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| Red Barber, Connie Desmond, Vin Scully |
One of them is about his mentor, Red Barber, who told him to not listen to other broadcasters and to be yourself in the booth.
Earlier today, STAA (Sportscasters Talent Agency of America) held a daylong summit, pulling together several great voices from the big leagues.
Bob Costas (for my money, the best active baseball play-by-play announcer), Kevin Harlan, Ian Eagle, Kevin Kugler, Beth Mowins, Pat Hughes, Chuck Swirsky, Tracy Wolfson, and -- Hello, friends -- Jim Nantz rounded out an incredible roster.
I didn't need to watch or participate and, given it's Monday, and as I play chauffeur as well as show host, I didn't have time.
Besides, I was getting missives sent to me all day via Twitter, text, and Facebook.
I don't doubt the advice was fantastic.
Costas advised sending work out all over.
Nantz cajoled attendees to believe they can achieve their goals and not give up.
The summit skewed younger, based on the amount of tweets I was reading and I was surprised at how many I knew.
The presenters showed their various spotting boards and the crowd oohed and aahed.
They took questions, and the questioners fell over themselves tweeting about it.
It was fun to watch from afar, and credit to John Chelesnik and company for making it happen.
So, back to Mr. Scully (and, by extension, Mr. Barber). I'm sure Vinny -- who rarely has a bad word to say, though he might not speak too kindly of the CBS folks from the early 80s -- would advise that attendees only pick up pieces of advice.
You see, the thing is truly to remain yourself on the air. As I've said before, we have Mike Lange or John Sterling or Vin Scully. Don't be them. Don't pick up habits -- especially the bad ones.
I truly think play-by-play is a wonderful skill, and one that applies to various parts of life. It's describing. It's reporting and informing and educating and entertaining (#RIEE>#LCRR).
It's storytelling, not number-crunching (I feel that's lazy).
"Mike Hirn is batting at .309. Hirn is from Putnam County, Ohio (Editor's note: he's not), one of several places in the United States named for Major General Israel Putnam, including a county in New York that one might be familiar with. Now Hirn waits and takes a fastball outside for ball one. General Putnam fought with distinction at the Battle of Bunker Hill as Hirn battles a curve ball and fouls it off, first base side, and it's one and one."
And, so on. Don't tell me how he's hitting .255 on a Monday in the middle of a pandemic with only two visible stars in the sky and a blah-blah-blah WAR and whatever else.
(Note: Nate Stdiham's average on Monday’s was better than Hirn's, and when he wore red socks he was three-for-four in stolen bases. See? These are the things you learn.)
While the spotting boards are lovely, my own advice (for what little it is worth) to younger broadcasters is to be prepared at the lower levels especially, where you won't have room for fancy spotting boards. I'll long-remember calling softball at Yale a year ago. I barely had room for my scorecard, measuring 8 1/2 by 11 inches. There was no room for my computer, so I utilized my iPad and my iPhone (in my lap) for anything else.
So, when folks talk about charts and graphs and colored pens, I chuckle to myself. That's great. Believe me, I would have loved to have mastered that, and I tried, but space just wouldn't allow it.
Instead I learned to improvise with a roster and a notebook. As wifi and smartphones became more common around booths (or I brought my own wifi), I leaned more there with a computer as well. I also trusted the best computer I have: the lump three feet above my...
Develop your style of notes, preparation, score card and delivery that works for you. Practice and self-evaluate. If the time off has allowed for anything, it's allowed for even more self-evaluation than I normally do, and I'm always tough on myself.
Also -- and I can't stress this enough -- young broadcasters need to climb from the depths. And they need to be bad and experience rejection. They need to drag equipment and have technical issues. That's why I like some of the things I see but I want to see more humility and the desire to be teachable. I fear that's going away with a sense of entitlement taking its place.
Then they need to ascend with their story. Everyone has a reason why they are where they are and, sadly, talent doesn't always win out. It just doesn't.
Building a network is beyond important, and don't look the gift horse in the mouth who was trying to be there for you when you were on the way up. You never know when you'll need that person again.
Pre-STAA we had the wonderful Call of the Game board where guys like Joe Block, Robert Ford, and Adam Amin were hanging out with...um...the likes of me.
I wish I could chat with teenage Rob to make sure he was comfortable with his decisions. Same with 20-something Rob, who elected to stay in a corporate job as he thought he had his life there, and broadcasting would be a side gig that could blossom.
Part of that turned out to be true. But, I appreciate my successes far more in the path that I took. That's why I still feel wonder when I see or hear anything regarding my work. It's never taken for granted.
I wish I could say that about many others.
Getting to the top doesn't necessarily mean you're truly successful. I was able to have my son grow up with me around. He was able to follow me to so many games and events and, while he's not going to be a sports broadcaster (or a broadcaster at all), he still speaks fondly of what I took him to, and the precious time we spent together.
I think there are still hard lessons to be learned. I hope the summit included that also.
But, hey, who am I?
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