{"id":2120,"date":"2009-04-13T15:31:00","date_gmt":"2009-04-13T19:31:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2009-05-28T13:37:12","modified_gmt":"2009-05-28T13:37:12","slug":"baseball-will-never-sound-the-same-to-ph","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/baseball-will-never-sound-the-same-to-ph\/","title":{"rendered":"Baseball Will Never Sound the Same to Phillies Fans"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I can’t believe I’m going to have to watch Phillies games without the voice of Harry Kalas<\/strong>, who died in the press box at the Washington Nationals’ stadium at 1:20 today. For those of you who did not grow up with “Harry the K” calling games since your childhood, the Baseball Hall of Fame broadcaster may be one more legendary voice you’ve heard in the background of ESPN highlights – and even imitated by ESPN broadcasters – but he’s THE VOICE of the team I first started following the same year Kalas came to Philly, 1971. From boyhood forward, every Philadelphia sports fan works on his Harry Kalas impersonation. It’s a good thing that we’ll be able to remember the sound of Harry’s voice a lot better than any of us try to replicate it.<\/p>\n

Admittedly, we’ve got weird priorities in Philadelphia, and our beloved sports broadcasters often resonate more deeply in our hearts than our usually suspect teams. When Kalas’ old color man and Hall of Fame Phillies centerfielder in his own right, Richie Ashburn<\/strong>, died midseason in 1997, our city mourned like Rome might following the passing of the Pope. I’m sure the coming week here will be no different.
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\nKalas helped bring the young Phillies team that would eventually win the 1980 World Series to life. His Long drive…watch this baby…OUTTA HERE!<\/em> home run call is what sport fans nationwide probably know as his signature, but how else would Phillies fans know the game’s greatest third baseman’s full name if not for Harry’s legendary Michael Jack<\/em> Schmidt<\/strong> home run call? What longtime Phillies fan didn’t cherish any opportunity for a team’s score or the inning count to reach “11,” prompting Harry’s trademark, 4-syllable pronunciation of the numeral as EE-O-LEVEN<\/em>? Kalas laughed, cried, cringed, and drank with us. I’ll admit, I always squirmed having to hear his drunken rendition of “High Hopes” the rare times the Phils made the playoffs, but eventually I’d be crying joyfully right along with him, our own Pope (Paul Owens, late architect of the 1980 team), Dallas Green, Bill Giles, Dave Montgomery, the players, and whatever other Phillies saps were raising their bottles of champagne on the tv screen. Life’s too short and playoff appearances are too scant in Philadelphia not to overlook horrible singing. Beside, we don’t judge a baseball broadcaster’s pipes based on his singing ability.<\/p>\n

Beside the authority and professionalism that Kalas brought to broadcasts, what I fear I’ll miss most is his ability to shut the hell up and let the game do the talking. Kalas would inject enthusiasm or mild criticism when the moment called for it, but for the most part he called the game and allowed for the quiet moments of anticipation that the game requires. When people who don’t get<\/em> baseball ask me how I can sit through the long stretches in which nothing really happens, I always say the game’s all about the anticipation, the time traveling that happens during the numerous “dead” stretches. From Game 5 in the 2008 NLCS forward, for instance, whenever Charlie Manual<\/strong> sends Matt Stairs<\/strong> (Professional Hitter) up to the plate as a pinch-hitter late in the game, Phillies fans will revisit the majestic arc of that ball he hit to put the Phils ahead in LA. I retraced the flight of that ball just yesterday, seconds before Stairs actually tagged Huston Street’s pitch and made possible another comeback victory. It’s been less than 24 hours since that ball cleared the fence in Denver, and I can’t remember if Kalas was doing the call. He probably was, and if so I’m sure he wasn’t citing some damn new wave statistics or providing “homer analysis” for viewers lacking a memory and an imagination.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I can’t believe I’m going to have to watch Phillies games without the voice of Harry Kalas, who died in the press box at the Washington Nationals’ stadium at 1:20 today. For those of you who did not grow up with “Harry the K” calling games since your childhood, the Baseball Hall of Fame broadcaster […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342],"tags":[57,170],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2120"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2120"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2120\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}