392 replies to this topic

[jamesdean]

Whoever they have up in the booth, they're certainly not going to make anyone old enough to forget Chuck Thompson and Bill O'Donnell.  Not even in the same league. 

[jamesdean]

https://www.youtube....h?v=IKp8ZKWQSx8

 

For those of you old enough to remember the magical summer of 1979, here's one of the great moments with Bill O'Donnell calling the play.  At the end you can hear Charlie Eckman and Chuck Thompson add to the excitement. 

[CMU82]

You had to pick one where they beat Sparky and Trammell and the Tigers, didn't you? 

 

I had Ernie Harwell and Paul Carey (the 'voice of God' ) on the radio, and George Kell and Al Kaline for the 40 TV telecasts at the time.

 

We ALL had it so good back then.

[Mike B]

https://www.youtube....h?v=IKp8ZKWQSx8

 

For those of you old enough to remember the magical summer of 1979, here's one of the great moments with Bill O'Donnell calling the play.  At the end you can hear Charlie Eckman and Chuck Thompson add to the excitement. 

The birth of Oriole Magic.  My favorite radio call of all time.

[Mike B]

Bill O'Donnell nickname, Words. was a terrific announcer.  He died way to young from cancer.

[Nigel Tufnel]

Blech.  Hopefully just a case of the old guys sitting out 2020...

 

 

 

Dan Connolly@danconnolly2016·43m

 

According to a source, MASN is completely revamping its broadcast lineup now. Being told Jim Palmer, Gary Thorne, Rick Dempsey and Tom Davis will not be part of any 2020 broadcasts. Ben McDonald and Mike Bordick will be main analysts. Scott Garceau & Kevin Brown play-by-play.

[Russ]

Jim and Gary are the only reason I watch.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

Hey some names might be pronounced properly this year. Maybe even pitches correctly identified as well. Thorne, Dempsey, and Davis can all retire as far as I'm concerned. Just make sure Palmer is back in '21.

[You Play to Win the Game]

Love me some Ben McDonald.

I guess they are going to simulcast the TV broadcast to the radio?

[BSLRoseKatz]

Honestly one of the main things I looking forward to was hearing Gary, this is disappointing but understandable 

[Nigel Tufnel]

Love me some Ben McDonald.

I guess they are going to simulcast the TV broadcast to the radio?

 

 

Here's what Connelly's article says.  Sounds like radio will be a separate broadcast.

 

https://theathletic....-off-site-only/

 

Radio broadcasts on flagship station 105.7 The Fan and other affiliates in the Orioles’ network will not feature regular color analysis from ex-players but will have teams of two play-by-play announcers rotating in for games. Geoff Arnold and Kevin Brown will do the bulk of radio broadcasts and will be joined by Melanie Newman and Brett Hollander for various games.

[Chris B]

For what it’s worth, I believe this is more of a decision from the Orioles than a choice from the broadcasters themselves.

[Mike B]

Blech.  Hopefully just a case of the old guys sitting out 2020...

 

 

 

Dan Connolly@danconnolly2016·43m

 

According to a source, MASN is completely revamping its broadcast lineup now. Being told Jim Palmer, Gary Thorne, Rick Dempsey and Tom Davis will not be part of any 2020 broadcasts. Ben McDonald and Mike Bordick will be main analysts. Scott Garceau & Kevin Brown play-by-play.

It is probably cutting cost and also cutting the number of people in contact with the team.

 

I would not be surprised if Palmer and Thorne have opted out.

 

I can't say, I am disappointed about Thorne.

[Mike B]

The 2 play by play guys  switching off is how it used to be done,

[dude]

I listened to a few innings of Melanie Newman on 105.7 today.  She has some work to do.  I am not sure, that with all the broadcasters, they have doing games any of them will get in a rhythm and develop into a solid option.

 

I mentioned Melanie in the Servideo thread and the interview she did with him, which I thought was good.

 

I think you're right about chemistry for the announcer teams and it's probably rare that it doesn't take some work to get a rhythm in the execution of the Game.  It's not like hosting a show where one person is interviewing the other and controls the pace for the discussion.

 

It will be interesting to see how her and all the other teams develop their in-game chemistry.  

-----------

 

I like her interviews on "The Grind".   This is probably a separate topic, but I don't think she's got something specific here.

 

...so a couple comments for her show, if she cares...

 

1) fix the lighting or camera or angle or something.  If gives her something that looks like a shadow mustache. She doesn't have one but gives her the appearance that she does for the bulk of the time.  Sometimes she moves and it's obviously not there, but I think it's an easy production fix.

 

2) She asks questions that sometimes have longer answers....'tell me the story' type stuff, which is good....but it also means she sits on camera doing nothing while the other person talks.  It forces her to smile and nod occasionally so it's not just a straight stoic look all the time....so I think she handles it ok, but maybe have a full screen mode for the interviewee, where, when they're in a longer answer, you can just make them the only one on the screen.  I feel like they're live so you need to play with the dynamics of that so it's not annoying.  Probably easy to do in post-production, but when they're talking for 45 seconds or 2 minutes, just give them full-screen.

 

3) I think The Grind is intended as coffee themed show title (she mentioned it as 'cup of joe' in the launch), but there's nothing coffee themed about the show.  They aren't up early or late (I think the show is 11am), nobody is drinking coffee and, while I probably haven't seen all of the interviews, nobody is talking about coffee.  If I wanted to name a show The Grind, I'd do it at 6am with my coffee and part of the personality of it would be discussion of the other person's favorite coffee or something coffee related.  "Thanks for being up early with me, what are you drinking this morning?" ...but they're both drinking water.  It's 11am.  Nothing to do with coffee.  One step beyond that, she's a pretty girl and 'the grind' wouldn't be my pick for a show with a pretty girl.

 

So I thought about what I'd name the show.  I didn't deliberate long so I couldn't even bill for a full hour, but I'd go with "The Heartbeat".

 

The Heartbeat with Melanie Newman has a nice ring and that's sort of in-line with the approach she takes in the interviews and it'd be easy to blow that theme up just a little as part of a core question or 2. 

 

Just some thoughts.

[Mackus]

More McDonald is a fantastic thing but dislike all the other changes. I'll miss Palmer a lot. I wish he and Ben were calling every game together. Fervently hoping that Palmer is back next year.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

If Palmer was done for good I think they or he would let people know

[russsnyder]

If Palmer was done for good I think they or he would let people know

I agree.

[SportsGuy]

I think the only reason you didn’t see Palmer day he will be back next year is because he doesn’t know how the world will be then.

I would think he will be back as long as it’s safe to be back but no one can predict that yet.

[Nigel Tufnel]

It turns out that Thorne was holding out because of contract dispute.  It's been resolved, and he's expected to have a Palmer-type role for the rest of the season.

 

https://theathletic...._shared_article