It bugs me to no end that we watch NBA all year, mostly on TNT, and ESPN too, and get great announcers like Kevin Harlan, and Reggie Miller (who has grown on me), and then in the Finals are stuck with a new crew on ABC. I like Jeff Van Gundy, but geez, where are the folks who have been there all year? Of course, the best show is TNT's "Inside the NBA," but that is gone this time of year too. Ernie does a great job herding cats, Kenny is super smart, Chuck knows his stuff, but Shaq seems content to slide by on personality. He rarely seems to add anything insightful.
I am glad Mike Breen and JVG are doing the Finals -- they are the best in the biz (don't care for Jackson much, but he complements them well). Personally, I absolutely hate Reggie Miller. (Almost as much as John Barry or Doris Burke, and that is saying something.)
I don't know if the NBA game time app does it, but the MLB package allows you to have the natural park sounds - NO ANNOUNCERS. It's beautiful.
I wondered why they change announcers, too. Mark Jackson is nothing special. As for Shaq...I've just always found his bully-boy personality repulsive. But, the media has always said that he's just being funny.
I don't like any of their 'color' commentators. They are all getting by on "personality" as far as I'm concerned. And I don't like their personalities. Every time I hear "hand down man down" or "mama there goes that man" I want to throw a fucking brick through my TV. What does that even fucking mean? Van Gundy may know his stuff, but he's an insufferable opinionated ass hole. I hope he gets hit by a train. Miller seems like he doesn't even watch the game most of the time, he's completely wrong on many plays as evidenced by the replays (that he also doesn't watch, apparently) and he's a big time NBA schill. Hate Shaq. Period. If anyone has "grown on me", it's Jon Barry. I don't particularly like him, I don't always agree with him, but IMO he does the best job of actually watching the game and providing good detailed analysis throughout, as opposed to pumping up his 'persona' and personal ego for 3.5 hours a night like those other ass hats. I think they should just hire Mike Rice.
Reggie is awful, how could you like Reggie? CWebb is a great announcer, it's a shame they don't use him more.
Does it also show video without any score/stat overlays? I'm not a huge MLB fan but I'd buy just for that!
You can watch the feed from the broadcast you're watching, and just select "Natural park sounds" or something... it's not available for every single game, but I've seen it on a ton of them.... it's phenomenal.
I used to enjoy the Braves games on TBS years ago. The announcers were as mellow as the game itself, NEVER talked over the game, shared a bit of knowledge as appropriate, within the flow of the game. Skip Caray was great, as were the other guys. But I stopped watching MLB years ago literally because of the pompous non stop motor mouth motherfuckers that called the games, specifically Bob Costas and Tim McGarver. It was maddening. For color guys, give me a Bob Eucker or Joe Garagiola any time. Or a Mike Rice...
The two best play by play guys are Scully and Jon Miller. They know how to call a game. Scully can do that shit by himself.
