Normally, a broadcaster travels with the team they cover and adheres to a tight schedule; however, Brooklyn Nets’ radio play-by-play announcer Chris Carrino was convinced to stay on the road for an additional day. It came following a busy Sunday during which he called the Miami Dolphins’ afternoon matchup against the New York Jets from Hard Rock Stadium and then, that night, the Brooklyn Nets’ battle against the Miami Heat.
The NBA recently held its annual sales and marketing meeting in Miami and included an awards ceremony to honor those working in these departments among professional teams. Carrino was tricked into attending and, unbeknownst to him, named as a winner of the esteemed NBA Values of the Game Award.
The honor, which he shared with former Executive Vice President of Business Operations for the Milwaukee Bucks — the late-John Steinmiller — is given to an individual who illustrates the values of the league in their community. It came in the midst of Carrino’s 22nd year behind the microphone for the Nets, and while the recognition was in part for his work on the air, it also related to the circumstances he continuously battles just to be able to do his job.
During his sophomore year at Fordham University, life seemingly changed once Carrino realized a drastic decline in his athletic abilities. He was examined by a doctor and was expecting to be told to lift weights or take vitamins to improve his strength and conditioning.
Instead, he received the news that he had Facioscapulohumeral Muscular Dystrophy (FSHD) – a genetic disease that causes the progressive degeneration of several muscles, primarily those located in the face, shoulder blades and upper arms. There is no treatment or cure for this condition, indicative of a diagnosis that could have depleted Carrino’s will to succeed and suppressed his broadcasting abilities.
“It’s almost like you’re speeding up this aging process of your body, but more than normal,” he explained. “I look at an 80-year-old man get up out of a chair, and I’m jealous of how easily he can do it because I can’t do that; I used to be able to do it.”
It is a disease he calls “scary as hell,” eventually requiring the use of a wheelchair and arranging special accommodations in his quotidian routine. Carrino struggles with activities including getting out of bed, putting on clothes and climbing stairs.
“It slowly goes on, so you get to adjust as it goes, and I think that’s been the key to persevering with it over the years,” Carrino said. “You lose something maybe every year or so and you adjust. You slowly kind of get used to your new reality.”
Despite the diagnosis and its hardships, Carrino fostered a growth mindset and recognized that he would be defined not by his condition, but by how he reacted to it. With these principles in mind, he was able to build a successful career in sports media and remains immersed in the game of basketball.
In 1997, five years after his diagnosis, Carrino was promoted by the New Jersey Nets to work as its manager of broadcast operations, making him responsible for broadcasting-related activities and studio producing. One year later, Carrino stepped in for John Sterling, the backup play-by-play announcer for the New Jersey Nets, since he was traveling on a west coast road trip with the New York Yankees.
The primary radio play-by-play voice of the Nets was Bob Papa, but he usually would miss about 20 games per year to fulfill other obligations such as calling boxing on ESPN or New York Giants football on the radio. Having a chance to do play-by-play announcing was something he voiced to executives with the Nets, including former Vice President of Broadcasting Amy Scheer. Now his chance had finally arrived in the form of an April matchup against the New York Knicks – and he was determined to succeed.
“I did the game and it went really well,” Carrino said, “and they came to me afterwards and said, ‘You know what? From now on, you’re the backup.’”
Over the next several years, Carrino’s load of games with the Nets slowly increased to the point where he broadcast nearly 25 contests one season. When Lou Lamoriello was named CEO and chairman of the New Jersey Devils in 2000, he assumed the role of CEO and vice chairman with the New Jersey Nets. Lamoriello had a decision to make when Papa’s contract with the team expired. He knew that the Nets’ radio play-by-play job was highly-coveted by broadcasters in the market, but he wanted someone who treated the job as their primary focus.
“He came to me and said, ‘Hey, you’ve been the backup; everybody around here speaks very highly of you,’” Carrino remembered. “‘There’s a lot of people who want this job, as you can imagine, but I think you’ve earned the right to give it a shot – and I’m going to give you a shot.’ I always appreciate Lou Lamoriello for that.”
For the first two years as the radio voice of the Nets, the team went to the NBA Finals and suffered defeats from the Los Angeles Lakers (2001-02) and San Antonio Spurs (2002-03). It was during this time where Carrino adjusted into the role, honing his craft and developing a rapport with the fans. As a play-by-play announcer, he was focused on effectively portraying the action to listeners and describing what was occurring on the court, facets of the role to which he remains committed today. Additionally, he aimed to captivate the audience by refining the use of his voice and how to preserve it, akin to a musical instrument that people want to hear.
“There are times where it’s not imperative to listen to a broadcast, so how do I get it so you want to listen,” Carrino said. “Then there are times where the game takes over and it’s serious. That’s when they need to listen and you want to give them what they need.”
Just how to effectively maintain his voice was a lesson he learned in 2016, the first time he announced the NCAA men’s basketball tournament for Westwood One Radio. The opportunity had arisen in a spontaneous meeting between Carrino and Executive Vice President and Executive Producer at Westwood One Radio, Howard Deneroff, in which he shared that a chance to announce part of the tournament might become available.
Once the Seton Hall Pirates qualified for the NCAA tournament, Carrino was tabbed to be on the air for Westwood One Radio since Gary Cohen was obligated to be on the Seton Hall radio broadcast as its local play-by-play announcer.
In the midst of calling four matchups in one day on the radio, Carrino had to intensely prepare and focus on the games to effectively convey the excitement and energy to listeners. The task, while it may seem arduous, was the realization of a lifelong dream for Carrino who grew up watching Big East games on Monday nights called by Bill Rafferty and Mike Gorman.
“You’ve got to get your voice through four games, and I learned that the hard way,” Carrino said. “In the first year by the third game, my voice was starting to disappear and I had to massage it back. Tea; cough drops; laying out at different times – and just nurse your way through it. I don’t think it was that evident on the air but it was evident to me. The more you do it, it gets a little easier and it’s been really something that I look forward to every year.”
Tim Capstraw joined the Nets’ radio broadcasts in 2002 as its color commentator and has remained Carrino’s primary partner since. Capstraw had minimal previous experience in sports media, entering the role after doing television and radio analysis for college basketball in the Big Ten and Northeastern conferences. Before that, he was the head men’s basketball coach at Wagner College, his alma mater, working in that role for a decade before moving off of the hardwood.
Per Carrino’s recommendation, Capstraw studied the work of John Andariese, a former color commentator who often worked with Marv Albert. Providing analysis on a purely-aural medium such as radio is challenging in that it is essential the broadcast team remains synced with the flow of the game. Add in the fact that basketball is a sport with continuous action interspersed with abeyances in play and it becomes quite evident that synergy must exist between broadcasters to execute an appealing broadcast. Now over two decades later, Capstraw and Carrino remain a strong broadcast duo and close friends off the air who both try to make each other better.
“He’ll tell you about halfway through his first year together, he kind of had an epiphany where he kind of figured out the dance,” Carrino said of Capstraw. “I think the key to the longevity part of it with Tim and I is that we do genuinely get along so well with each other.”
As the years go on, Carrino’s physical condition continues to diminish, but his bliss and infatuation towards his occupation has steadily augmented. Eight years after becoming the primary play-by-play voice of the Nets, Carrino added another job working as a play-by-play announcer for Compass Media Networks’ coverage of the National Football League. From the beginning, he was paired with Brian Baldinger, a former offensive lineman who had previously worked in television, and he made a seamless adjustment to the booth.
“I was a little worried he was going to be a little too verbose or think that he had to dominate the broadcast,” Capstraw said of Baldinger. “The first time we worked together – the first series – I knew it was going to be great because he knew exactly when to get in and get out; he gave me enough time to set up the play [and] he had an understanding of what I was doing.”
The difficult part of balancing his duties in basketball and football comes in the contrasting nature of preparing. Carrino closely follows the Brooklyn Nets and has been with the organization for over three decades, rendering him familiar with its history and current events. Conversely, Carrino’s NFL broadcasts are national, meaning he does not follow one team each week and has to research the matchup and storylines both quantitatively and qualitatively.
“Every game’s like a test, and you have a week to study for the test,” he said. “It’s kind of an open-book test; you’ve got some notes that you have in front of you…. [On] a national broadcast, I think people understand that you’re not with these teams every day, but you’re still getting all the information that they need.”
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With each passing day, Carrino knows his muscles are weakening; however, his fortitude and persistence remain strong. Throughout his career, he has been eager to take on new challenges and find ways to achieve his goals despite his condition. For example, Carrino’s neighbor accompanies him on road trips to call football games, helping him navigate the stadium and serving as a spotter while in the booth. The expenditure is covered by Compass Media and eases various difficulties Carrino combats in order to successfully arrive for the start of a broadcast. When it all begins, he genuinely becomes captivated by the game and absorbed in its action.
“My favorite time is when I’m just sitting at the arena and the ball is up in the air or the ball is kicked off because all the difficult things I have to do to get there are done, and now I just focus on something that I love to do,” Carrino said. “I consider play-by-play an art form, and as an artist, you love the fact that you can express yourself. [During] the games, I’m able to express myself, have fun and let loose.”
Whether it is doing play-by-play for three Olympic Games; hosting the Voice of the Nets podcast; or calling Los Angeles Angels baseball for a brief stint in 2012, Carrino has always been eager to take on new opportunities in sports media. He always wants to improve and strives to be at the top of his craft, but is satisfied with what he has been able to accomplish while enduring onerous circumstances.
“Sometimes you have a plan to get somewhere – and then something will happen that makes you have to drastically change that plan,” Carrino said. “There’s more than one path to success, and I’ve had to take a different path than the one that I maybe envisioned as a kid. Eventually, my willpower and my fortitude were strong enough that I achieved the things in my life; for the most part, I’ve done what I set out to do.”
Outside of his craft, Carrino established the Chris Carrino Foundation for FSHD, a nonprofit organization raising awareness towards his condition and raising money to research the disease. The impetus to start the foundation came from his wife, Laura, who challenged him to reveal his condition after keeping it private for many years.
He was willing to discuss it so long as there was a way in which he would be able to help others and urge support to discover treatment and/or a cure. Since the foundation’s inception in 2011, it has successfully raised money and led to breakthroughs regarding the disease.
“The more you can get out there and be open about it; the more you can tell people about it, the more you may find the right person who can be a game-changer,” Carrino said. “The kind of person who can offer the kind of support that we need both financially or whether it be a researcher or anything it could be – you’ve got to tell as many people as you can and hope that it finds the right people.”
Miles Davis is an acclaimed musician known for his abilities as a trumpeter and bandleader, specifically in the jazz genre. It took years of practice and repetition for Davis to truly become a master at his craft; in fact, he famously stated: “Sometimes, you have to play for a long time to be able to play like yourself.”
In order to succeed in broadcasting, Carrino believes you need to make it look simple while being both authentic and enthusiastic, and Davis’ words of wisdom, often cited by Capstraw, remain firmly rooted in his mind. Combined with his personality and indefatigability, Carrino demonstrates the values of the game and eagerly awaits the start of the action.
“It makes you take a step back and realize the longevity that I’ve had and how I’ve been around for a long time,” Carrino said regarding his award. “To be honored by your peers for that and be reflective on it; it was a great honor. I really did appreciate the award.”
