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The art of sports commentary Stuck

Posted on November 12, 2008 at 06:46 PM.

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So I left you all hanging last night with a promise of expanding upon sports commentary after proclaiming my love for Dick Enberg and what he's done over the years. Before I start I should at least fulfill my promise and relate what makes him so unique among the #1 NFL football PBP guys of the last 30 years. What makes him unique is that he didn't have one color man throughout his tenure as the #1 guy.

He started out with...

Merlin Olsen (personally I think this was Enberg's best partner. Enberg was always enthusiastic and excited about the games he was calling yet Olsen was a bland and professional guy who stuck to the game. There was little to no "humorous" moments between the two. The contrast between Enberg's bubbly and energetic game calls and Olsen's quiet and by the book breakdown of the game was excellent and made for good TV)

Bill Walsh (This was NBC's answer to the phenomenon of Madden and Summerall however Enberg and Walsh never really clicked. I don't remember too much of Walsh's time in the booth but I've watched his first game and he was like a fish out of water. I have a playoff game they worked on and will probably make a random comment about it in the future. Walsh's tenure in the booth is most remembered for a rather bizarre day in Buffalo during a playoff game. I'm hoping to get said game to see what the hoopla is all about.)

Bob Trumpy (IMO Enberg's 2nd best partner. They worked well together because Trumpy was always acerbic and never held back from criticizing what was going down on the field. Enberg usually ignored the criticisms but would often set Trumpy up for further diatribes. A great example of Trumpy's lack of restraint was during the famous "no punts game" between the Bills and Niners. Trumpy kept going on about the defensive playcalling of Bills coordinator Walt Corey. Trumpy literally was saying stuff like "I don't know what the heck Walt Corey is doing here..." "The Bills are playing some very sloppy defense" etc etc. This was the main reason Trumpy, despite working well with Enberg got flushed down the ranks at NBC after a couple years as top dog)

Last but not least Phil Simms and Paul Maguire (A typical 3 man booth but it worked well as Simms did the color and Maguire was the cranky old man. Enberg was a good traffic cop between the two but it seemed all 3 worked well and liked each other which you can't say about the MNF crew these days)

And now.....

What makes a good commentary team?

I'll make this short and sweet. There's all kinds of styles out there but to me the best is when you have two (or 3) guys who really like the game they're calling and "gasp" actually like each other! Now that's not to say that a little tension is bad because there was tons of it during the halcyon days of MNF with Gifford/Cosell/Meredith. In fact, as the years wore on Cosell got too big for his britches which got the other two to sulk behind the scenes. Yet, despite some professional differences (all three essentially liked each other for the most part) they never let it show on screen whereas the train wreck that is ESPN's MNF has oodles of tension all over the place.

The first year you had Thiesmann and Kornheiser basically sniping at each other while Tirico pathetically tried to keep the peace. There was also the major distraction of having celebs with no clue about football in the booth and talking inanities for a good chunk of the game.

This year Kornheiser changed his schtick from a no nothing boob to being a gushing fanboy of certain players which has often irritated Ron Jaworski. There have been times this season where it sounds like Jaworski would love to punch the daylights out of Kornheiser. At least now we don't have celebs and for the most part they stick to the game. If they got rid of Kornheiser I think this would be an excellent crew as Tirico is a good do it all type of announcer and Jaworski is an excellent communicator of what's going on on the field especially with QBs.

There's the "homer" crew that while they work for their local markets are terrible today because any game can be picked up anywhere. The worst offenders of this are Hawk Harrelson and Darrin Jackson who call White Sox games. Let's just say their catchphrases and open cheering for the Sox isn't exactly professional or entertaining. That being said, one can be a homer and be entertaining. Chuck Swirsky is a great example of that. He's a guy who is full of enthusiasm, knows what's going on and brings a ton of energy to his broadcasts. Now i've heard from some that he's annoying but I think he's small fries compared to the White Sox guys.

The best commentary teams IMO have guys who mix everything good in broadcasting and put it together. The best football crew out there right now is Gus Johnson and Steve Tasker. Johnson reminds me a lot of Charlie Jones in some ways. True, Johnson is more bombastic but you strip that away and he's a lot like Jones in that he calls a good game, has knowledge of it and knows how to be conversational with his partner. Tasker, to me is very underrated. The guy knows his football and has a great relationship with Johnson. They seem to like being in each others company and more often then not call a great game.

If only there were more guys like these two instead we get egotistical boobs (Joe Buck) idiots (You were a great player but you can't relate to today's game Joe Morgan) incompetents (Jamie Campbell stop calling Jays games please!) and boring guys (Can you tell the difference between a game analyzed by Steve Beurlein and Rich Gannon? I can't)

IMO the best days of sports play by play have long since passed us by. The golden age of TV PBP to me was 1970-1998. I think 1998 spelled the end of it as most of today's broadcasters are lazy and give into hyperbole. Interestingly enough that was the year that Fox truly became Fox with all the high tech graphics and such that we've seen over the last decade.

Tomorrow: Best commentary teams of all time in each sport (TV)

Comments

# 1 TJdaSportsGuy @ Nov 12

Such a well written piece about a topic I love. When I have more time, I'd love to talk further with you about this stuff. Totally agree about Gus and Tasker though (no homerism).