The dean of MWL Broadcasters

Jeff Johnson of the Cedar Rapids Gazette has an article about John Rodgers, the 15 year broadcaster of the Kernels.

After 15 seasons, Rodgers still loves calling the game

John Rodgers says he’s slowing down, though you have a hard time believing the longtime Cedar Rapids Kernels radio announcer.

Rodgers is a whirl of activity and energy on game night at Veterans Memorial Stadium. That includes his broadcasts, of course.

“The runner goes!” he shouts in that excitable John Rodgers tone. “There’s no throw! Safe! The runner is safe at third!”

I am lucky that I have had the chance to work with John in season, talk to him in the offseason, and call him friend over the last 11 seasons. Whenever, Cedar Rapids is in town and someone asks me how my day is going my response is: How can you have a bad day with John Rodgers in town?

He has his quirks...but...well, you've met me haven't you? His are nothing.

Jeff caught about 92 seconds of John on the air against the LumberKings.



Someone needs to get video of John at Miller Park next week.

This better not give anyone any ideas

I've known about this one for awhile, but didn't mention anything about it directly. Then, Ben got the job with the Whitecaps and the cat was out of the bag.

A Cardinals fan actually put it all together between complaining about untucked shirts and this was the result.

Quad Cities River Bandits silence radio broadcasts

Back in March 2008, the River Bandits and Miller Media Group, the owner of WYEC (93.9 FM, Geneseo, Illinois), had announced a three-year agreement to air the team’s 140-game schedule on the station. Games were also streamed on the team’s website.

Ending the deal a year early seems especially counterintuitive as the Quad Cities baseball operation is definitely on the rise. Total attendance (236,401) and average attendance (3,694) last season were both the highest since 1995 and rank among the top five years the history of the franchise. Since the ownership change, attendance has grown 64 percent on a per-game basis (from 2,254 in 2007) and 59 percent on an annual view (from 148,773).

A 2009 study by Street & Smith’s SportsBusiness Journal ranked the Quad Cities #31 of 239 minor league sports markets, best of all Cardinals minor league affiliate metro areas.

In confirming the news, Miller Media Group’s Kewanee, Illinois cluster sales manager Fletcher M. Ford was quite direct. He explained how the change was made and communicated.

“Your Easy Choice 93.9 WYEC was served notice from Kirk A. Goodman, Vice President and General Manager in late 2009 explaining the intention of the Quad City River Bandits not having a radio broadcast partner in the upcoming season for its fans,” Ford explained.

Ford wanted to make it clear that Miller Media Group was not a part of any evaluation process.

“This decision was made solely by the management of the Quad City River Bandits,” Ford said.

Goodman offered further details.

“We are indeed discontinuing our radio broadcast,” Goodman stated Monday. “We were being charged a very high rate to be on a station located 55 miles from our ballpark and in addition to that cost and the expense of paying for the salary and travel for a broadcaster did not make fiscal sense for our team.”

Apparently no alternatives that offered a match could be found.

“We made an effort to bring the broadcast to a more local station but none of the formats of the stations for the two main radio groups in our market worked with what we were willing to offer in return.

“It was strictly a financial decision…to pay what was necessary for our broadcast to be on the air was not worth the return we saw from having a broadcast,” Goodman said.

Nothing personal. Just business. That worked out so well for Tessio.

I'm an elder statesman? Really?

It's not an article about me...thank, Carneal...but, this Q & A with Peoria Chiefs voice Nathan Baliva gets around to where I am on the tenure ladder of announcers in the MWL. But, that's not important right now.

If you did an article on any announcer in minor league baseball, the origin story would be pretty much the same. It's like radioactivity and superheroes.

Q: How did you get started?

A: How far back did you want me to go? In high school we had a TV station at (Chatham Glenwood) and they needed people to do it. I loved all sports and played soccer and tennis in high school. We had a SportsCenter type of show call Redskins Sports Highlights. We would interview coaches or players. When we got to basketball season they were going to do all the game live, play-by-play. We had to audition and I was one of the two guys picked my freshman year. I did a few football games, but we had to travel for soccer. My senior year I didn’t play so I did football. They had a Frontier League team, the Capitals, so I would sit and do that.

Q: Were there influences (on your style)? I imagine being from Springfield, the Bucks from St. Louis might have.

A: Yeah, from when I was 6 on, that was what was on every night in the house. Being with my grandparents during the day after school, my grandma — who to this day at 93 years old is a die-hard Cubs fan — and I would be in the house after school and we’d be watching Harry Caray. ... But Jack Buck by far is my No. 1. I know people go both ways with Joe (Buck), but I’m a pretty big fan of Joe. I did a project on him in (graduate school at) Florida. I sat in the booth an entire game with (Cardinals color commentator) Al Hrabosky and watched them work and did a paper on them.

This is not surprising.

Q: I’m sure you have some favorite cities in the Midwest League.

A: I’m a big fan of Grand Rapids. ... South Bend, I’m not a fan of Notre Dame, but I don’t know how you can’t appreciate it. We’ve been there every year, and every year we find a way to get on campus one way or another. Those are good cites. I’m a big fan of both the stadium and city of Appleton. ... There’s a huge mall there. It all comes down to, when you’re on a bus and don’t have a car, what is within walking distance. So anyplace that has a mall or a movie theater or a Buffalo Wild Wings where we can watch the game, it will be a fun city.

Go read the rest.

Mail Call

Brad Tillery, the Lansing Lugnts broadcaster, actually reads this blog and did a little of my work for me.

Remember section in yesterday's game notes where I said, this was the first time the Rattlers won a series in Lansing, since I've been covering the team. I also mentioned that my records, the one that I have with me on the road, only go back to the 1999 season.

So, I thought that I would have to dig into the archives to find out the last time Wisconsin won a series in Lansing. Now, I don't have to do that work. Brad writes:

[The 2008 series] was actually the first time that the T-Rats had ever beaten Lansing in a series at Olds Park. The teams have split four times, but the Lugnuts had won the other eight sets. Hope that helps!

It does, Brad. Thanks for the help.

As a favor, head over to Brad's Blog. He has pictures of the flood waters that surrounded Modern Woodmen park last week. The picture on the right at the bottom of the post titled Iowa...Part 2 shows why they moved that series with the Lugnuts all around Iowa.