I’m not going to go too wild on this. Other sites are doing similar posts as well.
I’ll provide what I feel are the best calls in Sports Broadcasting this year. The only way to do this is to post videos and that’s what I’ll do. I know I said Best and Worst earlier, but the search is taking too long. We’ll provide the best calls in 2011.
We’ll go sport-by-sport and you can either agree or disagree.
Baseball
Dan Shulman, ESPN Radio — Game 6, World Series, David Freese Walk-off home run
Gary Thorne, MLB International — Same as above. Two great calls of the same moment.
Boxing
Larry Merchant vs. Floyd Mayweather, HBO Pay Per View — Floyd cursed out Larry and then Larry had the comeback of the year.
College Basketball
Gus Johnson, CBS Sports — Pac-10 Championship, Isiah Thomas hits the game-winning shot. “COLD BLOODED!”
College Football
Joe Tessitore, ESPN — “TOUCHDOWN! THEY DID IT!!” Iowa State upsets Oklahoma State knocking the Cowboys out of the BCS.
Joe Tessitore, ESPN on ABC — “Iowa State, USC and Baylor just made a mess of the BCS.” Baylor upsets Oklahoma less than 24 hours later and Joe Tessitore was there.
Golf
Dan Hicks, Johnny Miller and the Golf Channel on NBC crew — The 72nd hole for Rory McIlroy as he wins the US Open at Congressional. Great job by Dan and Johnny as they describe Rory McIlroy winning his first major championship.
Horse Racing
Larry Collmus, NBC — The 137th Kentucky Derby. It marked Larry’s first race for NBC as he replaced Tom Durkin who left in 2010. And he got a huge upset as Animal Kingdom won the race.
Jack Edwards Calls of the Year
Living in New England and having access to NESN and Jack Edwards is the gift that keeps on giving. He was in rare form in 2011. We begin with Jack mocking Chad LaRose of the Carolina Hurricanes with a “Yapping, yapping, yapping all the way to the box.” Classic Jack.
“GET UP!” In Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals, Roman Hamrlik of the Montreal Canadiens went down and Jack decided to yell at him.
In Game 7, Hamrlik went down again, but the Bruins went on to score and Jack decided to rub it in.
And after the B’s closed out the Habs, Jack decided to make some puzzling final comments about royalty and having fun. Eight months later, I’m still trying to figure them out.
NFL
none
NHL
Mike Emrick, Versus — Tim Thomas makes a tremendous save in the Eastern Conference Finals.
Women’s World Cup
Ian Darke, ESPN — “ABBY WAMBACH HAS SAVED THE USA’S LIFE IN THIS WOMEN’S WORLD CUP!” Ian Darke had a tremendous call of the goal that tied Brazil in extra time in the quarterfinals.
And that will do it for us.
