On Friday, Bob Costas will add another playoff game to his illustrious play-by-play resume when he is on the call for Game 2 of the ALDS between the Chicago White Sox and the Houston Astros (2 PM ET, MLB Network). He will be joined on the call by Jim Kaat, Buck Showalter, and Tom Verducci.
Costas was a guest this week on The Adam Schein Podcast. During that conversation, Schein did ask Costas about why he chose Syracuse and what it meant to him. The two of them are both in the WAER Hall Of Fame at the university. Schein was inducted this year.
Schein asked Costas if he feels like he is as good at anything as he is at calling baseball. Costas gave an interesting answer: he isn’t as good as he used to be.
“In watching some of [my old] games, I can tell I had a consistently better rhythm and anticipation. Maybe it’s 90% there now, there’s probably 10% where it’s not quite what it used to be. You have to try to figure it out. The way a guy who has lost a little velocity on his fastball has to figure out how to approach this hitter and get this hitter out in a little bit of a different way.”
As you watch the broadcast, Bob Costas told Adam Schein that he hopes the viewer is reminded of another legendary baseball play-by-play man.
“What I’m hoping for is that a baseball fan who watches this says not only that Bob and Jim Kaat and Buck Showalter made good points, but that it had a certain feel to it, it had a certain rhythm to it. The greatest of the great, Vin Scully, who worked alone essentially. He didn’t just provide lyrics and his lyrics were great. The way he presented it almost had a melody to it. That’s what you aim for. Whether you ever achieve it is another question, but that’s what you are aiming for. That there’s just something not just accurate and competent, but something pleasing about it.”
Whether or not Bob Costas thinks he is still what he once was as a broadcaster, if he is calling your favorite team’s games, it still provides the recognition and prestige that not many other broadcasters can match.
