Cardinals a generational affair for Carays
Between his lengthy broadcasting careers in St. Louis and Chicago, Hall of Famer Harry Caray sneaked in a year with the Oakland Athletics in 1970. More than a half-century later, Caray’s grandson and great grandson were together at the Coliseum calling Monday night’s Cardinals-A’s game.
“Harry would be astounded,” said Cardinals broadcaster Chip Caray, 59, who called the game two booths from his son, new A’s announcer Chris Caray, 24.
Susan Caray also was on site to experience the historic moment and embrace the family reunion involving her husband and son. In the bottom of the third inning, NBC Sports California showed a split screen of the Carays and then individual shots of the Carays through the years.
It was an emotional moment that left the younger Caray teary-eyed as he went to break with the words, “Wow. … Cardinals up one.”
From Harry Caray to longtime Braves announcer Skip Caray to Chip Caray to Chris Caray, it’s four generations of big-league broadcasters that started when Caray the eldest began calling games in St. Louis for both the Cardinals and Browns in 1945.
“Harry didn’t know his parents very well,” Chip Caray said. “He was kind of an orphan, a street kid in St. Louis who had to fight for everything he accomplished in life. That’s how his style evolved. He didn’t broadcast the game for the suits or the players or the managers or the GMs. He broadcast for the fans.
“For a guy who didn’t really know family, and the fact that baseball has kept our family together, and that a fourth generation is following in his footsteps, and considering the upbringing he had, it’s a remarkable accomplishment that he probably never would have dreamt in his wildest possibilities.”
Neither of the Carays hides from the family lineage. In fact, Chip’s legal name is Harry Christopher Caray III. Chris’ is Harry Christopher Caray IV. They hear accusations of nepotism, that they got the jobs only because of their last name. On the other hand, broadcasters don’t stick around the majors too long without talent or likability, and generations of Carays were known to have both.
In 1970, after 25 years in St. Louis, Harry Caray moved to Oakland and teamed with longtime A’s announcer Monte Moore. A year later, Caray was back in the Midwest and quickly became a lovable Chicago icon, initially calling White Sox games and ultimately moving to the Cubs, working through the 1997 season as one of the all-time most impersonated broadcasters.
Harry Caray died in 1998, and Chris Caray was born in 1999 along with identical twin Stefan Caray, a broadcaster at Double-A Amarillo, where the brothers were partners last year. Both interviewed for the A’s gig, which is calling games that primary playby-play TV announcer Jenny Cavnar does not.
“Everybody talks about the Harry Caray narrative,” Chris Caray said, “but truthfully, that narrative is not as important to me as being Stefan’s brother and Chip’s son. That’s what I identify with. I had never met Harry, but it’s so nice to know that people in this game still have so much respect for our family and understand the history.”
The Caray twins are extremely close. They were journalism majors and roommates at the University of Georgia, and before they were broadcast partners in the Texas League, they were behind the microphone together in the Cape Cod League, where their father dropped by to join the broadcast for an inning or two.
Chris Caray is hoping Stefan Caray follows him to the big leagues. “Getting to celebrate it with my dad is tremendously special,” he said. “But when I get to celebrate it with my brother when he gets up to the major leagues, there won’t be a moment bigger than that in my life.”
Why was Chris chosen over Stefan for the A’s job? Their father’s theory: “The A’s were looking for pistachio, and Stefan’s a little more chocolate. Chris is pretty straightforward and really good when the ball’s in play, which I think is the most important part of the job. He’s encyclopedic and digs deep to find out what’s going on. Stefan is a little more glib, off the cuff, a little more flippant like my dad was.
“That’s not an indication of his talent being any less than Chris’. It was just Christopher’s time. We feel confident that someone’s going to believe Stefan belongs up here, too.”
There’s little security in broadcasting, even as a Caray, and that’s especially true working for the A’s, a team on the run that’s supposed to play in Sacramento next season on its way to Las Vegas. Chris Caray and Cavnar took jobs with the A’s knowing it’s a fluid situation with uncertain futures.
But they’re big-league jobs, and there are very few of those. It just so happened that quite a few over the years were filled by Carays.
“Baseball and life come full circle in so many ways,” Chip Caray said. “Harry was here for a year, and the fact that Chris, who’s also named Harry, is in Oakland in his first year with a young and exciting team that’s on its way up is kind of fun. People forget that the year Harry broadcast the A’s, that preceded three World Series teams. Reggie Jackson, (Bert) Campaneris, Joe Rudi and the rest of them. Who knows where this iteration of the A’s is going to go, but there’s nothing better than being a young broadcaster with a young team because you get to grow up with them, and I’m really excited Chris has that chance.”
The twins grew up in Florida with their mother, older sister, Summerlyn, and younger brother, Tristan, and had little contact with their father for six months out of the year as Chip’s career took him from the Mariners to the Cubs to the Braves to the Cardinals.
But on Monday, father and son were proud to be calling the same game in separate booths, employed by different teams but just a few feet from one another.
“There is a standard set for the broadcasters here,” Chris Caray said, “and I intend to try to set my own standard while following the standard that my father, grandfather, great grandfather and twin brother have set forth for me.”
Chip Caray added, “We’re so blessed and lucky and fortunate to do this, to realize someone in our goofy family has been behind the microphone every year in this game since 1945.”