Listening to the Braves-Reds game on the WLW feed out of Cincinnati.  As I’ve said before, the Reds are always a good listen because of the opportunity to hear the legendary Marty Brennamen.  His partner tonight is former Reds pitcher and ESPN analyst Jeff Brantley.  Brantley was one of the few good ones on ESPN’s crappy baseball coverage (along with Dave Campbell) so it’s not surprsing that he was quickly run off by the 4 letter network.

Unfortuntely, this game is now in a rain delay in the top of the 3rd with the home team ahead 1-0.  But all is not lost and I’m not looking for a new game yet.  That’s because for baseball fans in Cincinnati, summer rain means one thing:

It’s time for Marty to take phone calls from Reds fans on the “Chiquita Banana Phone.”

And they have the corniest theme song for the segment too.  One minute you are hearing play-by-play of the ballgame from a Hall-of-Fame announcer and the next minute it’s now the squeaky voice of a banana singing:

“Ring, ring, ring, ring, banana phone.  Ding, ding, ding, ding, banana phone.  It’s no baloney, it ain’t a phoney, it’s the Chiquita banana phone.”

First question was about Ken Griffey Jr.  The analysts both took some delight in his failure to resuccitate his career in Seattle.  Interesting.  I hadn’t realized Reds fans were bitter about Griffey’s departure.  It’s not unexpected though since Griffey’s time in Cincinnati was a big disappoinment for most.  The third question of the segment was directed to Marty and the caller asked what the secret is to his full head of hair at age 66.

Nice.  I’d like to know that myself.  Oh how I love baseball on the radio!

I’m listening to my first Brewer broadcast of the season tonight.  The Brew Crew are hosting the Rockies and the ever-pleasant 74 year-old Bob Uecker has the play-by-play call on the hometown radio feed of WTMJ.  In spite of his reputation, the legendary beer man started the game with a very professional delivery, complimenting the action well.  His sidekick seems properly deferential and Ueck obviously still knows his stuff.  I’m taking in the game on the laptop with a beer, but sadly it’s an import and not some of Milwaukee’s finest.  Next time I will be better prepared.

Three distinct memories of the Milwaukee Brewers come back to me tonight.  The first is the 1982 World Series in which the Brewers lost a 7 game classic to the St. Louis Cardinals.  Seems odd now as the two teams have become division rivals.  But at the time Milwaukee was still an American League city.  Anyway, my absolute earliest memory of baseball is the 1981 World Series between the Yankees and the Dodgers.  But having been just short of 5 years old, I can’t recall any specific memories of that series other than rooting for Reggie Jackson.  However, I have a much better memory of the 1982 fall classic.  I remember rooting for the Brewers and being a fan of mustached closer Rollie Fingers, sluggers Cecil Cooper and Gorman Thomas, and young stars Robin Yount and Paul Monitor.  My new baseball collection was growing and I probably had some of their cards.  I was very disappointed the Cardinals won, as the team I had rooted for had now lost the World Series for the second year in a row.
 
The second Brewer memory is from 1996 when I listened to my very first baseball game over the internet.  It was a weekend night Brewer home game with Bob Uecker doing the call.  The internet was in its infancy and at the time I was well ahead of the learning curve, rather than way behind as I am now.  I can recall just how amazed I was to be listening to a baseball game in this manner.  MLB had not seized the broadcast rights yet.  I had tracked down the feed from a bare bones Milwaukee radio station web site.  And even though the dial-up connection necessitated re-buffering every minute or so, it was so cool.

My final Brewer memory is attending a game in now-demolished Milwaukee County Stadium in the summer of 1999 with my brother Russ.  We had driven up for a game from Chicago and didn’t stay long.  But it was memorable.  It was that ballpark’s last season and the building was indeed decripid.  The bratwurst and sausages, however, were affordable, plentiful, and wonderful.  Another thing that stands out about the game is that it was the first game played after a tragic construction accident at the new stadium that had killed one or more constuction workers.  That was kind of eerie, especially since we could actually observe the construction on the new stadium from our seats.  But we were grateful that the game was played and we got to be there.

So perhaps this game will go down as my 4th Brewer memory.  They are ahead 2-0 in the early-going.  Uecker had a solid call on a home run in which he was very animated.  In fact, he seems to be growing slightly more jovial with each inning.  He just claimed he could’ve hit a HR himself off the pitcher and has already told 2 stories from his legendary playing days.  I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that the beer by his side is starting to kick in.  My only disappointment is that the game feed is not providing local commercials.  And they wonder why I’m drinking Mexican beer tonight!

Time to check in after another week-long gap in my “baseball on the radio” posts. My listening has indeed been down lately.  I can’t really site a specific reason.  Good thing is it’s a long season and, if the noise of the kids permits, I’m sure I’ll get back in the swing of things before too long.

It’s after midnight on the East Coast and so I’m listening to some late West Coast baseball.  There are three options with ongoing games in Los Angeles, San Diego, and Seattle.  I choose the last option.

It’s my first listen to a Seattle broadcast on the hometown KIRO feed.  The M’s are locked in a 2-2 tie with the visiting Orioles in the 9th inning.  So far the Mariner announcers sound like two older-sounding white guys with rather monotone voices.  These guys definitely do not fit the profile I expected for the urban-chic city of Seattle, but they’ll do for the moment.

The MLB audio is giving me local commercials tonight, which I really appreciate since the Pacific Northwest is so foreign to me 3000+ miles away in Southwest Florida.  Commercials for the Seattle Pacific Credit Union and the Dairy Farmers of Washington have given me a little of that local flavor I so enjoy.  But what about Starbucks?  Or Seattle’s Best?  It’s late here in Florida.  I need some caffeine — if only through the magic of internet radio!