My 5 Favorite Baseball Announcers of All Time

This list will be different for every baseball fan. Many times it’s your team’s announcer and other times it’s a network announcer you grew up with. I tend to like announcers who are not complete homers although some I like… like Harry Caray. He made it fun even though he openly rooted for the Cubs…and Budweiser.

There are many more that could be on this list.

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5: Harry Caray – He injected fun into the game. It was like a fan announcing the game. He wasn’t technically the best baseball announcer but he was enjoyable.

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4: Mel Allen – I remember Mel when I was a kid on “This Week in Baseball.” That voice was a part of my childhood.

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3: Bob Uecker – “Just a bit outside” the more I listen to him the more I appreciate him.

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2: Jack Buck – NOT Joe… You could hear his excitement for the game in his voice. For me, the best is between Jack and…

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1: Vin Scully – Being a Dodgers fan I was spoiled by Vin Scully… my number 1 favorite. If you tuned into a Dodger game you would not know who employed Mr. Scully. He would not root for the Dodgers and he knew when not to say anything and let the action speak for itself.

Vin

Jack

 

 

Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

38 thoughts on “My 5 Favorite Baseball Announcers of All Time”

  1. A great list- growing up a Pirate fan my all-time favorite is “The Gunner” Bob Prince who was behind the mike for the Pirates from the late 40’s until the mid-70s One of the biggest mistakes the Pirates ever made was when they fired him. Decades later there are those who still haven’t forgiven them. As a young fan I would enjoy listening to the Pirate game and when it was over tuning into the last innings of the Cardinals with Harry and Jack. You can find some old Harry in his prime with the Cardinals on the internet- he was remarkable nothing like the old Harry who was still one of the best. Liked listening to Ernie Harwell in Detroit also.

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    1. I wanted to ask you that about Harry. All I ever heard was the old Harry. I knew he couldn’t have been like that when he was younger. I may have heard him when I was really young and not knew.

      I did like listening to Harwell also.

      i just read about Prince…Hard to believe with all of the complaints they didn’t hire him back before the very end.

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      1. Let me find a link of the old Harry with the Cardinals from the 60’s it is remarkable he was doing the game by himself and was really on top of things…. even Harry at the end was better than most of them… I think the big problem Prince had was with the executives at KDKA which carried the Pirates..he wouldn’t kiss their rear ends. He was a great story teller.. Milo Hamilton replaced him and Pittsburgh never took to him at all… Vinny hard to argue against him not being the best-

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      2. The story telling was an important thing. You have down time in baseball and that was as important as the play by play. It kept you entertained.

        With Vinny…yea I’m a Dodger fan but even Giants fans love the guy. His way with words was different than most…and his voice cut through AM radio rather well.

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      3. I don’t know how anyone couldn’t like Vinny. He was broadcasting forever and I can’t recall one controversy surrounding anything he ever said… there will never be anyone better.

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      4. Speaking of Vinny and Harry…did you see when Vinny sang in the 7th inning stretch in Chicago after Harry passed away? It was wonderful.

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      6. That was great. I can still hear the Harry I knew but a much focused one. Don’t get me wrong…I loved Harry at the end also…but this is great.

        Thanks Hans… I will have to look more of these up.

        The “sound” of the broadcast takes me back to when I was 12. I miss listening to the radio broadcasts.

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      7. When I think of baseball growing up my first thought is listening to games on the radio- there was something magical about that- I would watch the games on television but there was just something about radio… Yes you nailed it – a more focused Harry.

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      8. Yes it was magical. I would go to sleep by it. I could get the Cardinals and Reds broadcasts at times it depended on the weather. I don’t know who carried it but once in a while I would get a Dodger broadcast on a powerful radio I got when I was 10 or so. I remember “Farmer John” hot dog commercials.

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      9. I don’t think this is one of those- ‘it was better back then’ things- but it was- the announcers today just don’t captivate me- they aren’t interesting like the old guys were. Their stories aren’t as good or they can’t tell the stories as well…

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      10. It’s more of a corporate atmosphere now and more cookie cutter I believe. Those old guys grew up telling stories and it’s an art that probably will be lost for most people.

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      12. I love the way Casey talked. He could talk about anything and you would do a double take….He could talk about nothing but sound like it was something.

        I would like to look up some Dizzy Dean announcing…I’ve read where he was entertaining also.

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      13. It was probably before your time- they would have a guest broadcaster on Monday Night Baseball this was before Cosell did the games. it was always some old broadcaster who had retired. I can recall Dizzy being on it a few times and he was an entertainer..and he would always sing The Wabash Cannonball..

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      14. I’ve seen him do that on a Hee Haw rerun. That is great.
        Those country guys really made the announcing fun…those phrases. Red Barber “Ducks on the Pond” and what they brought to the game.

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  3. Great voices all! Tom Cheek is much beloved to Toronto fans, the quintessential radio voice of that team for the first few decades. I like Gregg Zaun a lot, although with Jays he was not play-by-play guy, he was usually pregame show and between innings… he’s smart and he spoke his mind, even though he was employed by team’s owner. If he thought a player was lazy or incompetent, he’d say so… like wise, when he praised a player you know it was coming from someone who’d been on that field himself.

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    1. That is what is wonderful about baseball. Everyone’s list would be different and there is a bond that grows between fans and an announcer…because he will be there long after the players move on.

      I remember Cheek…he was there from the beginning right?

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      2. Love Major League.
        Vin Scully is my favorite though…I know you have to know this but that is why Skully from the X-Files is named Skully.

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      7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dana_Scully#Conceptual_history

        https://www.buzzfeed.com/norbertobriceno/csm-was-here
        And, ‘How Soon Is Now’ was used in Charmed (with Love Spit Love’s version).

        https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/21213/was-pamela-anderson-supposed-to-be-scully

        https://www.rte.ie/entertainment/2008/0724/414071-thexfiles/

        https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/pamela-anderson-almost-offered-x-files-20080729-gdso6y.html

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      8. Pamela Anderson…oh geez no no no….absolutely NOT…
        Gillian is awesome.
        I have all of the Kolchak episodes…they are really good.

        Great list…this show was about as hot as you could get in the 90s

        Thank You

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      9. I grew up watching Darren McGavin!

        I remember when the X-Files was on Friday nights at 9pm and the 8pm show was VR5 with Lori Singer (and David McCallum).

        Fox executives are not very bright. Pam Anderson? UGH. Plus, Fox is what killed Firefly.

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      10. I just looked up VR5…looks interesting but I never saw it.

        Can you imagine Pam Anderson in that role? What no Tommy Lee as Mulder?

        I always thought Anderson was really good looking .

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      11. They snatched it off the air right in the middle of the plot. All about money and, creative license/fans be damned. It was a trip…

        Nah. Pammie & the Hoff as Mulder & Scully…cheese in suits with surfboards in the trunk of the patrol car with the red moving eye in the front (William Daniels saying…”Mulder (instead of Michael), I sense danger!”). They could draw their weapons and run in slow motion…wind in their hair. *eyes rolling* Now, I wanna throw up…

        Gillian was born in 1968 and went thru a punk phase in the 80s. Ever seen any of the punk shots?

        She is a stunning woman but, she has gotten too thin (and, her politics are ALL Hellyweird):
        https://bestofcomicbooks.com/hottest-pictures-pictures-of-gillian-anderson/

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      12. I hate when they do that to show… I liked a show called “Almost Grown” with Tim Daly that got cancelled about the sixties. Another one,,, Time Travel one called Journeyman in 2007…one season and then off.

        Oh Geez…bad bad bad…Thank everything that is holy that Pam didn’t get that role.

        I’ve seen some of those punk shots…I would have never guessed that based on her character lol.

        She has gotten to skinny. I saw a kinda recent movie “I’ll Follow You Down” and she is too skinny…

        I love the pic that she is dressed as Lucy

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      13. I remember hearing about Almost Grown. Now, Journeyman…I SO loved that show. I was pissed when they trashed it. Ditto New Amsterdam (2007) and The Dresden Files.

        Gillian strikes me as truly funky. She plays a lot of subdued characters but, in real life, I think she is probably radical. Just my girly opinion…;)

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      14. New Amsterdam sounds really cool from Wiki.

        She is odd…she will forever be Scully though…

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