My latest column for the National Sports Journalism Center at Indiana examines the legacy of Tim McCarver. This year’s World Series marks the end of an unprecedented run in sports broadcast history.
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Fox Sports held a teleconference for its World Series coverage earlier this week. Naturally, one of the first questions was directed at Tim McCarver, who will be calling his last series for the network.
“I don’t mind answering a couple (personal) questions, but the emphasis should be on the Series and the players involved,” McCarver said.
McCarver then went on to praise Fox Sports executives and began to get sentimental about his long-time partner Joe Buck.
When it came time for his turn, Buck, trying to lighten the mood with perfect timing, said, “I can’t wait for this to be over.”
Everyone laughed, and Buck paid tribute to McCarver. Then after a couple more baseball questions about the Red Sox and Cardinals, McCarver was asked again to reflect on his career.
McCarver answered and then made another plea: “I would prefer this be the last question about my final World Series, please. I respectfully request that.”
Indeed, if this whole thing feels awkward, it’s probably because it is. It gets to the core of a somewhat complicated broadcast legacy for McCarver.
I’m not so sure McCarver, 72, wants to walk away from his duties at Fox. He continues to emphasize that he isn’t retiring from the booth.
Last week, he told Chad Finn of the Boston Globe, “I’m not retiring. I’m cutting back on what I’ll be doing. I won’t be doing the World Series, playoffs, All-Star Game, but I’ll be doing something, stuff that will feed my passions. Plural.”
So why not just stay at Fox? The network could have reduced his regular-season workload, allowing him to be its signature analyst during the postseason.
It didn’t work out that way.
With McCarver’s contract set to expire this year, perhaps he had enough of hearing from critics who haven’t always been kind in recent years. There’s also the sense that Fox wants to bring in new blood in the analyst’s chair to freshen up its baseball broadcasts.
At some point, it’s just time to move on.
So whenever the final out is made next week, McCarver likely will be wrapping up the portion of his career that is unmatched in baseball broadcast history. This marks his 24th World Series as an analyst, a record. Remarkably, he did it for three different networks, beginning with ABC in 1985, when he teamed with Al Michaels and Jim Palmer for the St. Louis-Kansas City series. He followed the national TV baseball package to CBS and then Fox.
You don’t become the lead analyst for a generation without having some considerable talent. Once moving to the broadcast booth, McCarver quickly became known for an uncanny knack of anticipating what would happen in a game. Buck says there’s nobody better.
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Here’s the link for the rest of the column.
I for one am happy I won’t have to listen to him any more . To bad Buck isn’t going with him !
Just a couple postseason nuggets from McCarver. On Francesa’s show. “Shelby Miller is the sixth or seventh best rookie pitcher on the Cardinals.” Seriously. Second, “Sensational base running play by Kozma!” This referred to him risking breaking the cardinal rule of baseball and nearly making the third out of an inning at third. Also, it was a game in which the Cards trailed by five. It’s not just that he’s a windbag. He makes inane and unsupportable statments as a matter of routine. I’ve never personally met anyone who likes him.