What the Buck is going on? We need our TV guys
It’s always unsettling to discover you’re a second-class citizen.
But I’m afraid that’s what fans of the Toronto Blue Jays are right now, at least to Major League Baseball and the U.S. networks covering the team’s first playoff run in 22 years. We do not matter and anyone who argues otherwise is a fool or a liar.
All of the euphoria from this glorious season, all of the escalating thrills and intoxicating magic, got short-circuited over the last 48 hours. Now it’s gone to hell.
First came the demoralizing loss in Game 1 and the creeping fear David Price may not be a cyborg gifted to this city by an alien species that took pity on the chronic mediocrity of our big league squads. Then came the heartbreaking loss in Game 2 on Friday, and let’s not get started on video review or the ump’s strike zone.
So now the Jays are down by two in a best-of-five series. Does it look good? It does not. But as we sob our way toward Game 3 in Texas on Sunday, let’s talk about the talking that’s coming from our small and big screens this postseason. The play-by-play and colour commentary and low-grade cluelessness tumbling from the mouths of U.S. broadcasters who sound as familiar to us as Tchaikovsky does to Bieber.
On Thursday, the gabby interlopers represented Fox Sports and included Kenny Albert and Harold Reynolds, a fellow who is obsessed with artificial turf in the same way my mother is with Sudoku. On Friday, a crew from the MLB Network, including Bob Costas and Jim Kaat, hijacked Canadian airwaves to narrate the five-hour tragedy that turned city bars into funeral homes.
Then on Sunday, just to keep everyone off balance, the Fox guys will be back as Texas goes for the sweep. So if Reynolds continues to mumble, whistle, ramble aimlessly, giggle and showcase the incisive commentary you might expect from a fourth grader inside the Large Hadron Collider, there’s an excellent chance Canadians will be spiking their Thanksgiving gravy with tequila.
Who are these guys? More impor- tant, why didn’t we have our guys, Buck Martinez and Pat Tabler from Rogers Sportsnet? Their soothing voices provided the soundtrack to a stunning season that now, more stunningly, could end before the long weekend does.
Not having Martinez and Tabler call post-season games has felt like a betrayal. It has compounded the misery of this grim start.
It’s not that the U.S. broadcasters aren’t trying to connect with Jays fans, at least in token ways. On Friday, Costas and Kaat sprayed the opening minutes with so many Canadian references — the RCMP, legendary Blue Jays, the late Tom Cheek, the national anthem — it seemed like Stephen Harper was in the booth, pressing a .32 into their spines while whispering lines from Heritage Minutes.
But try as they might, it’s not the same because they don’t understand the mood that had overtaken this city. Unlike Martinez and Tabler, they have not covered the Jays this season. They don’t know the players. They can’t weave in backstories or fill in the downtime with telling anecdotes that resonate with local viewers.
Martinez and Tabler are not perfect broadcasters. The former can be distractingly agreeable — “Well, it sure does, Barry …” — and the latter can be mesmerized to the point of catatonia by pitch selection. (When Tabler says “cutter,” it sounds like he’s just come from a table reading for Deliverance: “Cuddd-rrr.”)
But you know what? They are our broadcasters. They had become as comfortable as an old pair of loafers. Now we are tottering in neon stilettos as Costas gives the weather in Fahrenheit and Reynolds blames global warming on thick turf.
These guys have completely messed with our rhythm and karma.
I asked the good people at Rogers why Martinez and Tabler were MIA. I was told Rogers is a regional broadcaster. Sportsnet is not permitted to produce post-season games.
As an international partner, Rogers can only air a feed from one of MLB’s national rights holders.
Whatever. Even if this sounds right, it doesn’t feel right, not when I glance at my monthly bill from Rogers. Is there really no way to get Buck and Pat back into our ears before it’s too late? Can’t we arm them with megaphones, place them outside City Hall and let them call the action off a few Jumbotrons this weekend?
Outsiders often mock Torontonians for thinking we are the centre of the universe.
But to the MLB, we are not even a distant moon. The Jays are down by two games and you just know the American broadcasters could not be happier. Vinay Menon can be reached at vmenon@thestar.ca