Short article this month.
I've noticed lately that I have listened to a lot of Sports and other Events being told to me as I actually watch them happen ... and it really has started to sink in that this is sort of redundant and a little odd at times.
Announcing. That's what we're talking about today.
If done well it's great but when it's not done well it takes a lot away from the Sport or Event. In most cases I'd have to say that announcers take away from the event.
This is not true, by the way, when applied to Radio... If you listen to Sports on the Radio... it needs to be fully described. Why? Because you can't see what is happening. The announcers are instrumental to a radio broadcast because the action cannot be viewed by the listener.
I like sports on the radio. I think most of the GREAT announcers for Sports were radio people. I grew up in my area with Dave Van Horne on the radio (he had various commentator guys over the years like Duke Snider for many seasons). He did the Expos games on radio and that voice is the iconic Sports radio voice for me growing up.
That's radio! That's great! That is how you describe sports to people who can't see them. He's good at it.
Now when it comes to TV...
I understand that there's differently abled people and many people can't watch Sports on TV due to eye related problems... but the vast majority of TV watchers can see... and I really have to say that describing things happening that the fans can see is sort of weird. We can see this so why are you telling us what we are seeing?
I don't think I need the game told to me as I am watching it. I remember noticing this when the NHL announce team in Canada, one year, had some labor negotiation thing and a few weeks of games were broadcast without announce teams. Just the game, no one announcing it to you as you watched. You saw the game... you heard all the sounds of the game (pucks hitting sticks, pucks hitting board), and the crowd feed was on so you heard the crowd roar, clap, n' boo ... and it was good. It made sense. I liked it better like that, to be honest.
One thing I really notice in regards to announcing in the the faster-paced games like Hockey is the difference between the radio feed and TV feed is pretty pronounced. If you play a radio broadcast over a televised game... you'd think you're watching a different game. Every play to some announcers seems to be the greatest thing that ever happened. I watched a game once on TV (with the sound off and the radio feed turned on instead).... and it was bizarre.... a guy shot and missed the net by two feet... and the radio announcer screamed like it was a scoring-chance of a life-time the shooter had just missed and oh it was almost a goal! What a play! Blah blah blah.... Etc. Etc. Etc.! No, I saw it on TV as it happened and it wasn't... I watched it happen as it happened and it was two feet wide of the target and not even close to the net.
The over-enthusiasm of announcers, these days, is insane. I get it that in Soccer, a game where there's like two goals per game... that the broadcast people love to scream GOAL in their home-country languages when there's a goal.... because goals are rare so it's a good enough reason to freak out when they occur.
Hockey, to me, is the biggest culprit in over-enthusiasm for mundane plays. If you watch a game on TV you might see something like Jyrki Lumme stumble out of the boards after knocking out a puck and chunk it up the ice... it hits the back of some guy's skate and comes back into the zone and the referee calls an off-side... and then they cut for station identification and a commercial for donuts...
...but on the radio? The announcers would describe this play and have you believing Hercules just tore open the gates of Hades in the corner and wrestled the puck away from a minotaur and then shot it up the ice! But alas it came back into the zone and off-side was called and they now must pause for IDs and donut spots.
I Love This Song!
Baseball is interesting because it's not as fast-paced as other sports and the announcers actually have no choice but to become likeable on-air personas because there's so much pauses between plays. The really great announcers in Baseball can develop into nation-wide beloved-icons for decades and decades. There's so many pauses in the game itself the announce teams have to start doing other content on air... and most of the time that's friendly banter, good natured repartee, and humor. People really like things like that. They do.
Let's just think about Bob Uecker for a moment now shall we? He played what? Two hundred games in the big leagues with a career .200 batting average? Yet this man is one of the most well-known personalities in the History of The United States of America! Why? Because he became the nation's beer drinkin' buddy by watching baseball WITH them as opposed to dictating actions to them (actions they can already see themselves happening).
He watched the games with them. That's a big key difference there. Bob Uecker became their friend who they watched baseball with... not a redundant town-crier who yelled at them what they could already see. He just hung out for two or three hours with them and watched a little baseball with 'em. His ol' pals.
Let's think of this man's credentials now.... just to name a few:
-Baseball Announcer
-Father on Mr. Belvedere
-Nationwide pitchman for Beer and other Products
-Part of the Wrestle Mania III announce team (which most consider as the best Wrestle Mania ever)
-Part of the Major League franchise of films
-Mainstay/Re-Occurring Guest on the Carson Tonight Show
-In the Baseball Hall of Fame (for announcing)
That's pretty good for a guy with a .200 career batting average. Now we're really getting somewhere, aren't we? We're figuring out what it takes to do this stuff right, are we not? If I can see the game I am watching.... I don't need it shouted at me while it happens. Do I? No, I don't. I want to chill out and watch it with cool people... and maybe some of these cool people just happen to be inside the TV instead of out of it.
I mentioned Mr. Uecker was at Wrestle Mania III up there.... the one with Macho vs. Steamboat... and Hogan n' Andre. What a happening, it was! It was truly... a happening! This event was A Happening is what it really was!
I'll let you in on something, now, that I've known since I was a little kid and that's:
That good announcers watch the broadcast with you and don't shout the actions ad-nauseam at you.... and I learned this from Wrestling. Specifically, I learned this from Wrestling Challenge when I was in my formalitive years.
People knock Wrestling... but I have learned more about Life from watching Wrestling then I could ever really fully describe or comprehend. The announcers on Wrestling Challenge (and yes, I've mentioned my admiration for these two before)... were Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan.
I, to this day, can just run those two arguing in my mind on loop in times of boredom. I can be a on bus going to work and looking out the window and these two will start narrating what is going on in the city outside the bus window in my mind. It's that ingrained into my brain.
"Hey! You think that guy there's on the take? That guy out there in the twenty dollar suit!? He's trouble!"
"Oh stop it! Will you stop!?"
I bet you many people reading this understand what I am saying if they grew up on Wrestling Challenge. Now, Let's point something important out before we continue writing about Wrestling Challenge...
...and that's....
...that Wrestling Challenge was never ever really any good. It was almost like an informerical for kids to buy merchandise and especially to announce where the upcoming live shows were gonna be. A good portion of the show was about promoting how Hacksaw and a Mystery Man were gonna be coming to the Nassau Civic Center or the Boston Garden or somewhere near your hometown...
To think now in these times, modern times.... like if right now a wrestling show has a bad show like Raw does a bad rating or AEW has a bad week ... you will not hear the end of fans complaining on the internet. They will complain for utter days and endless nights on the internet. But, there was no internet though in 1991 and Wrestling could be as bad as it wanted to be! It had a one way ticket to be as bad as yesterday's hot New Jersey garbage and nobody needed a credit card to ride the garbage train!
Let's look at an example match, shall we?
What do we notice here? Is it good? No. Are Gorilla and Bobby pretending it is? No. Are they even watching it? Not really. Or yeah they are, I think so because they notice when the guy in the purple pants falls awkwardly out of the ring ... as to which Bobby ponders "Is this guy bad!?"... yes, Bobby, this guy is bad. He's not good at falling out of rings in purple pants, Bobby. He really is bad.
Okay... now... what is the MAIN thing we notice in Bad News Brown vs. Keith Watkins here? Yes, that's right... the announcers are not narrating this mess. Nope. They are not describing to you things you can see with your own two eyes as plain as day. They are talking about a battle royal and the Hitman... wait.... they do wake up and notice when Mr. Watkins tumbles unceremoniously out of the ring... and then go back to the Hitman who cuts a promo... and then they sort of notice when News does a "karate kick" and then it's over.
This is the best. This is the best announcing you could aim for on a televised wrestling challenge. This is just one match too... they did hundreds of these! Hundreds! Maybe thousands and most of them were like this too!
If this was a hockey game in Canada on the radio it would have went something like this:
"Bad News Brown has hoisted this combatant out of ring! It is incredible! Wow!"
"Watkins has the fire to continue... what a match!"
"Brown has him in his sights for his Karate Kick! OH WOW! HE GOT HIM!"
"ONE TWO THREE! HE WINS!"
Now, from what I see on TV for sports these days.... let's say that above match was broadcast by a media company for TV instead of radio ... it would go exactly like how they would read it for radio... they would describe it with weird needless enthusiasm like that but the difference is you would be able to SEE it on TV and would be able to see how it actually looked. This is what I noticed when I watched the NHL playoffs in Canada this year. They do TV like it's over-acted radio and narrate every single action enthusiastically to you... actions that you can see yourself. You don't need to do that. The only thing you need to talk about in this match is how one guy looks like he just stepped out of a blender.
(Note: I know what the name of News's move was. It wasn't the Karate Kick it was the Ghetto Blaster. I'm surprised no one told Gorilla what that move's name was.)
I'm not really saying that Wrestling Challenge is how you should do announcing, really. I'm just saying that you don't always have to over-sell a sports event if the game isn't necessarily a super exciting one. If it's a 6 to 1 hockey game and the home team is losing and it's already over... maybe don't enthusiastically shout every play like it's important... just chill out and talk about players back-stories and stuff... or do friendly banter... or do good-natured repartee.... or something like that.
I wanted to work in Mystery Science Theatre 3000 in here too... but didn't fit it in anywhere. Joel and the bots (or Mike and the bots if you're a Mike-Head)... would watch those bad movies they watched with you like they were your friends. They built a gigantic following from that simple yet down-to-earth thing. The same way Bob Uecker did... the same way Gorilla and Bobby did.
People like Joel (or Mike), the bots, Bob Uecker, Gorilla Monsoon, and Bobby "The Brain" Heenan trust you enough to understand that you can watch something and know what is happening on what you are watching. They don't have to totally McCarver you and explain to you what a double-play is in both the 2nd and 6th inning (in case you somehow forgot what a double-play was between the 2nd and 6th inning)... they know you know what a double-play is. Don't worry. They know you're actually a pretty smart person, reader.
They kind of understand that me and you are sort of in this thing together, reader. Hahaha.... did you ever notice I write like this, friends? Oh yes.... I knew from a very young age that a reader or a viewer or a listener is smart enough to know what they are currently doing. When that trust exists we can go to more interesting places together, can't we? I learned that from Wrestling Challenge when I was like six.
I knew my favorites like Randy Savage weren't gonna show up on Challenge that week and knew the main event was likely gonna be Red Rooster vs. The Brooklyn Brawler... but I still anxiously awaited it each and every week. I didn't really care if Rooster defeated the Brawler... I just wanted to watch a bit of ol' Wrestlin' with my pals Gorilla n' Bobby again.
That's an important lesson to learn in life. I kind of always knew that since day one. Writing is like this too. When a writer and reader engage in readin' n' writin' together (it is a two-way street, isn't it?) .... it is a beautiful journey that two people are embarking on. It really is.
I know there's a person on the other end who will read this... just a person in the world like me... trying to get by in this weird ol' world we both live in.
Yes, so to conclude....
I think more people in media should take this approach. Your viewers, listeners, readers... they aren't slobs or bozos or "marks" who need everything explained to them .... they are just regular old intelligent human beings who want to watch some sports or laugh for a bit with you.
