My favorite announcers don't really have catch phrases. Although Jon Miller always had a fantastic double play call. "Ground ball to second, Billy flips it to Cal, over to Murray at first. TWO! A double play." If you grew up an Orioles fan and listened to Miller on the radio, you can hear him exclaiming "TWO".
Also, Frank Herzog and his "Touchdown, Washington Redskins". Just iconic.
I've often though about how spoiled I was as a kid with great announcers for my favorite teams. I know part of it is these are the voices I grew up with, but they were legends and fantastic announcers. I've heard other announcers in other cities and on XM Radio. Some a great, but others are just hacks and homers. I wonder how they get their jobs. But I used to listen to games on the radio when I had to go to bed. So I got used to hearing these fantastic sports voices:
Orioles - Jon Miller and Chuck Thompson on the radio. Mel Proctor on TV.
Redskins - Frank, Sonny, and Sam (Sam was a homer, but the professionalism of Herzog and knowledge of Sonny balanced it out).
Capitals - Ron Weber.
Maryland - Johnny Holiday's voice is fantastic and even as he ages is still a treat to listen to.
I wasn't much of a Bullets fan, but Mel Proctor and Phil Chenier were also great.
I can still hear their calls and in some cases greatly miss their voices for my favorite teams. The new voices aren't the same and in some ways are a deterrent to listening. Larry Michael has always sounded like a hack and I can't take more than 5 minutes of listening to him. Gary Thorne with the Orioles is a famous voice, but he sounds drunk half the time and I still associate his voice with hockey on ESPN and not so much baseball. Joe B and Craig Laughlin are great on TV for the Caps, and Walton is fine on the radio, but he's always a step behind the play which is noticeable in hockey because of the speed and many times the crowd noise gives away the play before he can call it. If Weber was behind in a play, you could never tell.
I miss the guys from the 80s. They were special in their own way. Miller may not be Scully. Herzog may not be Al Michaels. Ron Weber may not be Doc Emrick. But they were all legends in their own right.
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