Jan 24 2009
Radio the link between Braves, fans
By Bud L. Ellis
braves.today.com
ATLANTA — It may seem strange, in this day and age of varied information streams and 24/7 access, to focus so much on radio announcers.
I mean, who listens to radio anymore, with satellite radio, TV, and video and audio clips all over the Internet and accessible by cell phone?
But those who say that don’t realize the hold radio has on baseball fans. And not just for those who are in their golden years, those who grew up in a world where TV was a luxury and one game a week on the tube was the standard.
No, those of us who love this game so dearly have an inherent connection with listening to the game over the radio. Baseball by its nature is a perfect fit for audio, as it allows the listener to take the words coming over the speakers and paint the image of what’s happening. The slower pace of baseball lends itself to radio perfectly, as those behind the mike just don’t bring you the play-by-play, but instead become a conversation partner.
Radio holds its special place in baseball to this day. I can attest to that in a variety of ways. Whether it was sneaking my small headset radio to bed so I could listen to Braves’ games on the West Coast as a kid during the 1980s, or listening through the static on the deck of my Northeast Georgia mountain apartment during the summer of 1998 as Jack Buck on KMOX called another Mark McGwire home run, radio’s always been a part of the deal for me.
During my college years, when I held partial season tickets and the Braves were winning the NL West, my battery-powered Walkman was a constant companion on so many summer and fall nights at old Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. There I would sit, watching some of the greatest baseball of our time unfold right before my eyes, and amid the atmosphere and electricity of being there, I had the voices of Braves’ radio right there in my ears.
As difficult as it was to watch the Braves plunge to 90 losses in 2008, as discouraging as it was to see player after player after player land on the disabled list, the death of Skip Caray in August tore at my heart. Like so many who follow the Braves, Skip’s death brought me to tears, as if I had lost a member of my family.
And in a way, I had, we all had. Then, when Pete Van Wieren retired after the season, the void expanded. The radio voices of a team are always in the same place, game after game after game. TV stations change and broadcast crews shift around like the wind, but the radio – as it has for so long – remains constant.
We don’t have Skip or Pete anymore, and that will be difficult to swallow as 2009 dawns, as the team they described for 33 years looks to return to contention. Atlanta native Jim Powell has been named for one of the team’s radio spots, and another familiar voice from the past – former Braves’ broadcaster Don Sutton – is rumored to be the choice for the other chair.
I look forward to hearing Powell call a game. I’ve never listed to him before, but I know as a kid he listened to Skip and Pete and Ernie Johnson Sr., as many of us who follow this team did.
I know Sutton; he, along with Skip, Pete, and Joe Simpson, provided the soundtrack of the Braves’ dynamic streak of postseason appearances, pennants, and the 1995 World Series championship. It’d be great for Sutton to be back in Atlanta; he currently is under contract to broadcast for the Nationals in 2009, but both sides reportedly are working to get Sutton out of that deal and return him to the South.
Let’s hope it happens. Familiarity is what radio is all about. We don’t have Skip and Pete anymore, and that’s tough to fathom. Those two gave so much to this franchise, to all of us, for so very long.
—30—
I was a little kid when the Braves streak in the 90s started. I was born in 1987. I don’t even remember the 95 season. The only thing I remember about the 95 season was the first game of the playoffs against the Rockies where Chipper hit a homerun and then saved the game with a diving stop of a ball down the line.
But I remember that Skip, Pete, Don and Joe were the voices of the Braves. If I didn’t know better I would have sore they were a very part of my family. I hated when TBS stopped showing the Braves because that meant I wouldn’t be able to enjoy listening to Skip and Pete anymore. Where I live it is almost impossible to pick up the radio broadcasts depending on the weather. I remember working as a stock boy and in the back room having the Braves on the radio.
Just when I thought last season couldn’t get any worst we lost Skip. I cried. I remember I was watching the Sunday Night ESPN game when Jon Miller told the whole world that we had lost a legend. The next night’s game was one of the hardest games I have ever watched. Knowing that there were the Braves and knowing that there was no more Skip.
I will forever miss Skip with his famous saying of “Hello again everybody and welcome to another night of Atlanta Braves baseball.”
I was sadden again when Pete announced his retirement. Pete was so into the history of the game. I learned my love for stats and historic events about the game from Pete.
Skip and Pete were legends and you can’t replace legends. They will forever hold a place in Atlanta Braves history.