Thursday night, NBA/TNT's doubleheader features the red hot Knicks bringing a 13 game win streak to United Center vs. the shorthanded, injury-ravaged Bulls followed by Thunder/Warriors in Oakland. Coverage starts at 7P Thursday. Shameless plugs? Yes, but that's not the story. This is.

While Marv Albert & Mike Fratello will call Game 1 of the doubleheader between the Knicks/Bulls Thursday night, a rare all-analyst crew will describe Thunder/Warriors on TNT in Game 2 later in the evening from Oracle Arena in Oakland. That team...Steve Kerr, fresh off working the NCAA Final Four & Monday's National Championship Game with Jim Nantz, Clark Kellogg & sideline reporter Tracy Wolfson last weekend on CBS from Atlanta, Reggie Miller & former Warriors' star Chris Webber. Kevin Harlan, who usually calls one of the games with Miller, will get a rare night off from the NBA/TNT broadcast.

Turner Sports' Senior Vice President Craig Barry explained the unusual arrangement in yesterday's USA Today, and his explanation can be found here:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nb ... 11499686=1

Reggie Miller's voice drives me to kill.

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Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

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seriously for a second, bag...does Reggie Miller's voice sound pleasing to you? Or does his voice make you want to get in a car, drive to whatever arena he will be at that week, wait until sometime after the third quarter and beat him over the head with his own headset?

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Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

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I remember NBC doing this for an NFL game back in my youth. In fact, I don't think they had any announcers. The broadcast sucked.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

GD, NBC Sports actually did an NFL game minus announcers. It was December 20, 1980 between the Jets & Dolphins at the old Orange Bowl in Miami. The Jets won that game 24-17. There has NEVER been another such game.

Checking this out to see how Kerr does driving a telecast. He's not bad. Sounds a little nervous at times, but I think he could grow into calling pxp full-time if he wanted. He's already better than Dick Stockton.

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I caught a bit of the game last night. It wasn't too bad. It was pretty much 3 guys just talking basketball while the game was going on, and I had no problem with that. Something like this would probably work nicely with baseball too.

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I don't know about that one. "Baseball players just talking baseball" is basically the two White Sox booths, and those are awful. Though maybe the formula would work with people who aren't, you know, completely terrible.

I think it might be a fun approach for TNT late games, but then you run the risk of doing a bunch of Lakers games with the Shoot The Shit Club, and fans may feel short-changed by that.

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