Tim McCarver {Many Merged Threads}

[fkatt]

Is there an announcer anywhere more annoying, more second-guessing, more endlessly babbling, more condescending to his audience, more able to make you want to puncture your own ear drums with an ice pick and generally more stepefyingly moronic than Tim McCarver?

He completely ruins every broadcast Fox assigns him to with constant thinly-veiled sniping at players and managers decisions and abilities, and talking to the auduence as though we are all two-year-olds. It's pretty obvious he feels he should have been a manager somewhere after his playing career was over, and since he never got the opportunity, he's been reduced to a lifetime of pointing out how he would have done it better. The awful thing is, Fox gives him a national forum upon which to do it. What the hell did we do to deserve that?

McCarver makes Dennis Miller sound like Bob Costas for crying out loud. Jeez, I gotta go climb a tower.

[Skip]

McCarver isnt too well liked around here. He gets on my nerves too, at times, but in general I don't have a problem with him. ... and everytime I start to, he'll make a good call that no-one else does. But don't worry about me, I'm in the substantial minority on this one.

Also, welcome aboard. Head over to the icebreakers forum and introduce yourself.

[cubfan33]

I take it you haven't heard a game with Steve Lyons yet ...

McCarver says so much, that he's bound to say something insightful, if even by accident. He doesn't bother me.

Lyons doesn't really either. He's amusing. He appears to have no attention span, or idea what is going on. He reminds me of the character Phil Hartman played in the 92 presidential debates on SNL. You know.. as Admiral Stockdale, Perot's running mate.

Moderator: "How do you feel about that, Admiral?"

Stockdale: "Who am I? Why am I here?"

So, neither really bothers me. Now Thom Brenneman.... ouch. Snore.... Did anything happen, EVER, outside of Phoenix?

"Back when St. Louis played the Diamondbacks on May 12th..."

[moose]

the real question is, if the giants win, does joe buck have to sound excited about it?

[pathogan]

... I think he is by far the best color man out there.yes he talks too much,but he has something to say,much more then many of the other jocks who occupy that space.

[TimmyB]

McCarver's problem IMHO is that he is way too puffed up with himself. It comes through the broadcast. (Either that, or he has a very low opinion of himself, and this is an act... either way...).

That said, I find the guy pretty insightful. I certainly wouldn't put him in the same class as Steve Lyons.

[nyyfanfrombirth]

I don't want to start a whole thread about Joe Buck, but, just a silly observation -- has anybody noticed his hair? I mean, did he get plugs or something? I remember last year when I saw him I thought to myself: "Boy, he is really losing his hair." And this year the first time I saw him I said "Wow, he has really gained some hair." Maybe it's Rogaine or something.

[gyb13]

Originally posted by CpUltravox
McCarver says so much, that he's bound to say something insightful, if even by accident.

the so-called shotgun approach

[KCBOOMER]

McCarver is just like Tony Kubek when he did the games. Constantly yakking to the point of telling you what you were looking at on the screen

Does Tim McCarver upset anyone else when you listen to him? Geez...I had to mute my TV on Monday, he was making me so mad. He must be bitter about getting traded in '69, because he appears to hate the Cardinals. First, he proclaims "That's interference." As if he's the first and last word on all baseball rules, when it was obvious Santiago went out of his way to shove Cairo at third. Then, when they brought an umpire coordinator, someone who actually did know what he was talking about, up to the booth, McCarver couldn't quit arguing with him. Ugh.

Oh, and not to mention the fact that he repeatedly said "Pujols" to describe Miguel Cairo.

[gyb13]

i think we've beaten one to a dead horse many a time....except for maybe pathogan, not many around here enjoy/can stand him

[Gosfgiants]

He has a tendency to beat points, not only into the ground, but all the way to China. Was I the only one who thought he should of moved on after the Reggie Sanders not touching the bag play at 2nd on Sunday. He kept on going and going after it happened. Nothing came of it. Sanders ened up getting stranded at first. If the Giants had scored a run, maybe he could of harped on it. It's just that the play did not affect the outcome of the game. Three innings later he was still bringing up the same stupid play.

[Fatwater Fewl]

Originally posted by fkatt
Is there an announcer anywhere more annoying, more second-guessing, more endlessly babbling, more condescending to his audience, more able to make you want to puncture your own ear drums with an ice pick and generally more stepefyingly moronic than Tim McCarver?

Yes. I'm no McCarver fan, but here in Canada we have a thing named Brian Williams who does sports for CBC-TV. He does any Blue Jays game which appears on that network. And the sum of his baseball knowledge is approximately this: one guy throws a ball and another guy swings at it with a stick.

To hear Williams attempt to analyse a play or a developing situation has made me not just mute the tv, but occasionally turn the damn thing off in disgust. Things were particularly bad this summer as the possibility of a strike darkened my days. To try and watch a game on CBC was pure torture as it seemed that from the moment that he came on the air, Williams repeated and repeated and repeated his view of the situation; which seemed to be that the players make too money. That's it, that's what his view boiled down to, yet he would go on interminably without adding anything reasonable or rational to that one thought.

And that is his normal manner -- on any topic he takes up, the results are the same, a simplistic opinion repeated ad nauseum, while the wonderfully profound-in-itself* game of baseball unfolds in spite of him.

There are times when Tim McCarver is almost a balm to the ear.



*A paraphrase of Stephen Jay Gould.