The Magic of Baseball on the Radio

Among my earliest baseball memories are listening to the radio on a warm summer evening, the smell of barbeque floating through the air as a ballgame is broadcast on a transistor radio sitting atop a cooler in the backyard grass. One such memory dates to the mid-1960s when I was eight years old and my family was spending a week at my grandfather’s house in Bath, Ohio. My Uncle Billy and Aunt Shirley lived down the street, and on a Saturday afternoon, Billy was heating burgers and dogs on a charcoal grill with a beer in one hand – he always had a beer in one hand as I recall – and a spatula in the other, while listening to his beloved Cleveland Indians play the Detroit Tigers on WERE radio, with Jimmy Dudley and Bob Neal doing the play-by-play.

I do not recall the outcome, but I distinctly remember the sounds of the game in the background as I stood with Uncle Billy as we talked about the Indians and other baseball related topics. I discovered then that there is something magical about listening to a ballgame on the radio while normal life goes on around you – flipping burgers on the grill, playing catch with my brother, driving in a car on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon. It is a dimension of the game that is often underappreciated, especially today when all other aspects of life are so dominated by visual forms of technology.

There is also something romantic and very American about baseball on the radio, for it encapsulates not only the sounds of the ballpark on a summer evening but the memories and history of the game itself. Listening requires imagination, mentally visualizing the dimensions and layout of the ballpark as the announcers capture the flow and rhythm of the game.

When I listen to the play-by-play with no television screens nearby, I imagine myself in the stands with the entire ballpark before me, every player in my field of vision. I can see the third baseman scrape the infield dirt with his right foot between pitches, the center fielder glance into the dugout to check on positioning, the managers and coaches glaring intently at the field from the dugout steps. I imagine the opposing hitter dig his back foot in the batter’s box and wave his bat back and forth until becoming set for the pitch. I visualize the pitcher in his windup as the catcher crouches behind home plate, the umpire dressed in blue peering over the catcher’s shoulders. I see the white bases dotting the infield dirt, surrounded by the finely manicured green grass that paints the infield and blankets the outfield, a panoramic view of the ballpark that renders baseball into an urban oasis and place of refuge that soothes a weary soul.

A good baseball announcer brings the game to life while filling the time between pitches with tales of baseball history and interesting stories and backstories of the players, past and present, that make the game so memorable. Although for the past 21 years I have anxiously watched most of the Cardinals games on television (much to Andrea’s empathic concern), I still enjoy listening to the radio broadcasts whenever I am in a car or on my daily walk to Alverthorpe Park during an afternoon game. It is then I tune into KMOX radio and experience the companionship of John Rooney and Ricky Horton, two trusted friends who provide an articulate and fair description of the play accompanied by explanations of strategy and reflections and reminisces about their own baseball memories and other historic moments of baseball lore. It reminds me of the times past, when the flow and cadence of every professional baseball game traveled through the airwaves into the homes and storefronts of urban neighborhoods and rural landscapes throughout the United States.

As a young boy in central New Jersey who passionately, if unwisely, followed a team located halfway across the country, the only televised Cardinals games available to me were when the Redbirds played the Mets or Phillies, or the occasional few games every season when they were on the national NBC Game of the Week with Curt Gowdy. But during the late evenings on clear summer nights, if I finely tuned my transistor radio to the precise location on the dial, I could sometimes hear the comforting voices of Jack Buck and Mike Shannon on KMOX radio in St. Louis, one of the strongest radio signals in the country, announcing the play-by-play of a Cardinals game. Less precision was needed when the Cardinals played the Pirates, as I could more easily tune into the Pittsburgh station and listen to the distinctive voice of Bob Prince. As I lay in bed with my ear glued to the pocket size radio in my room, often in the darkness, I listened intently to the action and imagined the ballpark, the crowd, and the players on the field, as if seated on the third base side of the field several rows up from the dugout, with every player and element of the game in view. Even today, these remain powerful and impactful memories.

When in my younger years I played Strat-O-Matic baseball [see “Strat-O-Matic Memories: The Baseball Years”], a statistically-accurate board game that was based on each player’s actual performance from the previous season, I not only “managed” the Cardinals for 162 games each season but conducted the radio play-by-play of each game. But before you have me analyzed by a team of psychiatrists, you should know that Jon Miller and Bob Costas, both Hall of Fame broadcasters, did the same thing when they were kids. Inspired by these and other great baseball radio announcers, my play-by-play calling for each Strat-O-Matic game fed my imagination and brought the games to life.

In later years, when I lived in Washington, DC, and the only “local” team was the Baltimore Orioles, I frequently listened at night to Jon Miller who eloquently broadcast Orioles games during the Ripken era. The Orioles were a consistently good team in the 1980s and 1990s and Miller’s voice became a soothing presence, offering a respite from the daily pressures of life and work that dominated those days of early adulthood.

The best radio announcers, which for me include Jon Miller and Gary Cohen, along with the late greats Jack Buck, Harry Caray, and Vin Scully, add a poetic dimension to the national pastime. Scully, as the voice of the Dodgers, combined storytelling skills with his command of the English language, and he spoke with a warmth and eloquence that captured the hearts of baseball fans everywhere. Miller and Cohen (with the Mets radio network) are superb play callers with incredibly articulate voices and intelligent baseball instincts. Buck and Caray were probably the best twosome on the radio as the Cardinals announcers in the 1960s that lasted until Caray became the voice of the Cubs and Buck the trusted, masterful, and raspy voice of the Cardinals.

Radio announcers are good story tellers, and listening to a game on the radio connects me to the history of the game, to the memories of my youth, and to a distinctive piece of American life. With the crowd noise in the background, listening to a game is a more immersive experience, with everything taking place on the field reflected in the announcers’ words and descriptions.

When I moved to Philadelphia in the mid-1990s, before radio signals were delayed, I even brought the radio with me to Phillies games and listened to the Phillies announcers – Harry Calas and Richie Ashburn – describe the play while I watched the action on the field at Veterans Stadium. I was not alone in this, as other fans also had their radios tuned into the game while simultaneously watching and cheering the action. The radio broadcasts added to my enjoyment, providing an extra dimension of commentary and analysis that enhanced the sights and sounds all around me.

A good radio sportscaster informs the listener as to what is happening on the field while allowing the sounds of the game – the crack of the bat, the pitch exploding into the catcher’s mitt, and the crowd reaction – to come through naturally. As explained by journalist Gregory Barber in The New York Times Sunday magazine in August 2024:

Announcers are fond of painting metaphors, and their art is one of quick brushstrokes: calling fastballs from sliders while weaving in novelistic details that transform anonymous bench players into protagonists. . . . The game comes in and out of focus, just as it would if you could be in the stadium yourself. Certain moments nail your gaze to the field; others provide the opportunity to wander off in search of a kielbasa.

Baseball on the radio is a perfect way to absorb a game, whether lying on a hammock, cleaning a messy desk, cooking a meal, enjoying a long walk, or driving across the country. Last week, as Andrea and I drove home from visiting my mom and sister in North Carolina, I turned on the radio broadcast of the Cardinals-Brewers game and was immediately transported to Miller Park in Milwaukee, allowing me to pass the time for 2 ½ hours as I navigated I-81 and weaved in and out of truck traffic with the Blue Ridge and Shenandoah mountains in the distance. The Cardinals lost 3-2, and when Masyn Winn struck out in the top of the ninth with two runners in scoring position, I may have temporarily lost my cool – my memory fails to recall my recollection. But the broadcast was a pleasurable diversion to an otherwise long afternoon of highway driving.

I acknowledge that there may be more productive ways to spend one’s time. But baseball has been in my blood for over sixty years, and the Cardinals my passion for almost all that time. Win or lose, heartbreak upon heartbreak, the highs and lows of the game will continue to test my sanity more frequently than will ever be considered reasonable. When the cold, dark days of winter are upon us, and the completed pennant race becomes a distant memory, I will again long with anticipation for the start of a fresh season. Then, starting with the early days of spring training, baseball on the radio will restore me to a place where I belong and connect my past and present in a way that few things today can do. It will let me breathe again, through the remainder of spring and the long, hot summer, as the sounds and beauty of the game emanate through the radio airwaves like a welcome breeze.