This was just brought up on the Danny Mac show and I could not agree more... why is Keith Moreland doing play by play during the 5th inning and Jud Sirott just hanging out. It makes no sense at all. Sirott should be the play by play guy and Moreland doing COLOR, which it what he was hired to do. Hasn't WGN made enough mistakes the last couple of years that make no sense at all? Just sayin'.

I'm completely underwhelmed by Moreland, but I suppose I'll give it some time. Bernstein's idea that somehow this would make Pat Hughes sound much better hasn't panned out either. Then again I never had a problem with Santo so I must hate quality radio broadcasts or something.

I was always insulted by the fact that Dan thought putting Dave Otto in the booth would all of a sudden make all Cubs fans know so much more about baseball. Like the only place where any baseball fan gets their information is from the radio broadcast of their local team. I get that they were anti-Santo and it riled up the meatballs to have that take and thats fine but to think that in the internet age the only place you can learn about baseball is when Dave Otto comes down from the mountain and preaches WARP directly into your earhole is a weird take.

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Why does Pat Hughes need an inning off? Is this common among baseball announcers? I don't think guys doing NBA, NFL, or NHL games take time off during the game.

i was not in favor of otto or moreland landing the job. i would guess most baseball fans knew santo was awful for many years..but the replacement was a lateral move , just a different kind of awful..hughes is still outstanding and casper is still bad like chip carey. i think the inning off is to take a piss and stretch his legs

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Bernstein's argument about that whole thing was/is ridiculous. But that's another topic. I think Moreland is doing a fine job, but the station has no business having HIM do play by play in the 5th during Pat's break.

Maybe Hughes eventually wants a DJ/Farmer deal where they switch up color and PbP and this is a chance for Moreland to get some PbP time in. I doubt that's the case but who knows

Vin Scully used to take one inning off in the 70's/80's. Now I think he gets a couple of innings off to change his depends.

I think Hughes fronts a tribute band during the 5th inning at the Cubby Bear.

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

Those guys get halftime, baseball announcers don't. That's probably the time he drops a deuce.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

If you're talking about Casper the Friendly Ghost, I agree.

If you're talking about Len Kasper, you could not be more wrong. Chip Caray, or Carey, is in a league all by himself. I would say that you are in a extremely small group if you think Kasper is as bad as Caray.

HA!

i think you would be surprised how many people feel the same as me about len being too boring and bland, his voice is awful and he is a huge nerd just like chip.

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Okay, so Moreland's expotentially more listenable than Santo. But I can't say I particularly enjoy listening to him. And he's brutal doing play-by-play. Not sure I would have been happy with Dave Otto, either, but he would have been better than Moreland.

I think Len has been great so far. He knows the game, and works well with Brenly. He can throw in a good pop culture reference from time to time also, which is better than hearing the same Yaz stories for thr thousandth time on the other side of town. Kasper is not Chip Caray, they're not even close to being the same.

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better than hawk? of course he is, hawk is one of the worst in the biz all time, casper is slightly better than chip caray..i would have liked stone/brenley

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Agreed

Full disclosure: I met Len Kasper one time when I was interning in Milwaukee. He swung by to sit in on the afternoon show because he got his start in broadcasting under that host. I shook his hand and said I enjoyed his work.

Which I do. As far as the Joe Buck/Thom Brennaman era of clean-cut, largely dispassionate, company-man broadcasters goes, Len is probably the best one. He introduces statistics that other broadcasters neglect or dismiss, he gets up for big plays by the home team, works well with Brenly (himself pretty good, much better than he used to be) and generally radiates a sense of down-to-earth coolness that you don't get from a lot of guys elsewhere. Certainly better than the two guys I named, and eminently better than Chip Caray, who has good pipes but still manages to overplay his hand with them, then uses said pipes to spout off falsehoods, mistakes, and general idiocy.

We tend to forget how good we have it here sometimes. We can find flaws with our broadcasters, but if you ever have the chance to look around the league, overall we're still getting a much better experience than people are in other parts of the country. This is, after all, the #3 market. You can complain about Len not ripping people the way Harry did, or Pat Foley meandering off of play-by-play, or Pat Hughes being "too homespun" (I don't believe in this criticism at all, mind you, but I needed to add it for the Rule of Three), but we could be in Denver or Charlotte or something, where it's just Syracuse sausage links perpetually angling for better gigs.

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Well said! Lots of BAD broadcasters around the league. Both Chicago teams have it pretty good.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

I liked Chip, I really like Len and Bob, and Pat Hughes is a treasure.
I haven't listened to game with Keith on the radio yet.
I also loved Santo.
Sue me.

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Just chillin' like Garret Quillin.

Considering Moreland has probably only broadcast 50 or fewer Cubs games total, I find him improving. I tired of Ronnie near the end, but then I also didn't really like the last 10 years of Harry Caray, either. I listen to quite a few Tiger games as well as the brewcrew when the weather is right- none of their radio guys take an inning off like Hughes does- could it be a medical thing? The Tigers guys don't swich roles, either like Hawk/DJ. I always figured the inning off was a chance for the "next-in-line" to get some air time, and is probably a hold over from when Harry was so popular they needed him on both TV and radio.

I think Pat used to take the non-Cubs half of the 8th off when Andy Masur was the third man in the booth. He started taking all of the 5th off when Cory Provus replaced Masur in '07.

Uecker gets the 3rd, 4th, and 8th off, I think it is, but then again he calls the game solo. Jim Powell was a good play-by-play man in his own right, you know. Cory Provus just sounds like Thom Brennaman.

Marty Brennaman gets an inning or two off during which Jeff Brantley calls the game solo. Not good.

Never picked up a Tigers game, can't say what they do.

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I enjoy the hell out of Len Kasper. He's a great Baseball play by play Man.

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CSFMB 2014 Nascar Pick 'em Champion

We don’t have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven’t taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much. — Ronald Reagan

Doesn't Moreland do pxp for some Texas stuff? Maybe he requested that he be the lead man for the fifth inning rather than Judd.

Judd was okay doing play-by-play in the fifth last year--no better or worse than Andy Masur or Cory Provus, I suppose--but as a color commentator for Keith Moreland he's sounded absolutely soul-sucked. Maybe he's just exhausted because he's still working double duty with Blackhawks intermissions, but there's definitely a sense of "I'm not 100% sure why I'm here right now."

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So is Moreland on TV or just radio? I don't get the cubs out here unless they're on WGN National. I guess Moreland is suppose to be the new Santo? I hope he doesn't accept that role and be himself. Still remember being at the game when he went after Ed Fucking Lynch on the Mets back in 84 when he got plunked.

Gone.

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Good blanking riddance.

Let the Kerry Wood era begin. Will WGN bother with a charade that they are considering other candidates?

How many of us really care? I hardly listen to the Cubs on radio but try to watch a lot of TV games,even in September.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

I don't think Wood will be very good at all. He's too subdued. He might be better on the TV side, where you don't have to paint the picture so much.

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