Whispers

Whispers

 

Listen hard enough, and you’ll hear the voice of former Bulls’ announcer Jim Durham in the background on ESPN’s “The Last Dance.”  Durham did Bulls’ games for eighteen years, from Dick Motta to Phil Jackson, from close to a championship with Norm Van Lier and Jerry Sloan to the real thing with Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen.  “Here’s Michael at the foul line, the shot on Ehlo…GOOD!!”  Durham left in a salary dispute.

 

Announcers may matter more in Chicago than other cities.  If so, blame Jack Brickhouse and Harry Cary.  Brickhouse was such a homer, to the point you were too embarrassed to go there anymore.  And that was just with baseball.  When he called Bears’ games with Irv (That’s right, Jack!) Kupcinet, Brickhouse entered a world all his own, where punts and passes were forever confusing the play-by-play man.  As for the pre-stroke Caray, he was a mean human being who wielded a microphone like a club, never caring even once whom he hit or injured.  To listen to Caray was to take part in the crime.

 

So Durham was a godsend.  So was Wayne Larrivee, who did the Bears for thirteen seasons before the Packers snatched him up.  And, of course, John Rooney, who always let the faithful know, “That’s a White Sox winner!”  Larrivee says the Packers were his dream job even as a kid, so I can’t pin his loss on the McCaskeys.  And yet you wonder how they could let someone like that go without intervening to make an obscene offer to keep him.  Listen to Larrivee, and you come away impressed by his mix of concision and excitement and, yes, objectivity while still coming across as a fan.

 

Did I mention Rooney left in a salary dispute after the 2005 Championship?  The fight was more with the radio station than management, but still you have to wonder.  Why would teams let two such iconic voices as Durham and Rooney go?  The silver lining with Rooney is that he was teamed with Ed Farmer.  I’d say he rubbed off on Farmer in all the right ways.

But now Farmer’s gone, too.  I need a voice I can trust, one that’s dependable, distinct and honest.  We can only hope.