Ground Control to Major Thom

I'm here to talk about another example of that heinous Fox bias -- but not in the way you think. I'd like to speak about Thom Brennaman, Fox's B-level baseball announcer.

I first became familiar with Mssr. Brennaman about ten or twelve years ago. He worked for WGN, Chicago's answer to TBS. This was back when Harry Carray was still alive and still announcing the Cubs' games. He was getting older, though, so he would sit out the middle innings. During the 4th, 5th, and 6th, Thom took over. I didn't like him much, but I was a kid and preferred Harry Carray.

When I stopped watching WGN in the mid- or late-90s, Thom dropped out of sight. That is until last year, when I bought a used copy of Acclaim's All-Star Baseball 2003. Lo and behold, I hear the voice of Thom Brennaman as the game's commentator. (Joining him at color is Steve Lyons, whom I'll also discuss in a moment.) The commentary for that game is suitable, at least as far as Thom goes -- Lyons comes across as a moron, and the repetitive nature of video game commentary doesn't help much.

But now I have to listen to him while watching the Astros' playoff run. And I've noticed something a little...odd about his commentary.

Let's do a little exercise. Here are two examples of what I'm talking about -- these examples are fictional in the sense that these exact words were not spoken by Thom (because I don't access to transcripts and was too emotionally involved in the games to remember these word-for-word) but you'll get the basic point. Here we go.

1. "Jeff Bagwell to the plate for the Astros now...he's hitless in his last 12 at-bats. Just a terrible string of plate appearances for the Houston first baseman. There are talks, with his bad right shoulder, his advancing age, that his remarkable career may be coming to an end."
2. "Scott Rolen will be next to bat for the Cardinals. He was 0-for-4 yesterday, and did not have a hit in the NLDS against Los Angeles. There are some who would call that a slump, and there are some who would say...he's due. He's like a powderkeg, waiting to explode right now."

Hmm. That seem right to you? Does that seem maybe...biased toward one side? A side that has a red bird on their uniforms?

Now, I know what you're saying. Those examples are fictional. Yes, they are. (The Bagwell one especially, since he didn't go on such a streak, but Scott Rolen did -- the bit about him being hitless in the Dodger series is a fact -- and Thom did say the thing about him being due.) So what about reality, J.?

All righty: today's game was more or less a pitching duel between Roger Clemens and Jeff Suppan. Even though the Astros were winning from the bottom of the first on, when Jeff Kent launched a two-run homer into the Crawford boxes, all of their commentary on Clemens was still somehow negative. He wasn't keeping the ball down, he wasn't fooling anyone with his splitter, his pitch count was too high, yadda yadda yadda. Suppan, on the other hand, was pitching a gem in the eyes of Thom and the Fox boys in the booth. Excellent stuff, keeping the pitch count down, all those good things.

Now, Suppan wasn't pitching poorly -- don't get me wrong. But boldly praising the work of one side while blindly ignoring the work (or blindly criticizing the work of) the other side sounds...well, an awful lot like Fox. My favorite part is when Thom and Steve rambled for five minutes about the differences in pitch counts, followed by a graphic which displayed them: Clemens 102, Suppan 93. For those of you who can't subtract -- Fox employees, this means you -- that would be a difference of nine pitches. Yeah. Clemens also had more strikeouts, less walks, fewer hits, and fewer runs. And he, ya know, won. But Suppan was "brilliant."

In the eyes of Thom Brennaman, every decision Phil Garner makes is not only bad, but inexplicable -- "I just don't understand this." He describes the Astros bullpen in the same terms one would use to describe convicted felons: "hideous," "awful," that kind of stuff. Carlos Beltran and Brad Lidge are the only good players on the team, the rest of them losers and fools, all.

And Steve Lyons is just a moron. He comes across as a giggling, fawning idiot who knows next to nothing about the game. Which would perhaps be excusable if he hadn't played major league baseball. (I contrast him, oh, every single other former-player-turned-announcer, but exemplary examples would be Steve Stone -- who worked those WGN games with Brennaman -- ESPN's Joe Morgan, and the Astros' own Alan Ashby.)

I'd think I was imagining this bias thing, but every single person I talk to agrees with me. Are we crazy, or is Fox at it again? In the most bizarre way possible?

EDITED TO TALK ABOUT SOMETHING TOTALLY OFF-TOPIC:
I should also talk about the paperback edition of Al Franken's masterpiece, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right, which I spotted in Barnes & Noble tonight. If you don't have this book, pick up the paperback -- it's all got all-new stuff on Ann Coulter and (especially) Bill O'Reilly, to whom the book has now been hastily re-dedicated. (Fox's laughable lawsuit against Franken -- filed at the behest of the touchy loudmouth O'Reilly -- gave Franken tons of free publicity, helped the book to #1 on the Amazon lists, and made everyone at Fox look like idiots.) It's funny, it's informative, and it disintegrates the myth of the liberal media. If you don't hate Sean Hannity -- or if you do, and are looking for even more reasons to see his head removed from his shoulders -- read this book. Go, now!