Post by bossradio93 on Feb 3, 2004 15:29:11 GMT -5
Sports talk's irascible 1-2 punch
Joe McDonnell and Doug Krikorian speak to a certain kind of fan:
the die-hard local obsessed with L.A. teams.
By Paul Brownfield, LA Times, 2.1
Joe McDONNELL and Doug Krikorian (or "Joe and Doug," as they're known to regular listeners of local sports talk radio) held an on-air listener bash recently, on the occasion of their anniversary. The party was set up in the bar at Phil Trani's, a dark, low-ceilinged place a few blocks from the 405 Freeway in Long Beach. There was free food — pot roast, mostaccioli, French fries — and special guests, including Tommy Lasorda, who arrived in a gray suit and could be observed consuming a large meatball during commercial breaks.
McDonnell and Krikorian presided over the affair like lodge brothers elected to high office. Vagabonds of L.A. sports radio, they were celebrating three years on the air at the same station in the same time period — an eternity in their profession.
For most of the four hours of the show, McDonnell and Krikorian sat behind two microphones and a fold-out table that displayed their station logo above a riot of wiring tangled at their feet. Ancient arguments were stoked (who is the best Laker of all time?) and, with Lasorda there, the Dodgers' latest bonehead moves were prime fodder.
Lasorda, for his part, sat perched at the edge of the table. He had all he seemed to need — a meatball and a microphone. Soon enough they all got to ripping one another on the air: Lasorda ripped Krikorian for being cheap, and Krikorian ripped Lasorda for being Lasorda, and McDonnell ripped Lasorda for a managerial decision he made more than 23 years ago, in 1980, when the Dodgers dramatically swept the Houston Astros in the final three games of the regular season to force a one-game playoff.
"And then you started Dave Goltz," McDonnell said with disgust.
"That's all I had left, Joe," Lasorda replied.
The bar at Trani's was filled with men who might have served during the last great war. McDonnell, who is 47 and massively overweight with bleached blond hair, was wearing a Laker jersey with Magic Johnson's name and number on the back. During commercial breaks he doesn't move, while Krikorian, a garrulous 60-year-old sports scribe who also writes a column for the Long Beach Press-Telegram, tends to flit about. He is the sort of person who will hear his name shouted aloud in a bar ("Hey, Doug, what's [former Press-Telegram sportswriter] Doug Ives doing?" a tableful of gentlemen at Trani's wanted to know. "Promoting golf," Krikorian called back).
In his career Krikorian has covered something like 24 Super Bowls, 19 World Series and numerous title fights. He has also covered many more games that, to be honest, aren't worth remembering.
Miscreants on the margins of sports, McDonnell and Krikorian nevertheless wield an odd sort of power in this city. Their show, perhaps more than any other forum, gives voice to the triumph and anguish (mostly the anguish) of rooting for the home team in L.A.
Tune in today and you will hear them bemoan the imploding Lakers and the byzantine Dodger sale, in between all the stuff that makes it a sports talk radio show — partial-score updates for gamblers and commercials for car insurance and penile enhancements. You will hear surprisingly good guests (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was in-studio recently) and consistently odd ones (who is Sonny Vaccarro and exactly what does he do?).
The strangest thing is that "The McDonnell-Douglas Show," which airs on KSPN (710 AM) from 3 to 7 p.m. weekdays, continues to exist despite the attendant explosion of sports as entertainment product. The pair are in the midst of a five-year contract, but only the first year was guaranteed; they can be fired in an instant, and have been fired before.
But amid this uncertainty they have become a local constant — a bridge between slick, hype-driven coverage and a time when athletes made good money but not Madonna money, and sports was still about the intimate relationship of the fan to the local team.
This all seems hopelessly quaint in an era when advertising has turned the game into product placement and the networks cover games with more urgently talking heads than an episode of "Nightline."
Sports talk radio has always been a haven for the lunatic fringe, a low-rated medium for men dominated by trumped-up controversy manufactured daily. But it has also given inconsolable, and triumphant, fans a place to go.
In his book "True Believers: The Tragic Inner Life of Sports Fans," Joe Queenan consults a therapist to determine why he is emotionally addicted to the fortunes of Philadelphia's sports teams.
"One day I sat down to calculate how much of my adult life had been wasted on athletic events," he writes. "The numbers chilled me to the marrow."
Sports talk is aimed at this person. You could argue that L.A. isn't as passionate for the local teams as places like Boston or New York or Philadelphia. You could also say that ours is a city of immigrant fandom — Packer fans and Yankee fans and 76er fans all mushed together in one unwieldy mass.
And yet there exists the local fan with the long memory and the bleeding heart, and for this person there are Joe and Doug.
Back on the air at Phil Trani's, the actor and former Ram Fred Dryer called in; he and Lasorda got to reminiscing about seeing the Hollywood Stars play at Gilmore Field. David Vasay, the 27-year-old producer of "The McDonnell-Douglas Show," worked his black book, the one with the phone numbers — home, cell — of pro athletes and their agents and team publicists. Laker greats (and friends of the show) Jerry West and Elgin Baylor went on the air. So did current Laker General Manager Mitch Kupchak, even though last year, as the Lakers flamed out in the playoffs, McDonnell and Krikorian were calling him "Asleep at the Switch Mitch."
Marge Hearn, widow of Chick Hearn, paid her regards and a respectful hush fell over the room.
But Lasorda continued to be Lasorda, and Vasay finally put the black book down. For McDonnell and Krikorian, another afternoon drifted into evening on the wings of old anecdotes, bad jokes and arguments that will never end.
Los Angeles Radio People-Feb. 1, 2004
Joe McDonnell and Doug Krikorian speak to a certain kind of fan:
the die-hard local obsessed with L.A. teams.
By Paul Brownfield, LA Times, 2.1
Joe McDONNELL and Doug Krikorian (or "Joe and Doug," as they're known to regular listeners of local sports talk radio) held an on-air listener bash recently, on the occasion of their anniversary. The party was set up in the bar at Phil Trani's, a dark, low-ceilinged place a few blocks from the 405 Freeway in Long Beach. There was free food — pot roast, mostaccioli, French fries — and special guests, including Tommy Lasorda, who arrived in a gray suit and could be observed consuming a large meatball during commercial breaks.
McDonnell and Krikorian presided over the affair like lodge brothers elected to high office. Vagabonds of L.A. sports radio, they were celebrating three years on the air at the same station in the same time period — an eternity in their profession.
For most of the four hours of the show, McDonnell and Krikorian sat behind two microphones and a fold-out table that displayed their station logo above a riot of wiring tangled at their feet. Ancient arguments were stoked (who is the best Laker of all time?) and, with Lasorda there, the Dodgers' latest bonehead moves were prime fodder.
Lasorda, for his part, sat perched at the edge of the table. He had all he seemed to need — a meatball and a microphone. Soon enough they all got to ripping one another on the air: Lasorda ripped Krikorian for being cheap, and Krikorian ripped Lasorda for being Lasorda, and McDonnell ripped Lasorda for a managerial decision he made more than 23 years ago, in 1980, when the Dodgers dramatically swept the Houston Astros in the final three games of the regular season to force a one-game playoff.
"And then you started Dave Goltz," McDonnell said with disgust.
"That's all I had left, Joe," Lasorda replied.
The bar at Trani's was filled with men who might have served during the last great war. McDonnell, who is 47 and massively overweight with bleached blond hair, was wearing a Laker jersey with Magic Johnson's name and number on the back. During commercial breaks he doesn't move, while Krikorian, a garrulous 60-year-old sports scribe who also writes a column for the Long Beach Press-Telegram, tends to flit about. He is the sort of person who will hear his name shouted aloud in a bar ("Hey, Doug, what's [former Press-Telegram sportswriter] Doug Ives doing?" a tableful of gentlemen at Trani's wanted to know. "Promoting golf," Krikorian called back).
In his career Krikorian has covered something like 24 Super Bowls, 19 World Series and numerous title fights. He has also covered many more games that, to be honest, aren't worth remembering.
Miscreants on the margins of sports, McDonnell and Krikorian nevertheless wield an odd sort of power in this city. Their show, perhaps more than any other forum, gives voice to the triumph and anguish (mostly the anguish) of rooting for the home team in L.A.
Tune in today and you will hear them bemoan the imploding Lakers and the byzantine Dodger sale, in between all the stuff that makes it a sports talk radio show — partial-score updates for gamblers and commercials for car insurance and penile enhancements. You will hear surprisingly good guests (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was in-studio recently) and consistently odd ones (who is Sonny Vaccarro and exactly what does he do?).
The strangest thing is that "The McDonnell-Douglas Show," which airs on KSPN (710 AM) from 3 to 7 p.m. weekdays, continues to exist despite the attendant explosion of sports as entertainment product. The pair are in the midst of a five-year contract, but only the first year was guaranteed; they can be fired in an instant, and have been fired before.
But amid this uncertainty they have become a local constant — a bridge between slick, hype-driven coverage and a time when athletes made good money but not Madonna money, and sports was still about the intimate relationship of the fan to the local team.
This all seems hopelessly quaint in an era when advertising has turned the game into product placement and the networks cover games with more urgently talking heads than an episode of "Nightline."
Sports talk radio has always been a haven for the lunatic fringe, a low-rated medium for men dominated by trumped-up controversy manufactured daily. But it has also given inconsolable, and triumphant, fans a place to go.
In his book "True Believers: The Tragic Inner Life of Sports Fans," Joe Queenan consults a therapist to determine why he is emotionally addicted to the fortunes of Philadelphia's sports teams.
"One day I sat down to calculate how much of my adult life had been wasted on athletic events," he writes. "The numbers chilled me to the marrow."
Sports talk is aimed at this person. You could argue that L.A. isn't as passionate for the local teams as places like Boston or New York or Philadelphia. You could also say that ours is a city of immigrant fandom — Packer fans and Yankee fans and 76er fans all mushed together in one unwieldy mass.
And yet there exists the local fan with the long memory and the bleeding heart, and for this person there are Joe and Doug.
Back on the air at Phil Trani's, the actor and former Ram Fred Dryer called in; he and Lasorda got to reminiscing about seeing the Hollywood Stars play at Gilmore Field. David Vasay, the 27-year-old producer of "The McDonnell-Douglas Show," worked his black book, the one with the phone numbers — home, cell — of pro athletes and their agents and team publicists. Laker greats (and friends of the show) Jerry West and Elgin Baylor went on the air. So did current Laker General Manager Mitch Kupchak, even though last year, as the Lakers flamed out in the playoffs, McDonnell and Krikorian were calling him "Asleep at the Switch Mitch."
Marge Hearn, widow of Chick Hearn, paid her regards and a respectful hush fell over the room.
But Lasorda continued to be Lasorda, and Vasay finally put the black book down. For McDonnell and Krikorian, another afternoon drifted into evening on the wings of old anecdotes, bad jokes and arguments that will never end.
Los Angeles Radio People-Feb. 1, 2004