Monday, March 31, 2014
Great Voices From the Past!
I had an instant last
week when all of the great voices of baseball echoed in my brain. One at a
time, naturally, as there just isn’t room for all of them: Vin Scully, Harry
Caray, Tom Cheek, Red Barber, Ernie Harwell, Jon Miller, Jack Buck, Tony Kubek,
Early Wynn, Phil Rizutto, Bill White,
Mel Allen, Dizzy Dean, Dave Van Horne, Curt Gowdy,Tim McCarver, Bob Uecker, Ken
Coleman, Jerry Coleman, and Joe Garagiola. Current broadcaster Dan Shulman, a
Canadian, does a fine job as well. Most were winners of the Ford Frick Award,
an annual affair at Cooperstown.
Hall of Fame Announcers: Jack Buck, Harry Caray and Garagiola-Late 1950s
I touched on the fact
last week that I had spent an afternoon beside Joe Garagiola, Junior. He is now
working for Major League Baseball as a Vice President, in a role similar to
that of Brendan Shanahan in hockey.
His father spent ten
seasons in the Major Leagues as a player. He signed with the Cardinals as an
amateur free agent in 1942, but made his debut on May 26, 1946, when he was
twenty years old. He spent his first six years with the Cards, before being
traded to the Pirates. He had a stint with the Cubs, and finished his playing
career with the Giants.
So that was his
fourth team in the National League, when there were only eight teams in the
League. He remembers squatting behind the plate when the great Stan Musial
stepped up to bat. He looked back at Garagiola, surprised to see him in a
Giants uniform. “What the heck are you doing there?” Musial asked.
Garagiola told him
that he had been traded. Musial asked, “You did, when?” Joe replied, “This
morning.” Musial then asked, somewhat surprised, “Why don’t you quit?” and Joe
retorted, as only he could, “Now?”
Garagiola added wit and
wisdom to the game whenever he was behind the microphone. He spent 57 years in
the broadcast booth. I dare say that he knew everyone in baseball for the
latter half of the 20th century. My recollection of the titles of
the games, and the networks, is always a little vague. I think the game was
advertised as “The Game of the Week,” and it usually was on a Saturday
afternoon. But that was the time to settle in with a couple of cold ones to
enjoy the great game, and the greatest stars.
Garagiola often
teamed with his childhood friend Yogi Berra on the rubber chicken circuit. They
grew up together on “The Hill”, an Italian sector in St. Louis. Berra recalled
watching Garagiola in the 1946 World Series. Joe hit .314 in the series,
outhitting Musial and Ted Williams. After the Series was completed, they both
worked together in the hardware section of Sears, Roebuck and Co. Garagiola
recalls that Berra “was not much of an expert in hardware. A customer asked
Yogi about a specific kind of screw. Yogi went blank. He pointed at the jars of
screws and told the customer he couldn’t tell one from another. He said, ‘Pick
it out yourself.’” From Yogi Berra, Eternal Yankee, by Allen Barra.
Garagiola moved into
a retirement community a couple of years ago, as did Berra. He called Berra
after moving in. He asked, “How’s it going, Yog?” Berra replied, “It’s all
right, but geez, they’ve got a lot of old people here!”
He remembered a
pitcher with a funky delivery: “He threw nothing but elbows and fingernails at
you, and, pretty soon, the ball came.”
Garagiola is a member
of the Baseball Hall of Fame; however, he says his most cherished baseball
memory came when he witnessed the Diamond Backs winning the World Series in
2001. His son had put together that team as General Manager, and Joe was
justifiably proud of his boy.
Garagiola enhanced
the game for all his listeners, and his friends. Always.
James Hurst
Sportslices.blogspot.com
# posted by James Hurst @ 10:10 AM 
