Do you want Remy to be the teams announcer on opening day?

Do you want Remy to be the teams announcer on opening day?

  • Yes

    Votes: 171 33.8%
  • No - I want him fired or "forced" into retiring

    Votes: 95 18.8%
  • No - I want him to quit on his own

    Votes: 240 47.4%

  • Total voters
    506

keninten

New Member
Nov 24, 2005
588
Tennessee
MentalDisabldLst said:
 
I can't believe I'm hearing people say that Remy should have somehow not paid for his son's legal needs.  Leaving aside the fact that any parent with the means would do the same for their child no matter what they were accused of - do we not believe in right to counsel?  On this board, perhaps 30% of whose membership are attorneys?  Even the most conservative, fire-and-brimstone person on issues of crime and punishment should at least appreciate that it's not the State paying for a public defender, and thus coming out of their pockets.  But more importantly: Give the Devil benefit of law, for your own sake.
 
So, if he was otherwise fit to keep his job absent his son's actions, and if he was otherwise not entangled in his son's nefarious acts, it's somehow Jerry Remy's paying of legal bills that disqualify him from continuing to (mostly) entertain you for 162 games a year?  I can't fathom the logic that would support that point of view.
 
"Stopped defending the guy" - yeah, he's offering no excuses for his son's actions.  He's not a supporter of domestic violence, nor is he even in any denial or bargaining phases with his grief over the effective loss of his son's life, liberty, and/or soul.  Phil Robertson of Duck Dynasty, meanwhile, is unapologetic about his gay-hating, and is still on the air.  Jerry has acknowledged the terrible tragedy his son has wrought, gone on radio to further explain the situation, and yet somehow needs to fall on his own sword, too?  Those are some pretty lofty standards you expect of public figures.  I wonder how many of us could meet them.  Let he who is without sin...
 
 
 
Leaving aside the idea that we should avoid ad-hominem arguments on a board of this caliber... I think it's fair to credit P91 with a total change of heart over the last few years when it comes to issues of gay equality.  He now fully supports gay rights, as far as I have heard, and furthermore he attributes that to arguments he heard on V&N which he found persuasive.  Good Keynesian that he is, perhaps.
 
If we're going to talk of the subject of forgiveness, I'd suggest that P91 deserves some public praise for his coming-around on that.  I mean, maybe we don't kill the fatted calf, but our brother here was lost, and is found, and it is appropriate to be glad.  I'd like to hope that I'm capable of reversing my opinion if I ever realize I'm so wrong about such a deeply-held belief.
 
So this criticism of his post is unfair in a couple respects - inaccurate that he doesn't attribute being gay to nurture, incomplete in that it's an oversimplification of a grossly complex Nature/Nurture debate (in either instance), and fallacious in that his own beliefs have no bearing on the accuracy of what he's claiming (which is, simply, that Jerry Remy might not even deserve criticism as a parent for his son's actions, nevermind whether he should bear responsibility in his professional role).
It is crazy to think Remy shouldn`t help his son`s defense. I`m sure Jerry is hurting far more than any of us can fathom. I`m sure he still loves his son.
 
That`s a pretty broad brush to be painting alot of people with. Religion should be left out of this discussion along with politics and sexual preferences.
 
Rovin Romine said:
See, this is where a "like" button or something of the sort would come in handy.   But I'll clutter the thread with my approval for MDLs post, particularly the issue of not bashing someone like P91 who has had their view of an issue expand and evolve
I`m glad P91 is out of the primordal slime and up to your level. Too bad people can`t leave gays alone to live their lives instead of using them for political fodder.
 

rundugrun

New Member
Jul 23, 2005
455
Knoxville, TN
How did this thread devolve into a gay marriage debate? Also, there is a difference between paying for Jared's legal costs for his first scrape with the law and paying a top flight defense attorney to game the system and ensure that your son doesn't get jail time. An objective father would have realized pretty quickly that Jared needed a major wake up call. For me, pulling the plug on the fancy defense lawyer is a good start.
 

Myt1

educated, civility-loving ass
Lifetime Member
SoSH Member
Mar 13, 2006
41,579
South Boston
rundugrun said:
An objective father would have realized pretty quickly that Jared needed a major wake up call. For me, pulling the plug on the fancy defense lawyer is a good start.
1. I think this is close to an oxymoron.
 

joe dokes

Member
SoSH Member
Jul 18, 2005
30,243
rundugrun said:
How did this thread devolve into a gay marriage debate? Also, there is a difference between paying for Jared's legal costs for his first scrape with the law and paying a top flight defense attorney to game the system and ensure that your son doesn't get jail time. An objective father would have realized pretty quickly that Jared needed a major wake up call. For me, pulling the plug on the fancy defense lawyer is a good start.
 
Credit for using "ensure" correctly.
 
Seriously, though, and notwithstanding the who-is-a-good-lawyer discussion elswhere in these pages (writ short: $$$$ ≠ quality), do we even know that the guy they hired is "top-flight" or "fancy," as opposed to a guy that someone recommended to Remy years ago?  And if there are, as it seems many people of Jared Remy's monstrousness getting similar treatment, did this guy "game the system?" 
 
As for the "major wake-up call," an "objective father" (to the extent such a thing exists), might have seen that the son was apparently trouble free after 2007. Maybe that objective father thanks God (in 2009 or 2010 or 2011 or 2012) that his troubled son has reached a point in his life where at least the violence has stopped, even if the son isn't exactly a contributing member of society. And then, here we are.
 

terrynever

Well-Known Member
Lifetime Member
SoSH Member
Aug 25, 2005
21,717
pawtucket
Could Remy end up becoming a better announcer through all this? He seemed more business-like yesterday and stuck to the game, which is never a bad idea.
 
M

MentalDisabldLst

Guest
keninten said:
That`s a pretty broad brush to be painting alot of people with. Religion should be left out of this discussion along with politics and sexual preferences.
 
It was a sidebar note on a thread tangent.  Permit me a bit of rhetorical flourish.  Rip conceded the point gracefully and I think we can let that issue lie.
 
The bigger deal is P91's point that we ought to consider whether Jared's actions even reflect poorly on his father's child-rearing choices at all.  Given the murky status of nature vs nurture on things like this, and the fact that we're talking about an adult capable of his own decisions, oughtn't we hold Jared solely responsible?  Some people are just monsters (or just plain screwed up), even if they happen to have famous fathers.  I'm not entirely convinced that Jerry Remy couldn't have had a more-positive impact on his son's development, but I definitely don't know for sure one way or another with enough certainty to damn the man and his career because of it.
 
rundugrun said:
How did this thread devolve into a gay marriage debate? Also, there is a difference between paying for Jared's legal costs for his first scrape with the law and paying a top flight defense attorney to game the system and ensure that your son doesn't get jail time. An objective father would have realized pretty quickly that Jared needed a major wake up call. For me, pulling the plug on the fancy defense lawyer is a good start.
 
I'll repeat my earlier question: Why do we care who he hired, or that he hired anyone?  Facing legal action against themselves or their family, who in their right minds would hire anyone but the best attorney they could afford / find?
 
You're saying that you want him fired from his post at NESN, but if he had hired a less zealous or competent legal counsel for his son, you'd be OK with him remaining the Red Sox color commentator?  I simply don't understand.
 

joyofsox

empty, bleak
Lifetime Member
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Jul 14, 2005
7,552
Vancouver Island
terrynever said:
Could Remy end up becoming a better announcer through all this? He seemed more business-like yesterday and stuck to the game, which is never a bad idea.
 
I had the "ballpark sounds" option on and did not watch NESN, but in the spring training games I saw, he was simply doing a lame play-by-play over every single replay - offering nothing more than telling us what we could all see on our screen. Maybe he offered some token analysis every few innings. Pretty much the same thing he has been doing for the last few seasons. He's found a comfortable rut - describing the replays requires no advance prep work, no real knowledge of the other team - and seems quite satisfied to stay in it. I don't see him bothering to change at this point. 
 

yep

Member
SoSH Member
Feb 3, 2006
2,465
Red Sox Natin
This thread has kind jumped the shark, in terms of main-board content, I think. But to the point:
TomRicardo said:
Do this many people think Remy is actually good not horrid at his job?
Remy had/has a skill-set, separate from pure baseball-intelligence, which is an ability to talk for three hours a day, six months a year, without:
 
- a grating, offensive voice;
- lots of ums, ahhs, stammering, not-sure-what-to-say noises;
- going on tedious and poorly-formulated multi-minute "thinking out loud" dissertations. 
 
The above alone is actually a much rarer skill-set than it gets credit for, as anyone who has ever sat on a conference-call can attest to. Quite a lot of very intelligent people, and even people who have graduated broadcast-school programs or public-speaking courses can quickly become completely unlistenable if they are not working from a script or from prepared remarks. And that includes professional talkers such as salespeople, trial-lawyers, entertainers, etc. 
 
Remy also a certain very real appeal (albeit perhaps not an acutely SoSH-oriented one):
 
- He's a local, and you can hear it in his voice;
- He has a down-to-earth, barstool-type delivery and demeanor;
- He spent almost his entire career with the Red Sox;
- He does a pretty good job at providing a narrative about what the players are thinking and what's happening on the field, from a human-interest POV;
- He usually knows the players, their names, and how they fit into the picture, and;
- Last but not least, you can tell who he's rooting for, but he's not a "homer"
 
Compared with some platonic ideal of the perfect color-commentator, there is a lot to find fault with his baseball-analysis, shilling of sideline businesses, re-hashing old jokes and so on. But compared to the real world of color-commentators, he is often significantly better than the national guys, and vastly better than most other hometown-broadcasters I have heard. 
 
The collective quality of commentary on this board, for example, is much better than anything you generally find on a broadcast, but a collective conference-call of SoSH would probably be an unlistenable horror-show. And I dare anyone to start a live-stream of yourself talking through a real game, and see if anyone prefers it for more than ten minutes, much less a full season-- extemporaneous public-speaking is a different thing from posting when you have something interesting to say. Coming up with a steady stream of unique and intelligent insights is much easier when you have time to formulate your thoughts, than when the clock is running and dead-air is the enemy. 
 
That said, the Sox have other options.
 
I think Remy's brand is tarnished. His value, such as it is, was based on being a down-to-earth, barstool-type guy, not a brilliant baseball mind. I don't quite know how gay marriage got mixed into this thread, but whatever value Remy had, was tied up in his ability to yuck it up during slow/meaningless games, and his earthy relatability as a knowledgeable fan of the team and the game. I don't/won't/can't judge his parenting abilities etc from afar, but too much of his family's dirty laundry has been aired for me to feel like he's still my lovable old TV-buddy, watching the game along with me. 
 
I like Eck. I think he has a better baseball mind than Remy, and I generally prefer his commentary. He doesn't have the same on-air charisma, warmth, and chemistry with Don, but maybe that stuff could emerge in time. I'd love to see how Pedro or Schilling might fare, if either is interested in the job-- both have a demonstrated, opinionated, "loudmouth" streak, which I think is a non-trivial part of the color-commentator's job, that Eck sometimes lacks. The job of the color guy is, in part, to have something to say, even when there is nothing to say. I'd love to see Ortiz get a shot, but he's still playing. I have no idea whether any of these guys are interested in the job. Is Millar looking for a full-time gig?
 

Reverend

for king and country
Lifetime Member
SoSH Member
Jan 20, 2007
64,040
It would be really awesome if Eck would take the color job.
 

Sprowl

mikey lowell of the sandbox
Dope
SoSH Member
Jun 27, 2006
34,441
Haiku
Mike Lowell was a fine stand-in for Remy a few years back - in fact, he did so well that Remy didn't like him at all upon returning, and behaved as if Lowell were a threat. Eck and Lowell are the two best stand-ins I can remember.
 
M

MentalDisabldLst

Guest
That's a great breakdown of Remy's skills, Yep.  And I appreciate the argument of, "too much of his family's dirty laundry has been aired for me to feel like he's still my lovable old TV-buddy, watching the game along with me".
 
I'd just say that time smooths a lot of such things, and if we can assume it won't alter Remy's broadcast style, it won't be long before even an informed listener like this crowd will forget about it as they watch a Sox game.  Meanwhile, I'd be cautious of a "grass is always greener" approach.  Eck isn't a long-term solution, for reasons we've discussed, and most options we could pick up out there are very likely to be much worse than Jerry Remy.  There can be lots of boring moments in baseball games, even boring games, and many announcers are part of the problem.  Remy, in my experience, is part of the solution.
 

Hoplite

New Member
Oct 26, 2013
1,116
Very good rundown by yep. By virtue of having been the team's announcer for such a longer period of time, there's also a nostalgic aspect to hearing Remy's voice. And he obviously works quite well with Don, who I love. I second Mental's thoughts that we should be careful about "the grass is always greener" approach. As far as announcers go, we could be doing much worse. I think Eck would annoy the crap out of me if he was the fulltime announcer. I can only hear him say "gotta have that" and "good cheese" so many times a year.
 

Reverend

for king and country
Lifetime Member
SoSH Member
Jan 20, 2007
64,040
Regarding the greener grass, I would encourage anyone who might be so interested and has access to mlb.tv to listen to Alex Speier do color on the WEEI broadcast on March 29th.
 
He's tremendous. I'm not sure anymore that I even knew what green was before that.
 

Sille Skrub

Dope
Dope
SoSH Member
Mar 3, 2004
5,930
Massachusetts
Castig and O'Brien also do a great job on WEEI. 
 
With all of the Remy stuff going on, this season I find it preferable to just listen on the radio than watch on NESN.
 

Granite Sox

Member
SoSH Member
Feb 6, 2003
5,055
The Granite State
Hoplite said:
Very good rundown by yep. By virtue of having been the team's announcer for such a longer period of time, there's also a nostalgic aspect to hearing Remy's voice. And he obviously works quite well with Don, who I love. I second Mental's thoughts that we should be careful about "the grass is always greener" approach. As far as announcers go, we could be doing much worse. I think Eck would annoy the crap out of me if he was the fulltime announcer. I can only hear him say "gotta have that" and "good cheese" so many times a year.
 
This is the essential issue with Eck as a full-time color man to me.
 
He has a very defined schtick: iron, moss, bridge, gotta have it, hair, cheese (sneaky and/or educated).  Orsillo falls prey to it every game, and they actually get distracted away from the action with Don attempting to be mini-Eck.
 
In addition to his off-field endeavors and requirements, I think Eck has a decent understanding of his limitations and picks his spots to avoid burnout.  If he were hired for a full season, I'd pull my moss...er hair out by mid-May.
 
Remy is good at what he does, and he's a darn sight better than what is out there for other teams (I spent time yesterday watching Giants, Pirates, and Yankees broadcasts, and the color guys were very unimpressive, to say the least).
 
As SS notes, Joe and Dave are always available if righteous indignation can't be overcome.
 

terrisus

formerly: imgran
SoSH Member
Sille Skrub said:
Castig and O'Brien also do a great job on WEEI. 
 
With all of the Remy stuff going on, this season I find it preferable to just listen on the radio than watch on NESN.
 
That's what I've been doing as well, although while watching the television on mute as well.
 
There seems to be an even bigger delay between the radio and the television than in past years though. Normally it would be like this during national games, but during NESN games the delay wouldn't be that long. But, so far this year the delay seems as bad as it would normally be during national games.
 
I wonder if they're putting more of a delay in place because they're more concerned with something happening/being said in the booth that they need to edit around.
 
EDIT: As a note, I don't really have too much of a problem with the Remy situation, it's more just that I just like the radio broadcasts.