What’s Fair or Foul in Broadcast Booth? : Announcers Walk a Fine Line When Reporting Controversial Incidents

Most workers know that you don’t cross the person who signs the paychecks.

So is a baseball announcer who is employed by a ballclub free to report accurately and fairly, or must he favor the home team to guard against repercussions from the boss?

Another question: Are announcers employed by teams free to practice journalism and break stories, sometimes negative stories, involving the teams they work for?

Most announcers say that they are objective when it comes to reporting what occurs on the field, and that reporting off-the-field happenings, generally, is not part of their jobs.

Not all baseball announcers are employed by the teams, however. Some work for radio or television stations. Others have part of their salaries paid by the team, part by a station.

There are all kinds of financial arrangements in major league baseball, and there are all kinds of broadcasting styles. One is not necessarily related to the other.

Some announcers, such as Harry Caray of the Chicago Cubs, are considered “homers” because they root, root, root for the home team. Others, such as the Dodgers’ Vin Scully, play it down the middle and, for the most part, are objective.

What style is preferred by fans generally depends on the market. In a melting pot such as Los Angeles, homerism generally does not go over real well.

Still, a caller to KABC’s radio program, “Sportstalk,” earlier this season complained that the Dodger announcers don’t back the team enough. The caller said she was tired of their impartiality.

Objectivity in baseball broadcasting became an issue earlier this season, however, when Marty Brennaman and Joe Nuxhall, the announcers for the Cincinnati Reds, were called on the carpet by President Bart Giamatti of the National League for their role in the Pete Rose incident April 30.

Rose was suspended for 30 days by Giamatti for shoving umpire Dave Pallone.

A hesitant call by Pallone at first base enabled the Mets to score the winning run in a 6-5 victory over the Reds. Rose, after getting nicked on the face while arguing the call with Pallone, shoved the umpire twice.

After the incident, Brennaman said on the air that Pallone was incompetent. Nuxhall called Pallone a scab because he crossed the umpires’ union picket line in 1979.

Several fans who brought radios to the game hurled them, and other objects, onto the field in a barrage that chased Pallone to the umpires’ room.

After looking into the case, Giamatti instructed Brennaman and Nuxhall to see him in his New York office, correctly reasoning that they were within his jurisdiction since they are employed by the Reds. Had the announcers been independent of the club, working for a station, say, Giamatti might have requested that they see him but they would not have been required to honor his request.

Of the meeting with the Cincinnati announcers, Giamatti said: “I expressed my views and they expressed theirs. We all agree completely in deploring fan violence, wherever it occurs, for whatever reason.”

Brennaman said that he was concerned that he would have to sit there for two hours and be brow-beaten, that his first amendment rights--freedom of speech--would be infringed upon. That was not the case, he said.

According to Brennaman, Giamatti said: “ ‘If you want to be critical of umpires and players, I have no problem with that. I just felt that some of the things you said contributed to the atmosphere in the park.’ ”

Added Brennaman: “I think in certain cases we did go over the line. I came out of the meeting with a good feeling.”

Where had they gone over the line?

“I listened to the tape Sunday morning (the next day),” Brennaman said. “At one point, I said that a roll of toilet paper had been thrown from the stands and come to rest near Pallone, which seemed appropriate. My implication was that I condoned throwing things on the field, and I apologized for that on our Sunday broadcast, which was 24 hours before we met with Giamatti.

“I also said that I had never seen fans in a more angry mood and that they had good reason. Once again it was as if I was condoning their behavior.

“I can’t do anything about the past, but I can do something about the future. If the situation develops again, I’d handle it differently. I don’t know if I would be more restrained about criticizing the umpires. They’re part of the game and shouldn’t be considered above criticism. But I would be more restrained with statements that could inflame a crowd--if, in fact, that’s what happened.”

About his style, Brennaman said: “I think my allegiances basically lie with the fans. I realize my check comes from the ballclub, but for anyone in my business to be successful or enjoy longevity, you have to maintain credibility. If a listener at home believes what you say, you have a leg up on a successful career.

“I want my team to win--it’s always easier to say nice things when your team wins--but not to the extent of openly rooting.”

Brennaman said he likes being paid by the club rather than a station because it gives him the opportunity to accept other assignments during the winter, assignments that a commitment to one station might prevent.

He said, however, that he would not work for the club if it did not allow freedom of speech and, in fact, he would probably not have remained with the Reds if Dick Wagner had stayed as general manager.

“I was tired of being brought in and chastised for critical comments,” he said. “I went through that early in my career with managements here that were very sensitive to criticism of the club.

Red Barber, among the first baseball announcers, spent 33 years in the major leagues, beginning in 1934. He spent 5 years with Cincinnati, 15 with the Brooklyn Dodgers and 13 with the New York Yankees.

He learned about objectivity early in his career, and passed that knowledge on to a young protege, Scully, in the early 1950s.

“I was working the 1935 World Series between Chicago and Detroit for Mutual radio,” recalled Barber, now 80 and living in Tallahassee, Fla. “NBC and CBS (radio networks) were also doing that Series, and had their own announcers there.

“The commissioner, Judge (Kennesaw Mountain) Landis called us all together.

“He told us this: ‘Don’t try to play the game, merely report it. Don’t be critical. The managers, like you gentlemen, are the best in their business, and they don’t need your help. The umpires don’t need your help. Merely report.

“ ‘Suppose a player gets a mouthful of chewing tobacco and walks over to you and spits in your face. Report from where he started, report the route he took, report the accuracy of the delivery, if your eyes are that good, and report the reaction of the commissioner, if he has one. But no opinions. Just report.’ ”

Barber says his fundamental philosophy of “just reporting” made it easier for Jackie Robinson to break the color line in 1947.

“I never said he was black or a Negro,” Barber said. “All he was was a whale of a player, and that’s what I reported. I think that helped the situation very much.”

Barber, it is believed, was the first announcer employed by a team. He was paid by advertising agencies until 1946, when the Dodgers gave him an unheard-of contract for $105,000 over three years.

“Larry MacPhail was in Cincinnati when I was with the Reds, and after he came to New York and took over the Yankees, he offered me $100,000 over three years to go across the river,” Barber said. “Branch Rickey (part owner and vice president of the Dodgers) topped that by offering me $105,000, although I would have stayed with the Dodgers had Rickey just matched the Yankees’ offer.”

Barber did end up with the Yankees in 1954 after a falling out with Walter O’Malley, who had taken over controlling interest in the club. “Walter O’Malley and I didn’t get along,” Barber said.

To make matters worse, O’Malley didn’t support Barber in a salary dispute with the sponsoring Gillette Co. during the 1953 World Series. Barber wanted more than $200 a game, and ended up refusing to work the Series.

His 13-year stint with the Yankees ended in 1966 when Barber, at 58, was fired for reporting news that didn’t sit well with Yankee management.

Late in the season, during a televised game, Barber asked the director to get a shot of the crowd. “It was by far a record-low crowd (only 413),” he said. “That was the news. A picture of the crowd ran on the back page of the Daily News the next day.

“Well, Terry Smith (the Yankees’ director of broadcasting) was in the control room, and wouldn’t allow us to show the crowd. He told the director, ‘You can’t have that shot.’

“Who was I working for? I was working for the fans. They deserved a shot of the crowd, but they never got it, despite my requests.

“A couple of days later I met with Michael Burke, who was running the Yankees for CBS, the owner at the time. I asked Mr. Burke how he was doing, and he said: ‘Forget the niceties. You’re fired.’ ”

Barber said he has no regrets. “I felt I was doing my job, and that was to be a reporter.”

Scully says of Barber: “He trained me like a child for seven years and taught me a great deal of discipline. I might have been out of control otherwise.

“Even in inflationary times, the cheapest thing in town is an opinion, and I’ve tried to keep mine out of it. I don’t avoid reporting what I see, but criticism is getting involved on a personal level, and I try to avoid that.

“I’m trying to have a conversation with the listener rather than calling off an airline schedule. I obviously have a relationship with the club and players, but I try to keep my own feelings and emotions out of it.

“I’ve always felt that the more detached I was in volatile situations, the better job I did. I’m not saying that I’m right and those who do some cheerleading are wrong, I’m just trying very hard to go down the middle of the road and mind my business.”

Years ago, a reporter was in the booth with Scully during a game, and noted in a story later that Scully quietly cheered by raising his arms, as if signaling a touchdown, after a Dodger home run.

Scully later explained to the reporter that he misinterpreted his reaction. “When I raise my arms, that’s a signal to the engineer to pick up the crowd noise,” he said. “I was not cheering.”

Scully’s philosophy of reporting only what takes place on the playing field has at times drawn criticism from the media.

In 1981, for instance, he never mentioned the possibility of a player strike, even when it was imminent, and was rapped by The Times’ Scott Ostler.

Wrote Ostler: “The night before the major league players went out on strike, Scully, Ross Porter and Jerry Doggett were televising a game from St. Louis. They made no mention of a possible strike. They did, however, trot out the props, like the good old promo-night calendar for the upcoming home stand, which of course never took place. . . . In short, it seems Vinnie and his partners aren’t always giving us the whole story.”

Last season, after Dodger vice president Al Campanis’ comments about blacks were televised on a Monday night, Scully and his partners didn’t make much of it on a Tuesday telecast. They read a prepared apology, and the next day, they reported Campanis’ dismissal.

Scully said recently: “Just because I have a microphone doesn’t make me a judge or the leader of the tribunal. I’m there to broadcast the game.

“I think people in our business get into trouble when they try to answer questions as opposed to saying, ‘I don’t know. I don’t know what’s happening behind the closed doors.’

“I don’t guess. That would be wrong. I’m a play-by-play broadcaster who is trying to heighten the interest of our listeners so that they’ll come and buy tickets, and trying to sell the sponsors’ products. I’m not Ted Koppel. I’m not an investigative reporter. There are people more qualified to do that.”

Scully pointed out the disclaimer that runs at the top of each broadcast to the effect that the announcers are paid by the club and said:

“There is no conscious effort to withhold. On the other hand, there are obligations that should be fulfilled. In the Campanis incident, the club was issuing statements almost immediately and we read them. The only thing we didn’t do was make editorial comments, though I did say that his comments were indefensible but the man himself was worth defending.

“As for the strike in ‘81, I had nothing (informative) to add to the situation. We have talk shows before and after, and I felt it was overkill for me to try and comment.

“In retrospect, I probably should have mentioned that there was the possibility of a strike and that there were meetings going on, though I felt people were aware of that. I remember telling the guys in the booth, ‘Let’s just give them a good game tonight.’ And it turned out to be a darned good game.”

In 1978, the Dodger announcers avoided reporting a clubhouse fight between Steve Garvey and Don Sutton.

Said Porter: “We got word of that secondhand. We don’t report hearsay.”

As for the inner workings of the Dodgers, such as possible trades, Porter said: “You hear rumors about trades all the time. We are not rumormongers. When the club makes an announcement, we report it.”

Porter said that the announcers, even though they are Dodger employees, are not privy to any inside information. “We prefer it that way,” he said.

Until this season, the Dodgers owned their own radio and TV rights, and sold their own advertising. But since that task has gotten more complex, the Dodgers this season sold the rights to KABC radio and KTTV, Channel 11, giving the stations the responsibility for the advertising.

But the Dodgers still employ the announcers and maintain control over the quality of the broadcasts and telecasts.

On being employed by the club, Porter said: “I think it’s advantageous because you don’t lose your job if the club changes radio stations.”

Porter said that in his 12 years with the Dodgers, no one has ever told him what can be said and what can’t.

He added: “I think you build your reputation on credibility. You hurt your credibility if you take the stance that every call against the Dodgers is a bad one. As a reporter, you should be accurate.”

Don Drysdale, who joined the Dodgers this season, said that he too likes being employed by the club.

“I think it’s better that way,” Drysdale said. “The ballclub is aware of what it takes for you to do your job. If you work for a station, they may expect you to do things like go visit with sponsors in the stadium club rather than spending time preparing on the field.”

Drysdale said he developed his style working with Dick Enberg with the Angels, and that’s why he plays it pretty straight.

When he left the Angels to go to the Chicago White Sox, he said, he wasn’t about to change his style.

“I told Eddie Einhorn and later Jerry Reinsdorf (the White Sox owners) that if they wanted me to second-guess and criticize, that as a former player, I could second-guess and criticize with the best of them,” Drysdale said. “But that just wasn’t my style.

“I don’t believe in beating a dead horse. I never belabor a bad play, or a bad call. You report it, and that’s it. I’m there to report, give some insight, add little color, a little humor here and there.”

However, Drysdale, uncharacteristically, got on a soap box when Dodger pitcher Tim Belcher was ejected after hitting the Mets’ Kevin Elster in the back May 30. Drysdale was outraged by Belcher’s ejection, and voiced his feelings in no uncertain terms. He questioned how an umpire can determine if a pitcher is indeed intentionally throwing at a batter.

Drysdale, when he was pitching for the Dodgers, always believed that “protecting the plate,” or brushing back a hitter, is part of the game. So Drysdale apparently was speaking more as an ex-pitcher than a Dodger employee.

About being a homer, Drysdale says: “In Southern California, you just can’t do that. Vinnie’s not like that, and neither is Chick Hearn. You can’t fool the public. Because of television, fans are a lot more sophisticated now than they were 30 years ago.

The Angels do not employ their radio announcers, Al Conin and Ken Brett. Their salaries are paid by KMPC. But KMPC and the Angels are both owned by Gene Autry.

Conin is considered a homer by some. He doesn’t use the word we when talking about the Angels, but he agonizes over every loss. Conin says he is not a homer.

“To me, a homer sees things through rose-colored glasses, and I don’t,” he said. “I don’t think I redefine the game to make the Angels look good.

“If you miss a cutoff man or fail to move a runner from second base with no outs, you’ve failed in a fundamental aspect of the game, whether it’s the Angels or Yankees. I think a homer finds a way to overlook that.”

On the other hand, he says: “I do want the Angels to win and that’s the basis from which I begin every broadcast. The better the club does, the more listeners you have and the higher your ratings. I can’t see a broadcaster wanting it any other way.

“Besides, when you’re doing the same team every day, you wouldn’t be human if you didn’t develop attachments, and once you have those attachments, you’re going to want those players and the team to win.”

Drysdale, on the other hand, said: “Over the course of a season, you’re going to announce at least 60 losses. Maybe 10 of those are going to come in a row. You can’t get on an escalator and go up and down with the team. You’ll drive yourself wacky.”

Conin said:

“I think Vin Scully and Dick Enberg are two of the very best examples of broadcast journalists, and that Vin has set a standard for objectivity, but I also think he shows a lot more enthusiasm when the Dodgers are winning and doing well.

“During the last innings of a Koufax no-hitter or during the Don Drysdale (shutout) streak, you could feel his excitement. How about when he shouted, ‘We go to Chicago’ (after the Dodgers defeated the Milwaukee Braves in a 1959 playoff for the National League pennant)?

“I think the bottom line is, do we maintain credibility? And I still think our listeners feel that we’re not hiding from truth and reality. I think the use of the word we is a no-no.

“I’m not trying to couch everything in terms of how the Angels do. I don’t think my desire to have them win reflects a lack of objectivity on the air. I still think we stay in touch with reality. I think everything is fair game for criticism as long as you’re not being mean about it.”

Enberg, who was the Angels’ lead announcer for 12 seasons, starting in 1969, said that former General Manager Fred Haney gave him some important advice during his first spring training.

According to Enberg, Haney told him: “Report the ball, not what you hope it will do or what it should do.”

Added Enberg: “That was the foundation from which I developed my style. But things have changed. Television has made fans more sophisticated. Sometimes, you have to do more than just report. And sometimes you don’t.”

Enberg recalled that in 1971, when the Angels traded Alex Johnson, the 1970 American League batting champion whom the club considered a troublemaker and malingerer, he did an editorial on television.

“I said Johnson was known for malingering and not going all out but that there was another side to Alex,” Enberg said. “He cared about kids and he never drank or smoked, things like that.

“Apparently some fans who didn’t care for Alex called to complain. Mr. Autry and Dick Walsh (the general manager) called me in, not to chastise me, but mainly to find out what I had said. They hadn’t seen it.

“Looking back, maybe I shouldn’t have done the editorial.”

When talking about homers, most announcers point to Chicago’s Caray. Drysdale, who used to work in the same city as Caray, calls him “the last of a breed.”

Said Caray: “Show me an announcer who doesn’t want his team to win and I’ll show you an announcer who doesn’t give a damn. It’s selfish interest, not the team, not the players. It’s that when your team is doing well, your ratings are higher and you have more listeners.

“But don’t put me on any list of homers. I call it the way I see it. I don’t make up anything. I’ve gotten in trouble with my teams’ owners, general manager, field manager and players. I don’t care who signs my checks, the fans are my real employer. If you do the job to the satisfaction of the fans, no one is going to fire you in the face of their support.

“Hell, it isn’t the town or the players (that create his enthusiasm), it’s the game itself. Today’s players are only temporary actors on the stage. Regardless of the stupidity of the owners, union and players, the game continues to get bigger and bigger. I could go across the street to a Little League game and be just as excited as I am at Wrigley Field.”

Of the Cincinnati incident, Caray said: “I could not believe they (Brennaman and Nuxhall) incited a riot. Did everyone in the park have a radio?”

Did he agree with what was said?

“I think it’s unfortunate that the umpire was called a scab,” Caray added. “What the hell did that have to do with it?”

Caray said there have been several times when he has been asked to stop into the National League office to have a tape reviewed, but never with the publicity that accompanied Brennaman and Nuxhall. He said he hopes the two Cincinnati broadcasters took a lawyer with them.

“I would assume that even the former president of Yale University (Giamatti) knows the inalienable right of free speech--or should,” he said.

Barber has a different view of what happened in Cincinnati. He said: “My radio partner, Bob Edwards, (they do a show every Friday morning for National Public Radio) happened to be at that game. He said it was one of the worst things he’d ever seen, and we have talked about it on our show.

“I have talked to umpires over the years, and their biggest fear is a riot in the crowd. In Cincinnati, they almost had a full-scale riot.

“People take their transistors to the park. They have ever since Scully, the transistor kid, started the trend after the Dodgers moved to Los Angeles (in 1958).

“Things got so bad, Pallone had to leave the field. I’ve never heard of anything like that. The ballpark is supposed to be a safe place. In this case, it was not a safe place.

“I think the sentence given to Rose was sound. He got poked in the face, but that was because he put his face right in front of Pallone. Pallone didn’t intentionally poke Rose.

“I think the announcers should have been sentenced, too. The message should have been sent out to all broadcasters: Report such affairs, but do not add to them.”