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The best of the O's: Media awards
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Yesterday's fan experience awards focused on the Baltimore stadium experience. Today, it's time to celebrate the television, radio, and internet coverage of the birds. Do you have your own personal favs, current or past? Feel free to chime in and discuss.
The best in-game television personality: Jim Palmer
Runner Up: Buck Martinez
Palmer is the only MASN announcer with the Hall of Fame pedigree that allows him to speak his mind, and he isn’t afraid to criticize the club. His rants can be a little self-indulgent, but he’s better to listen to than any of the MASN apologists working for the team-owned network.
Martinez sounds like someone is holding his nose while he talks, but he brings a catcher’s insight to his commentary.
The best sports talk host for O’s discussion: Ken Weinman at 105.7 FM and 1300 AM.
A fill-in for Anita Marks and Amber Theoharris and weekend evening host, Weinman is not likely to be advertised as a sexy sports radio host, but his shows are thorough, fair-minded, and passionate. He’s not a screamer and he doesn’t seem to hold grudges, except against the Yankees, which is fine by me.
Anita Marks, who I met once at a karaoke bar in Canton, is friendly, almost too much so. She seems more interested in befriending players than asking hard questions. Anita is also surrounded by two intolerably loud and obnoxious cohosts, Mark Zino and Jeremy Caan, or Kahn or whatever.
If you aren’t familiar with the show that features these two knuckleheads, imagine being at a baseball or football game and getting stuck in front of “those guys.” You know, the types of guys who you would hate sitting in front of because they would be shouting at the team as though they knew more than the GM, the owner, the manager, and the players combined.
And you just know that they go home and whine about playing second fiddle to Anita because she’s a blonde “sports chick.” I told her to fire these idiots when we met, but no such luck yet.
All of the guys at WNST are excellent, especially the charismatic afternoon host Rob Long, but NST’s O’s coverage is inherently biased because of owner Nestor Apparicio’s grudge against the team.
The best source for O’s news – Roch Kubatko’s School of Roch
Runner up – Orioles Hangout
With all due respect to the guys who still work there, Shmuck or no Schmuck, I canceled my subscription to The Sun when they let Roch go. Check out the exhaustive archive of work he’s produced in the short time he’s been at masnsports.com.
Tony Pente at orioleshangout.com has a great site, too, without the access Roch had as a part of an established corporation. The site erroneously reported a Brian Roberts trade last Winter, but most of their coverage is spot on and their discussion boards are an oasis for suffering diehards.
The best MASN commercial: Softball league hero
I liked the old spots that taunted opposing teams’ players. My current favorite involves a softball league hero comparing his diamond exploits to the careers of Rick Dempsey and Jim Palmer as the O’s legends look on in bemusement.
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