On Thursday, Hall of Fame hockey broadcaster Mike “Doc” Emrick joined the Pirates’ radio booth and called some of the spring training action. MLB.com has video:
[mlbvideo id="545992983" width="600" height="336" /]
Emrick is a big Pirates fan. During the broadcast, he said, “You know, I gotta divorce myself from cheering.”
Having done neither, I would imagine it’s difficult to call one sport and then try to do the same with another because you get used to processing information at a certain speed. Hockey is very fast-paced, so you have to inform the listener quickly and accurately. Baseball is much more slow-paced and I’d imagine can be a bit uncomfortable to feel like you have to fill in all of the moments where nothing is happening. Emrick sounded like a natural, which isn’t surprising given his resume.
Emrick will also call a few innings on the Root Sports telecast on March 9 when the Pirates take on the Red Sox.