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BY JOSH ABEL

In print | Published April 23, 2009

When I turned on the Phillies telecast last Monday, I was stunned to learn that Harry Kalas, the team’s announcer since 1971 and a Hall of Fame member since 2002, had passed away.

The day before, Sunday, I had jumped for joy as he announced Matt Stairs’ game-winning bomb in Denver, as I had countless times over the past two decades. And yet on Monday, he was gone.

The following week saw a tremendous outpouring of love and sorrow from Philadelphians. His passing dominated the news and people flocked to South Philadelphia to lie out their remembrances at Citizens Bank Park.

I was surprised at how greatly Kalas’ passing affected the city, but I shouldn’t have been. For tens of thousands of people in the Philadelphia area, he was the voice of our baseball obsession. An announcer has a special place in baseball that other sports just don’t allow for. Even the most committed fans are unable to attend all 150 or so games each season, so they experience the sport through a television or radio.

Even though it is the sport and the team that we love, Harry Kalas was our link to them, and over 38 years, he became an institution, transcending the microphone and becoming a meaningful and much-loved part of the Phillies experience himself.

For me, no great play has truly occurred until I watch and re-watch the replay a handful of times. Even when I’m at the ballpark for the game, I can’t wait to see the highlight reel upon returning home. When you watch around 150 games per year on TV, the telecast becomes an important part of how you understand the sport.

The familiar angles they use become the natural way to view the game. Similarly, the call of the announcer becomes the natural way to hear the game. All of the great moments that speckle my baseball fandom are accompanied by the call of an announcer. As a Phillies fan, this means Harry Kalas.

Mitch Williams’ 4:30 a.m. game-winning hit; Scott Rolen’s game-winner in the first game after 9/11; Ryan Howard’s three-homer day; Jimmy Rollins’ division-clinching double play; Brad Lidge’s strikeout to win the World Series. All of these plays belong to great players of the Phillies’ past 20 years, but in a small way, they belonged to Harry Kalas as well. And he did his best to make sure that those great moments belonged to each of us, too.

But baseball is only partly about the great moments. A Major League season is long and filled with routine. It’s an announcer’s most difficult job to remain engaging at these times. Many fail. Harry Kalas did not.

He had a beautiful, gravelly voice, and though it could erupt when it needed to, it was usually calm and comforting. One clip was a perfect demonstration of this. It comes from a day game in 1998, the middle of some very bad years of baseball for the Phillies. Kalas is holding a cigar in the booth, sitting next to color commentator Chris Wheeler. There is near-silence in the stadium — these are the dog days of summer.

“Wheels, smoking a cigar is like falling in love. You are first attracted to its shape. You stay with it for its flavor. But always remember: never, never, never let the flame go out … And the 0-1 pitch is inside for a ball …”

I regret that I am too young recall vintage Kalas, for, by all accounts, he was at his best when he was paired with Richie “Whitey” Ashburn, who passed away in 1997. I also can’t gush about what a friendly guy he was because my relationship with him was exclusively through the airwaves.

I would feel disingenuous writing about these traits because I was not privy to them personally, and so talking about them would cheapen what I feel was a true relationship he and I had — a relationship that was similar to but distinct from the ones he had with each other Phillies fan.

He was a great announcer, but that’s ultimately not the point. By just being a central part of the baseball experience in Philadelphia for so long, he became a friend. Never was the listening experience as enjoyable as when his partners were out of the booth, perhaps eating or in the bathroom, and it felt like he was talking directly to you.

So I’ll leave the proper eulogizing to people who have met him face-to-face. They can properly tell you about his warmth, his positive attitude, his ability to tell a story. But even those of us who haven’t met him can claim Harry Kalas as a friend and share in the grief of the Phillies and Kalas families. After all, every Phillies fan shared at least one great passion with him, and we all spent many summers in his company.

Josh is a sophomore. You can reach him at jabel1@swarthmore.edu.

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