Is there no one in the Baltimore Orioles’ front office with a brain to spare in the idiotic suspension of play-by-play broadcaster Kevin Brown?
Finally, in a long-awaited summer when the air around Oriole Park should be filled with joy, somebody in upper management decided the best way to celebrate the moment would be to silence Brown, who is arguably the best play-by-play person we’ve had around here since the departure of Jon Miller.
Oops, Jon Miller, bad subject.
In Brown’s case, he was suspended because he dared to tell the truth about recent Orioles’ history.
Even though it was an innocuous truth.
Even though it was a truth that points out the happy fact that the Orioles have finally climbed out of their years-long doldrums.
Even though the very facts he recited had been prepared for the O’s broadcast team by the club’s own public relations department.
You heard about this, right?
You must have, because fans at Oriole Park have been chanting “Free Kevin Brown” this week.
And you must have, because media outlets all over America have had a chorus of voices declaring they’ve never heard of anything so ludicrous happening to a sports announcer in all of recorded history.
(They must not have gotten the news yet about Jon Miller’s departure from Baltimore. But it’s too painful, and too soon, to talk about the Miller incident. It only happened 27 years ago.)
Brown happens to be one of the brightest young broadcast talents in major league baseball – because he’s smart, he’s witty, he’s congenial, he brings his genuine excitement to the most dramatic moments, and he brings more to games than a mere recitation of statistics or angle-of-flight talk or spin rates or any of the other modern measurements that drain the human element from the game.
And he wasn’t even saying anything negative about the Orioles.
He was saying how much better their record is this year than previous years, and for a brief moment mentioned some comparative won-lost numbers.
Such as, the Orioles have won more games at Tampa Bay’s Tropicana Field than they won in the previous three years combined.
This is the stuff that got him suspended July 23. Reportedly, he’ll return to the Orioles’ telecasts Friday, August 11.
I haven’t seen any reporting that confirms who made the decision about Brown, but the general consensus is that it’s John Angelos, the Orioles chairman and managing partner. If it wasn’t Angelos, it’s hard to imagine a decision this important was made without his go-ahead.
Whoever’s the culprit, let’s get a few things straight.
You’re running a baseball team, not Pravda. There is no party-line truth guiding these broadcasts. Baseball is not about politics or toeing a party line. It’s an entertainment, a game designed to remove us from the cares of the day.
Broadcasting these games is a kind of art form. The best of these broadcasters can keep up with the action, unplanned and unrehearsed, as it’s happening. This requires spontaneity, and it requires a certain amount of freedom to tell the truth.
If Kevin Brown gets suspended for the innocent, factual reporting he did – in the service of extolling the home club – then where does the spontaneity go, and where does the joy go, if he (or anyone else in the broadcast booth) has to worry if the next sentence will mean the loss of a job?
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