{"id":244,"date":"2013-10-13T12:28:31","date_gmt":"2013-10-13T16:28:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/?p=244"},"modified":"2013-10-13T12:30:32","modified_gmt":"2013-10-13T16:30:32","slug":"play-by-play-a-video-game-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/2013\/10\/13\/play-by-play-a-video-game-story\/","title":{"rendered":"Play by Play: a Video Game Story"},"content":{"rendered":"

Play by play broadcasters are often times, the faces of the team…Viewers listen or tune in \u00a0night after night and it’s not unusual for an announcer to thank his faithful for “inviting them into your living room”…But talk to every single one of them and they’ll tell you the same thing….It wasn’t always that way…They started in a small market and worked their way up….”Just do the games”, Dale Arnold <\/a>told students at the Boston University Sports Journalism Seminar series recently….Arnold, the only man to call all five Boston pro sports teams, started in Brunswick, Maine…”I carried my own equipment, I set it up, if I was lucky I had a color guy and then when the game was over I took it all down and I hauled it all out”…It was that kind of starter job that led him to the Maine Mariners and eventually the National Hockey League…<\/p>\n

For Glenn Ordway, learning was \u00a0sitting next to legendary Boston Celtics broadcaster Johnny Most<\/a>…An unabashed “homer”, Most never criticized the home team while frequently taking the visitors to task for the slightest discretion…Student Ordway learned some valuable lessons at the masters side, not the least of which was painting the picture…”Every game is different, said Ordway, but you’re going to sit there and tell a story and the story’s going to have chapters, chapter one, chapter two and the story unfolds. \u00a0Once you get there, you’re prepared for the story but you don’t know how the story is going to come out.”…Thankfully, Ordway never did follow all<\/em> the lessons of Most…He never did set himself on fire!<\/p>\n

On the subject of criticism, it’s a slippery slope, considering you’re job is usually approved by the very team you;re covering…Arnold offered a simple piece of advice for young and veteran broadcasters alike; “You can criticize the play without criticizing the person”…And while the player may not hear what you have to say, there’s always a family member ready to stir things up…<\/p>\n

We all have our favorite announcers, favorite moments, Most got so popular they used to stage \u00a0“sound-a-like<\/a>” contests as a tribute…And YouTube<\/a> has made a living out of posting videos you’ve never seen or want to re-live, the so-called greatest sports calls ever…<\/p>\n

Sit back, come along or the ride and if <\/span>you ever run into Pete Citidinni, Lou Uliano or Mike Abbatanozzi, thank them for me…I cut my play by play teeth trying to pronounce their names while not embarrassing myself doing it…<\/span><\/p>\n

What’s your favorite moment?<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Play by play broadcasters are often times, the faces of the team…Viewers listen or tune in \u00a0night after night and it’s not unusual for an announcer to thank his faithful for “inviting them into your living room”…But talk to every single one of them and they’ll tell you the same thing….It wasn’t always that way…They […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":901,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/901"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":247,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244\/revisions\/247"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/fshorr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}