” Off the Wire ” proudly sponsored by Pete’s Auto Body.
I mentioned some time ago that I understood the unrest of fans and the media-at-large over the Toronto Blue Jays using their TV crew of Dan Shulman and Buck Martinez in a simulcast format for their radio network as well.
As an announcer primarily in the field of sports, I should be horrified by the alteration and supportive of the displaced announcers on the radio roster.
And to a certain extent I truly do understand the affinity for baseball radio and the longing for the days of Tom Cheek and Jerry Howarth on Blue Jays Baseball.
However, Tom & Jerry’s 23 year run ended earlier in the century and health considerations knocked Jerry Howarth off the Blue Jays broadcasts in 2017.
As I saw it, or as I heard it, there were two combined issues with what followed, both to large degrees that were contributing factors in the current radio revision.
First familiarity. Radio is done best by people that are familiar. Companions. People you know, or people you think you know and furthermore, people you’ve come to trust.
The Jays announcers, post Tom & Jerry, weren’t as familiar to the listener and there was no hope whatsoever of being as popular or as close to the audience as Cheek and/or Howarth had been for decades.
Plus, some of those announcers, to be kind, weren’t up to professional or contemporary baseball standards in my view, and many times in the latter years of Jerry Howarth, once Jerry’s on air stint was finished the next sound on my radio dial was…. ” click “.
Simulcasting TV & Radio Major League Baseball isn’t a great call and using the pandemic to make alterations was somewhat lame.
However, the potential does exist that Rogers could see some success with the new simulcast format and then, hopefully, upgrade the radio crew somewhere down the road.