sterling is an abomination in the booth. I didn't tell you to listen to Met games because of the announcers--I suggested that you sample them to see what great, detailed, competent play-by-play is all about. For that matter, you can go to youtube and do a search for the 1949 World Series. Listen to the portions done by Mel Allen, if you want to stick to Yankee announcers, or those done by Red Barber as well, if you don't want to be that parochial. You'll be thunderstruck by the difference between what those guys are doing and the offhanded slop served up by Sterling. And if you think this level of competence no longer exists anywhere, you should listen to a few minutes of Howie Rose or even Wayne Randazzo. I'd suggest that Dufus T. Firefly listen to this World Series game as well, but he's such a staggeringly ignorant and dumb piece of shit, I don't think he'd appreciate the vast difference.
Allen does the first half of game one--here it is:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srx6Gy1VgJs&t=1784s
This rainout is consumer fraud. There is actually a greater likelihood of scattered thunderstorms during the day tomorrow than there is tonight. The Yankees just don't want their chess pieces moving around in today's heat--it will be a bit cooler tomorrow. The decision on game postponements should be taken away from home teams and left to the umpires.
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I’m Stat Boy!®™
I just got off of my shift at The Pizza Pit. Mommy had a sandwich waiting for me in my basement apartment and I ate it. Then I picked my zits and changed out of my cool orange and red uniform. After I attempted to sooth my onanism, I decided the world should know of the depth of my baseball knowledge. I insult everyone, but claim I’m the one being picked on. I’m Stat Boy!®™, and the world should pay for me being such a loser!
I’m Stat Boy!®™
I just got off of my shift at The Pizza Pit. Mommy had a sandwich waiting for me in my basement apartment and I ate it. Then I picked my zits and changed out of my cool orange and red uniform. After I attempted to sooth my onanism, I decided the world should know of the depth of my baseball knowledge. I insult everyone, but claim I’m the one being picked on. I’m Stat Boy!®™, and the world should pay for me being such a loser!
I’m Stat Boy!®™
I just got off of my shift at The Pizza Pit. Mommy had a sandwich waiting for me in my basement apartment and I ate it. Then I picked my zits and changed out of my cool orange and red uniform. After I attempted to sooth my onanism, I decided the world should know of the depth of my baseball knowledge. I insult everyone, but claim I’m the one being picked on. I’m Stat Boy!®™, and the world should pay for me being such a loser!
I’m Stat Boy!®™
I just got off of my shift at The Pizza Pit. Mommy had a sandwich waiting for me in my basement apartment and I ate it. Then I picked my zits and changed out of my cool orange and red uniform. After I attempted to sooth my onanism, I decided the world should know of the depth of my baseball knowledge. I insult everyone, but claim I’m the one being picked on. I’m Stat Boy!®™, and the world should pay for me being such a loser!
I’m Stat Boy!®™
I just got off of my shift at The Pizza Pit. Mommy had a sandwich waiting for me in my basement apartment and I ate it. Then I picked my zits and changed out of my cool orange and red uniform. After I attempted to sooth my onanism, I decided the world should know of the depth of my baseball knowledge. I insult everyone, but claim I’m the one being picked on. I’m Stat Boy!®™, and the world should pay for me being such a loser!
I’m Stat Boy!®™
I just got off of my shift at The Pizza Pit. Mommy had a sandwich waiting for me in my basement apartment and I ate it. Then I picked my zits and changed out of my cool orange and red uniform. After I attempted to sooth my onanism, I decided the world should know of the depth of my baseball knowledge. I insult everyone, but claim I’m the one being picked on. I’m Stat Boy!®™, and the world should pay for me being such a loser!
I’m Stat Boy!®™
I just got off of my shift at The Pizza Pit. Mommy had a sandwich waiting for me in my basement apartment and I ate it. Then I picked my zits and changed out of my cool orange and red uniform. After I attempted to sooth my onanism, I decided the world should know of the depth of my baseball knowledge. I insult everyone, but claim I’m the one being picked on. I’m Stat Boy!®™, and the world should pay for me being such a loser!
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Never cared all that much for Mel Allen, but Red Barber was the gold standard. There are clips of him on the net doing games from the 1936 and 1949 world series
Yeah, if I hear 'how about that?', I'd prefer it be preceded by Keith Jackson's 'whoa Nelly!' Mel Allen was the Al Roker of his day.
Stat douche, are you showing up on the 12th, or will you be busy cowering by your keyboard? We'd love to meet you.
OK--obviously neither of you listened to the clip I posted, and both of you are lazy-minded mediocrities who can't even bother to do even basic homework about the topic you presume to pontificate on, with your embarassing jags of juvenile sarcasm and snarling attempting to veil your ignorance. It would take you five minutes to listen to a half inning of the 1949 World Series to understand my point, but you don't have a clue. I doubt that either of you ever listened to more than a minute of Mel Allen's play-by-play--or Red Barber's, for that matter. But you LOVE a patently incompetent, narcissistic fraud like Sterling.
QED.
Here's the consensus among the informed, literate respondents to a Fangraphs poll, who ranked Sterling and Waldman dead last among the baseball radio announcing teams. Unfortuanately, the adjectives "informed" and "literate" will never find a home among the brain-dead groupies who infest these comment columns:
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/broadcaster-rankings-radio-30-21/
30. New York Yankees
Broadcasters: John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman
Ratings (Charisma/Analysis/Overall): 2.3, 2.0, 2.1
Three Reader Comments
• “What can I say about John Sterling that hasn’t already been said about any of history’s greatest monsters?”
• “Ask John Sterling if you can predict baseball.”
• “My mother would never let us say anything bad about Suzyn Waldman because she is a cancer survivor. That said, her most memorable contribution to the broadcast, in my memory, was when she declared that she was going to challenge Kyle Farnsworth to a cookie baking contest. The results were not reported to my knowledge.”
When there’s praise among readers, it’s generally for what I’d guess you’d call the “timbre” of Sterling’s voice and for Waldman’s clubhouse reports. Such comments, however, are greatly outnumbered by criticisms — largely concerning Sterling’s belabored trademark calls and poor eyesight and the pitch of Waldman’s own voice.
I loved Mel Allen calling the Yankees games. Not so much Red. I never cared for Red's country bumpkin Southernisms and phrases. And Red never liked Mel because he was paid more than him and looked down at him as an inferior announcer. Red seemed to have that problem with more than a few which was why the Dodgers cut him loose. That and his over inflated ego and contempt towards other broadcasters who weren't as uptight and regimented as he was. He was also a bigot. Here is an excerpt from Jimmy Breslin's biography of branch Rickey:
"Barber was the first person outside the team's board of directors to be told by Branch Rickey that the Dodgers had begun the process of racial desegregation in baseball, which led to signing Jackie Robinson as the first black player in the major leagues after the 1880s. As a Southerner, having lived with racial segregation as a fact of life written into law, Barber told Rickey that he was not sure he could broadcast the games. Barber left the meeting with Rickey and walked for hours trying to decide his future. Having been raised in the racially segregated South, and having attended the University of Florida, while, at the time of his attendance was limited to white male students, he had in his words, 'been carefully taught', and the thought of broadcasting games played by a Negro player was simply too much for him to agree to. He arrived home and informed his wife of his decision to quit that very night. She, also being from the Deep South, had become accustomed to a much better life in a toney neighborhood of Westchester County. She convinced him that there was no need to quit then, and a few martinis into the evening, he said he would try."
But the one funny thing about Red Barber that I remember to this day was in the 1965-1996 time frame when I was a kid. It was on a Sunday when every team in baseball played a double-header and had Monday off. WPIX decided to run a live pre-game program with Barber in the noon hour before the 1 PM start. There were only a few he broadcast and the one I saw was turned out to be his last.
This program had Red talking baseball to the home viewer, talking Yankees and going over stats and what to look for during the games. This particular one had Red in the bleachers doing a remote. After a commercial, Red started talking to the fans. Barber tried to make small talk to a group of teenagers and he asks a kid " How are you doing" to which the kid replies "Great Red". He turns to another kid and asks " So what did you do last night during this heat"? The kid says "Well Red, I fucked your mother". LOL, Red's face dropped and he was like a deer caught in the headlights. After about 10 seconds of silence, they ran a commercial. When they came back they ran another feature and never again did Red do a pre-game live remote.
Here's why Dufus T. Firefly especially is an irredeemable imbecile: he natters on about Keith Jackson. Jackson made his name exclusively as a TV SPORTSCASTER. The subject under discussion is BASEBALL RADIOCASTING. I posted the clip of game one of the 1949 World Series because it features two of the greatest radiocasters at the peak of their powers to provide a dramatic contrast to Sterling's glaring incompetence. If anyone should bother to listen to the clip, he/she will immediately be startled by the wealth of descriptive detail, effortlessly, often eloquently, conveyed, a natural talent for conveying the pace and rhythm of the game, the discipline to focus on the action so that the radio listener--who is effectively blind, remember--is immersed in the action as though present at the ballpark, as opposed to enduring the pompous ramblings of a dumbass, abrasive narcissist who makes the broadcast about himself--his insufferable Broadway anecdotes, his endless string of cliches, his daft nonanalysis--rather than THE GAME ITSELF. It would all be obvious to anyone who spent even three or four minutes sampling a half inning of the following--Allen or Barber, take your choice:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srx6Gy1VgJs&t=1784s
It’s just too easy to bait this guy.
Moreover, Dufus T. Duncecap, Keith Jackson was primarily a college football announcer--he never had a gig as a regular announcer for an MLB team. His only baseball announcing was on some postseason telecasts for ABC until even they realized that he wasn't well suited to the sport and phased him out in favor of Al Michaels.
Clear enougy, you MORON? What you don't know about this subject could fill an entire blog--and regularly does, for some mysterious reason.
Just gotta ask: did it ever end up raining?
13bit-- Oh, sure--it's about baiting when someone decides to depart from the reigning groupthink of this insufferably stupid blog. When idiots like HC66 dribble on incoherently for two thousand words at a time, it's all in good fun, right? As long as you moo loudly like a good cow in the herd--just like you, 13bit!
In reality, as we all know, it's about serious analysis of a serious subject--something that is clearly beyond you. You are one of the imbecilic Sterling groupies on this blog. Your posts are just chronically STUPID. You know nothing about this subject. You're a dolt, a slug, a cipher. If you had anything intelligent to say, you would have done so by now. I haven't seen you make an intelligent or original or perceptive comment in your entire time here. You're just a pathetic little herd animal, a lifetime loser, who feels more important when piling on with other morons, like a pig in slop. ENJOY, LOSER!
Thanks to Carl J. Weitz for some characteristically insightful and perceptive commentary on this subject amid the bricbats of the usual thugs. I must say, however, that I think you're wrong that Allen and Barber did not get along when they were both with the Yankees. They both made a lot of money--more than most of the players--but Allen made somewhat more because he was the main team announcer and went on the road, while Barber did only home games. This is from the SABR biography of Red Barber:
A few days after he left the Dodgers, Red was hired by the Yankees. The new job was quite a comedown. For twenty years in Cincinnati and Brooklyn, he had been the principal broadcaster, handing out assignments to his assistants. He decided how many innings they would call, who would do which commercials, who would handle pregame and postgame shows.
The Yankees' principal broadcaster, Mel Allen, was the most famous sports announcer in the country. Red was hired to handle pregame and postgame shows on televised home games and to work a few innings of play-by-play. He traveled with the team only occasionally. “Mel accepted me as an equal,” he insisted.” . . . he could not have been nicer to me either then or all through the years we worked together”
Whether you believe his version or not is another story. I know that Allen and Rizzuto did not get along--Allen regarded Rizzuto as an incompetent interloper. In general, Allen became increasingly temperamental over the years and difficult to work with. But he and Barber always got along, as far as I can tell.
https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/5d514087
Carl, funny story, but I think you do the great Red Barber a disservice.
I have read the full account you cite about his accepting Jackie Robinson, and taken as a whole it is a story of self-criticism and humility—really, about how stupid his racism was. We have to remember that, especially in that time, people were often taught horrible, racist things from birth. I think it speaks more for them that they were able to overcome it, than our anti-racism might for those of us lucky to have been born to more enlightened parents.
And as I understand it, Red left the Dodgers because he had the guts to stand up to the awful O'Malley. I've always hear that he and Mel got along—and that both despised Rizzuto as an interloper.
HC66--you're right about the relationships of those three Yankee broadcasters.
Also, Carl, you realize how it was that Red Barber came to be fired from the Yanks, right? Because, once again, he had some integrity and dare to show how empty the Stadium was for a make-up afternoon game in 1966—something like 413 people there.
Just think of it—Mel Allen and Red Barber in the same booth! Icons, both! That has to be the greatest booth combination ever—and didn't Curt Gowdy join them at some point?
Amazing—Barber was even the subject of a hilarious Thurber story. What a culture we had then. (And yes, yes, I know: also an even more noxiously racist culture than we have now. But couldn't we have kept the good stuff and got rid of the bad?)
Incidentally, I happened to have a brief correspondence with Red Barber when he was quite old and doing commentary for WNYC. He was incredibly gracious, when of course he didn't have to care a lick. Seemed like a real gentleman.
And hey, Rufus: don't forget my man, Frank Messer. They made a fun trio!
HC 66--Curt Gowdy was Mel Allen's number-two radio man for a couple of years--I think until 1950 or 1951, when he was hired by the Red Sox.
I always thought that Frank Messer was one of the dullest announcers ever, although basically competent.
And if memory serves me, Messer was doing games for the Orioles before his Yankee stint. So even back then, we had a pipeline from Baltimore to NY.
It rained like the dickens last night, starting about 8:00. Massive lightning, heavy wind, just a deluge. Kept up for an hour and a half, two hours, at least. Think the more typical type of rain stretched out longer.
Connection to Baltimore started when the Baltimore team was bought in 1903, moved to New York, and renamed the Highlanders.
Messer was the straight man, but a total gentleman and professional. Phil and Bill would clown with each other. Messer made sure someone called the game.
Stat douche, are you showing up on the 12th, or will you be busy cowering by your keyboard? We'd love to meet you.
Unlike you stat douche, most of us here are over the age of 12 and actually know those sportscasters without searching youtube.
You ARE so easily baited. Your shrink must be very wealthy, judging from your insecurity.
I'll ask again, pussy:
Stat douche, are you showing up on the 12th, or will you be busy cowering by your keyboard? We'd love to meet you.
Small note: quality is not determined by popularity. Fangraphs people as a group don't appreciate anything out of the tight, usually dull parameters they consider "good." Like statsters, their focus lacks humor, humanity, and any reference outside their narrow area of interest. So of course, John and Suzyn would be beyond them. They do not conform to the rigid approach and scope these fanboys can understand, much less appreciate. Baseball used to be full of characters, but now we have the parade of bland p.r. robots trained in saying only the "right thing." So it goes. We won't see anyone like these two again. Too eccentric and individual for corporate sports and corporate sports fans.
Messer was a class act. Another in the long list of good people unceremoniously dumped by the Boss for no good reason. Not as bad a Yogi, but close.
Fangraphs author:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carson_Cistulli
"A 21 century poet". Milton Academy boarding school. Has panic attacks.
Yep, I'd value his opinion on baseball announcers!
Have stat douche and him ever been seen in the same room at the same time?
Hey guys, our angry anonymous troll does have a point, because the old time announcers really were great. To fill in the rain delay last night, I listened to a game called by Barber, Rizzuto, and Allen on May 14, 1961, the second game of a doubleheader. They played doubleheaders on Sunday back then to attract a big crowd. They got 43,000 for these games, it being the first nice day of the spring (some things don't change).
Anyway, the call was fantastic. They did it largely solo, though when Barber does the first 5 innings, he asks the scooter a few questions. Barber is very low key by modern standards, but he does have a gift for language and paints a nice picture of the game.
The most heartwarming thing about the game was how great Mantle was. I remember him as a broken down guy on bad knees, very dangerous at times but usually striking out. Well, he was the best player in the game back then. Hits the ball like a rope, steals bases, runs down everything in centerfield, can be seen kidding Yogi about Yogi's struggles with the transition to the outfield. I wish I could have seen him in his prime.
Ceeja: Was there any particular reason why you anonymously posted complimentary thoughts about Statboy rather than under your usual login ID?
If the words above were indeed written by you, please reply under your normal login ID (i.e., with the Ceeja link to your profile) to confirm. Otherwise, some of us might wonder if it was really you writing the above.
<snicker>
Hey stat boy - nobody is trying to bait you. You're just an angry little victim-y guy, a truly sad creature who can't play with others and, when people call you out on your boorish behavior, you respond with sub-adolescent, personal insults. I'm sorry you're so angry and miserable. The world is not necessarily a qauntifiable place, and to even have an argument about announcers is pretty absurd. I must get back to real life but, rest assure, I'll be skipping any posts from you or any other cowardly poster who won't identify himself with some consistent handle.
It's me but I wouldn't say my thoughts were really complimentary. Just getting nostalgic for old time yankee games. These trolls end up ruining blogs.
I will not condemn Statboy for his opinions or beliefs. He has some good points sometimes. But the insults and ugliness is really unnecessary and just shows insecurities, bad manners, and a general lack of class. Too bad. He's not stupid, just abominable.
I'll condemn him for being an asshole.
General comment on the increased traffic here. Caused by demise of RAB, I believe, and infestation of other sites that made them intolerable or unable to comment on.
The 'new' commentary is overwhelmingly good and nice to see. It really does add to making the conversation interesting. Especially the obscure (mostly geezer related) references being caught.
We *did* get some of the cancer, though, along with the convivial commentariat.
Even when you have a nice enjoyable walk through the park. you'll occasionally step in dog shit. You just can't predict it.
Just to make it clear to JM, Dufus T. Duncecap, 13bit, and other assorted herd animals and sewer scum who blight this blog: I expressed my opinions about John Sterling. In return, I was subjected to the usual arounds of insane personal invective from the same aforementioned assortment of miscreants. So I responded in kind. They are ALWAYS the first ones to attack, and ALWAYS the first ones to whine like little wounded puppy dogs when they receive a taste of their own. Check the course of this thread, and you'll see that I'm right. It STARTED with Dufus's "And stat baby's hatred of the Master just highlights his rectal cranial inversion" and proceeded downhill from there. Even as I persisted in trying to maintain a substantive discussion, complete with evidence from respected links and primary sources, the same scummy characters kept compulsively secreting their toxins. And a tip of the hat to Carl J. Weitz and HC66 for sticking to the subject and discussing it in civil terms without lapsing into preadolescent vituperation.
As for the rest of you pigpen psychotics, you can kiss my ass. You're all extremely stupid, ignorant (like Dufus bringing up a college-football telecaster in the midst of a discussion of baseball radiocasters), and nearly all of you lack the requisite knowledge and taste and civility to carry on such a real discussion (aside from Carl J. Weitz and HC66) without imploding into a cesspool of your own psychopathic vomit. Your only joy, your only real pastime, is reveling in the neck-deep muck of groupthink, like frenzied Nazis saluting the fuhrer en masse, each thread its own little Nuremberg Rally of morons and stunted adults who think nothing is more important than rooting for a corporation and its incompetent employees.
So, where were we? Sterling SUCKS. A total asshole personally--which explains his popularity in this little Yankee Charention--and one of the most notorious incompetents in this history of baseball radiocasting, as attested to by the headline title of this blog--no matter how much duque wishes retroactively to romanticize Sterling's various idiocies and deficiencies and ineffably charming and lovable. duque knows full well that the guy is a disaster, and devotes most of the featured sidebars on the blog to ridiculing him. You can't have it both ways, duque. And most of the mad-dog, snarling Sterling groupies in the Charenton comment section miss this basic point about this whole undertaking.
Correction: Sterling's various idiocies and deficiencies AS ineffably charming and lovable
Assholes like Local Bargain Jerkoff and Dufus T. Duncecap are the kind of people who would be shouting "send her back!" at Trump rallies--troglodyte minimonsters of the fascist crowd. Beholed Local Bargain Jerkoff acting as the Nazi ubergruppenfuhrer, menacing Ceeja for not adhering to the party line sufficiently when Ceeja acknowledged that I had made a good point. That's not allowed in this little Nazi howling wolfpack, right Local Bargain Jerkoff?
And meanwhile, the phony sanctimonious liberal JM, with his unerring instinct for fake sanctimony and mediocrity, calls out none of THIS kind of abomination, because he is just another howling member of the mob, notwithstanding his laughable pretensions to decorum. He lets all that abominable jackal sniping pass without comment, while singling out only the victim of it, the person who did NOT start it. JM, you're full of shit, and as debased and nasty as the people you fail to call out. You're just a regressed fan in the worst sense--a mamber of a mob that, in your eyes, can do no wrong as long as it's brandishing an interlocking NY or maybe a swastika. You are beneath contempt.
behold, not beholed--but right in a way, as in "assholed."
They are ALWAYS the first ones to attack, and ALWAYS the first ones to whine. Yeah, sure. What color is the sun in your world?
Mommy! Mommy!
Be there on the 12th pussy idiot.
Dufus T. Duncecap-- Why don't you entertain everyone with your mental retardation again by regaling us with the name of a college-football telecaster the next time the topic of baseball radiocasters comes up?
And it's right there in the thread--you lobbed the first volley of abuse. You're a sick, stupid, piece of shit--always have been, always will be.
So you're attending on the 12th, pussy dweeb?
"But you're entitled to your masochistic pleasures if you enjoy his broadcasts.
July 17, 2019 at 3:51 PM"
"They are ALWAYS the first ones to attack, and ALWAYS the first ones to whine"
Total pussy fucking pussy asshole fucking pussy basement dweller pussy douche bag.
Grow a fucking nut and show up on the 12th.
Dufus T. Duncecap: That first quote is about conflicting evaluations of and reactions to of Sterling's broadcasts. Your response was a stream of verbal vomit of abuse from a psychotic. Get help before you harm your wife or children or dog. You're emotionally diseased and extremely STUPID.
Now--have you learned the difference between a radiocaster and a telecaster yet, Duncecap? Between baseball and college football? What was your SAT score? Minus what? LOL!
SAT scores? Seriously!?
You are a fucking 12 year old.
Total pussy fucking pussy asshole fucking pussy basement dweller pussy douche bag.
Grow a fucking nut and show up on the 12th.
C'mon pussy toad douche bag.
Show up on the 12th. Don't be a keyboard warrior. Actually grow a gonad.
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