13. Dan Shulman and Orel Hershiser. John Kruk is the third guy with them now. I haven't heard enough of Kruk on a game to have an opinion or him, but Shulman and Hershiser saved us from Jon Miller and Joe Morgan on Sunday Night Baseball. For that, I'll always be thankful. Joe Morgan was the worst.
12. Gus Johnson and partner. Gus Johnson really should still be doing the NCAA tournament. Maybe he'll be doing some Big East basketball games with the Big East's deal with Fox. Fortunately, we still have the Gus Johnson Soundboard.
11. Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez, and Ron Darling. These guys are really good and Keith Hernandez is Keith Hernandez.
10. Dick Stockton and Hubie Brown. As Hubie Brown might say, "Okay, you're Jim and you're writing about your favorite broadcast teams. You know you want to include Hubie Brown, and his partner now is Mike Tirico. But come on now, you're not going to put a guy who went to Syracuse and lives in Ann Arbor on your list so you have to pick somebody that Hubie Brown hasn't been partners with for more than 10 years."
9. Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth. Al Michaels is the best play-by-play guy for football. I might take Phil Simms over Collinsworth, but his partner is Jim Nantz. And I met Collinsworth in Ireland and he was very nice.
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| Me and Cris Collinsworth at Temple Bar |
8. Mike Breen, Jeff Van Gundy, and Mark Jackson. Mike Breen is very good at what he does. I'm going with the old three-man team that included Mark Jackson because Jeff Van Gundy has some wacky ideas and Jackson balanced him nicely. I like Van Gundy, but I think these guys were even better with Mark Jackson.
7. Sean McDonough, Bill Raftery, and Jay Bilas. I could have gone with Verne Lundquist and Bill Raftery, but I went with this team because Jay Bilas is really really good at what he does. I love Raftery, McDonough is solid, and Jay Bilas is as good as anybody that ESPN has for anything (also very entertaining on twitter).
6. Somebody who's not Tom Hammond and Mike Mayock. Notre Dame fans hated the old team of Tom Hammond and Pat Haden. One thing that we didn't like is that Pat Haden went to USC. Haden left and we replaced him with somebody that went to Boston College (not as bad as USC, but still a Notre Dame rival). I didn't know much about Mayock other than the fact that he went to Boston College since I didn't have NFL Network (it took Cablevision 8+ years to get NFL Network, that could be it's own post). I just remember watching Mayock's first game and being really impressed with how well he knows the game. He's great. And Tom Hammond is finally getting replaced on the Notre Dame games, so all is well.
5. Al Michaels and John Madden. I am very much opposed to gambling, but I find all the gambling angles in football entertaining. I love the Bill Simmons-Cousin Sal podcasts and I love when Al Michaels makes gambling references during football games.
4. Marv Albert, Steve Kerr, and Craig Sager. Marv is the best play-by-play man for basketball.
He should be doing the Final Four (Jim Nantz should stick to golf) and NBA Finals (Breen is very good, just not as good as Marv). Steve Kerr is solid. And you have to respect Craig Sager. There shouldn't be much that's all that important for his job other than being an attractive female, but he's built a successful career entirely on wearing ridiculous outfits.
3. Pat Summerall and John Madden. I grew up with Pat Summerall and John Madden calling the best games on Sunday and the Madden video games (they never should have taken Madden's voice out of the video game). You could have the video game recordings of Summerall and Madden calling a lot of games and I would enjoy it more than most broadcast teams. I remember one year after Summerall had retired, CBS had him do an introduction for their Thanksgiving game. Tom and I had the TV on while we were doing something. We heard Summerall's voice and just stopped whatever we were doing. Summerall and Madden were a part of Thanksgiving. It's not the same without them. John Madden was as entertaining as a broadcaster could be. I remember one time when a fumble was being reviewed and Madden said something like, "When our forefathers started this game, a fumble was a fumble. But now we look for reasons why a fumble isn't a fumble." And of course, we wouldn't have had this without John Madden.
2. Mike Gorman and Tommy Heinsohn. Mike Gorman is good. You probably have to be a Celtics fan to appreciate Tommy Heinsohn the way I do. He's probably the biggest homer in all of broadcasting. If you're not familiar with his work, think about how much Lou Holtz loves Notre Dame and multiply that by two or three. I remember Mad Dog had him on in 2007 when the Celtics were in the middle of a 22 game losing streak. He had nothing to say about the team. He once compared Leon Powe to Moses Malone and that wasn't even his most ridiculous comparison. That honor goes to when he compared Greg Stiemsma to Bill Russell (I'm not joking, this actually happened, I heard it). The best part is that I totally think that Tommy actually believes these things (at least as long as Leon Powe and Greg Stiemsma were on the Celtics).
1. Vin Scully. Quite simply, he's the best. I love Tommy Heinsohn for what he does and I love Vin Scully for being the exact opposite. The number 1 ranking came down to who I would miss more if they retired. I'd miss Tommy, but not as much as Vin. Everybody associates Vin Scully with the Dodgers (and rightfully so, he's been doing their games since 1950 when they were still in Brooklyn), but Vin is very fair. He also does everything very differently because he doesn't have a partner. When he tells stories, he doesn't have somebody else to help him set them up. He does everything so well. He will get some minor things wrong (like the count or calling a changeup a curveball or something), but he's still great. There are few things that annoy me as putting on a Dodger home game on the Extra Innings package and hearing the road team's broadcast instead of Vin (that was the other factor that gave Vin the edge over Tommy, not getting Vin on Extra Innings is more disappointing than not getting Tommy on League Pass). He's 85 years old and I wouldn't be surprised if he retired soon. I really don't want that day to come. I don't want anybody else calling games for the Dodgers. Vin Scully is the voice that I associate with baseball.
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