Give or Take: 'Hawk' Harrelson

[CD1083]

Bud Selig, Jerry Reinsdorf talk to Hawk Harrelson about rant - ESPN Chicago

As a Chicago White Sox fan, I absolutely love listening to Ken 'Hawk' Harrelson.

Listening to Harrelson is like sitting down and watching a game with your Uncle who wears a team hat and jersey. The entire time he yells at the tv and takes it personally when they lose. Except he's the broadcaster.

Now I'll admit that if I was a fan of another team and had to listen to him broadcast the game, he'd drive me bonkers, but since he's on my team I can't say enough good things about him.

So what do you all think?

Would you take him home or give him away?

[slic1149]

I was a big Harrelson fan especially when he played for the A's and the Red Sox. He either wrote or had ghost written an autobiography in the early 70s. Hawk spent a lot of time talking about hustling pool. At that particular time in my life I made most all of my disposable income as a pool hustler. I remember his stories with a great deal of affection.

While I am not a White Sox fan I love Hawk as a color guy. He gives games a unique flavor. I don't know whether he was the first to use the term "Duck snort" but I love the imagery. I can understand why some fans don't like him but I think he adds a lot to a game broadcast or telecast and I always enjoy listening to him.

[David Watts]

Harrelson's style is so unique that I've always wondered how I would feel about him if he was announcing for my team. When the Sox are drilling my Tigers he can really get under my skin and the nicknames drive me crazy.

[jaxmagicman]

Worst announcer in baseball, HANDS DOWN.

[RchW]

^^^This^^^

[CD1083]

Originally Posted by jaxmagicman

Worst announcer in baseball, HANDS DOWN.

Originally Posted by RchW

^^^This^^^

Care to elaborate.

You're not the first person to say that, what about him makes a bad announcer?

[rudel.dietrich]

Possibly the worst announcer in North American sports. He is an loud buffoon who legitimizes the shift in sports announcing from delivering the game to the fans to creating a cult of celebrity for the announcer himself.
I have never found anyone outside of White Sox fans who have anything good to say about him so that should tell you something.

He also tries to take credit for inventing the batting glove. So there is that too.

And it is not just us three who find him the worst ever.

GQ Names Hawk Harrelson Worst Announcer In Baseball: Chicagoist
There is a GQ poll who overwhelmingly found him to be the worst

Broadcaster Rankings (TV): Intro and #31 | FanGraphs Baseball

There is a reader poll from Fangraphs who also found them to be the worst


I still find it funny when White Sox fans are surprised by how awful he is.
Announcers should either enhance your team or do nothing.

But for your White Sox Hawk is one of those rare announcers you actually detracts from your team by making them look immature and run in a bush league manor. I realize that the Sox always have to fight an image battle with the Cubs and keeping Hawk on the payroll is not making you look any better.

I will finish with one last thing. With every announcer you have to ask yourself, if this person got fired, would he/she be able to find work again?
With 95% of announcers the answer is yes. But I guarantee you that if the Hawk were to hopefully find himself unemployed in the near future that he would not work again.

[CD1083]

I don't see the issue with the broadcaster being enthusiastic about the team he is broadcasting for. I want the guy broadcasting to be as much of a fan of the team as I am.

I'm rarely bored watching a Sox game on TV. Something I can't say watching ESPN games.

[rudel.dietrich]

Originally Posted by The Chase Davis

I don't see the issue with the broadcaster being enthusiastic about the team he is broadcasting for. I want the guy broadcasting to be as much of a fan of the team as I am.

I'm rarely bored watching a Sox game on TV. Something I can't say watching ESPN games.

You missed my point and the point of the rest of the Hawk disliker. It is not that he likes his team. I have no problem with that. It is the obnoxious and sophomoric way in which he goes about it.
He does not have a single ounce of professionalism and he seems more suited to being a junior high student asked to announce his middle schools basketball games on the radio.

[CD1083]

Originally Posted by rudel.dietrich

You missed my point and the point of the rest of the Hawk disliker. It is not that he likes his team. I have no problem with that. It is the obnoxious and sophomoric way in which he goes about it.
He does not have a single ounce of professionalism and he seems more suited to being a junior high student asked to announce his middle schools basketball games on the radio.

I guess I don't see that. You'd have to give me an example of something specific he does that is sophomoric. I listen to him all year long and he conducts himself well.

You make it sound as if he's Howard Stern out there.

Do you think the example I linked to is out of line?

[Kobie]

Originally Posted by jaxmagicman

Worst announcer in baseball, HANDS DOWN.

Precisely this. Hawk Harrelson is utterly horrendous. Easily the worst announcer in baseball, possibly ever. There is not a single bigger homer out there than Hawk. None. Period. Full stop.

In early May this year, after Detroit's Jhonny Peralta hit a two-run walkoff homer to beat the White Sox, Harrelson responded with 63 seconds of dead air.

Hawk Harrelson Homering: High Time HE GONE? | Chicago Sports Media Watch
(Audio/video clip attached to link)

[rudel.dietrich]

Originally Posted by The Chase Davis

Do you think the example I linked to is out of line?

No actually I don't have a problem with that. I do however would take him to task for cursing on air. You just can't do that.
You know me from the OT forum and know that I am not a very moralistic person and I have little problem with swearing, violence and sex. But those three things have their place.
Sports is one of the few things on TV where you can be completely free from those three things. It is one of the few things I would be okay with my kids watching at any age.
You just can't curse on air.

[The Professor]

Precisely this. Hawk Harrelson is utterly horrendous. Easily the worst announcer in baseball, possibly ever. There is not a single bigger homer out there than Hawk. None. Period. Full stop.

Not even close to the worst ever.

Hawk's problem isn't homerism. Baseball needs a few homer announcers. It has enough dull-ass vanilla by-the-book ESPN clones who nobody can tell from Adam.

Hawk's problem is that in the last decade he's become an excessive caricature. He was always cartoonish, a homer, with the lingo - South Carolina to Chicago by way of Arch McDonald. I loved watching White Sox games in the 1990s when Hawk and Tom "Wimpy" Paciorek were together. I thought they were unique. Fun.

Since Paciorek left, possibly because of Harrelson's maneuvering, it has not been as much fun. And the Hawkspeak seems ever more forced, what little spontaneity existed is gone. Former partner Darrin Jackson was (and is) inept and dull. Steve Stone has his own large reputation and ego and is so clearly put off by Harrelson it makes the broadcast strained. Stone could hack the homerism - hell, we worked with Harry Caray - but Harrelson's ego is spikier and shtick plastic where Harry was vain, boozy and organic. Hawk can't pull off the "Mayor of Rush Street" thing like Harry.

I don't think he's as bad as his worst critics do. I don't think he's nearly as worthwhile as he was a decade ago. I do hate the stupid "Heave the Hawk" people who complain that his hick phrases are just not "Chicago." Not that Harrelson is anywhere near this league, but Red Barber ("ol' redhead jumpin' up on a log and hollerin' to ya'") was hardly Brooklyn. Mel Allen was definitely not the Bronx. Hawk deserves criticism - but being Southern and talking like it, even if it is largely shtick - is not the problem.

In early May this year, after Detroit's Jhonny Peralta hit a two-run walkoff homer to beat the White Sox, Harrelson responded with 63 seconds of dead air.

He works on the television side. Why, exactly, do you need him to tell you what you are seeing? Whatever Hawk's flaws, the notion that a minute of dead air is horrible is laughable to me. Radio men need to fill the air for the most part, letting it breathe occasionally. TV men, who could stand to let it breathe even more, seldom ever do. I'm not sure anything better conveys the deflated feeling of White Sox fans watching the game than Harrelson's dead silence.

That he would be castigated for his silence, even if it is because he's a raging homer, says a lot about why baseball broadcasting is awful in this era.

[Kobie]

For over a full minute? Really?

He actively roots for the White Sox during broadcasts. That is unacceptable.

[The Professor]

Originally Posted by Kobie

For over a full minute? Really?

He actively roots for the White Sox during broadcasts. That is unacceptable.

Says? I don't understand this notion that all baseball broadcasters must be blandly impartial. Some can do it brilliantly (Vin Scully), but if I'm tuning in to watch my team, I want the local broadcasters to be more than vanilla clones. There is a limit and a line, and Hawk might cross it occasionally, but I don't think that it is homerism itself that is the problem.

Bob Prince jinxed opponents from his broadcast perch and cheered for Roberto Clemente ("Arriba! Arriba!"). He urged Willie Stargell to "spread some chicken on the hill." Harry Caray rooted for the Cardinals, White Sox, and Cubs with equal verve in his long career.

Harrelson isn't awful because he roots for the White Sox. He's awful because his schtick is tired and predictable.

[CD1083]

Originally Posted by Kobie

He actively roots for the White Sox during broadcasts. That is unacceptable.

Why?

[Kobie]

Originally Posted by The Chase Davis

Why?

Because it's extremely unprofessional.

And before you ask, when Harry Caray used to openly root for the Cubs, that was unprofessional too. I'm certainly not insisting that these guys be mindless automatons; however, there are rules for working media that some of these guys simply choose not to follow.

[Kobie]

Originally Posted by The Professor

Harrelson isn't awful because he roots for the White Sox. He's awful because his schtick is tired and predictable.

There's also this; however, a huge part of Harrelson's schtick is merely the fact that he is a relentless homer.

[TBPauly]

I didn't think the dressing down of Hawk by Commissioner Selig was really necessary. If the White Sox management is unhappy with him, they do have an option they can exercise by terminating him.

Watched it happen on WGN America...usually watched the Rays games on SunSports here in Florida, but it's rare outside of FOX or ESPN to see another take on the Rays games, so I put the Sox feed on. Thought Hawk was totally off base in his rant. You can't keep going one-up on another team with unsportsmanlike acts and not expect the umpires to notice. They did. Hawk came off like a 10 year old child that didnt get the baseball cards he wanted in his bubble gum.

[CD1083]

Originally Posted by Kobie

Because it's extremely unprofessional.

And before you ask, when Harry Caray used to openly root for the Cubs, that was unprofessional too. I'm certainly not insisting that these guys be mindless automatons; however, there are rules for working media that some of these guys simply choose not to follow.

Why is it unprofessional? They are the team's broadcasters. If he was a Fox or ESPN broadcaster I'd agree, but when broadcasters travels with the team, I fail to see how they are anything other than a representative of the team.

If I'm watching a broadcast of another team's announcers I fully expect them to 'root' for their team.