john flaherty will save our broadcasts.

we all know that i love the yankees, but can't stand michael kay. i tuned in to the twins-yanks broadcast last night fully expecting the usual bromidic nonsense from kay and whoever was paired with him-- singleton, who's not awful, or perhaps kaat, whom i like somewhat. i heard a voice that sounded like al leiter's, but that was a bit more subdued.

turns out it was former yankee backup catcher john flaherty. he didn't say much, and when he did it was at the prompting of a specific question from kay, at least at first. he was calm, and his statements were imperfect: he trailed off mid-sentence a few times, and he tripped over a word on occassion.

but he sounded great. he let kay call the game, and didn't bite when kay tried to sucker him into a heated debate. he added some interesting comments on the weight of the catcher's mask (he had a herniated disc, so his trainer in tampa switched him to a hockey mask), and about pitch sequencing (when a-rod struck out). he talked about fundamentals, but one by one, and without using the cliche of "fundamentals." in other words, he was talking about baseball, with no bluster or false excitement, just with an appreciation for what was going on, and with a responsibility to help the average baseball fan understand everything, in all of its nuance.

but the best part was the silence. he didn't talk when he didn't have to, and the faint sounds of the game itself shone through. that hasn't happened in a yankee broadcast for as long as i can remember. the times when he trailed off were because the action was resuming, and he realized that the pitch was more important than his thought. kay, and john sterling, and other announcers try to impose; they foist their catchphrases and vapid pseudo-analyses on the public, superimposing themselves over the game. the beauty of an announcer like vin scully, for example, is that he understands that the game is beautiful, not the instant interpretation of the game. flaherty didn't impose himself: he complemented the action like another camera angle or a well-placed area light. maybe he was too timid, but his calm demeanor couched his silence in terms of an overarching perspective, not in terms of hesitancy.

i believe that he will get even better. he's only one season removed from being on the field, and his inexperience in the booth was clear. he used the phrase "nice job" at least 6 times, for everything from a cuddyer single to get the run in, to a mientkiewicz stop on a sharp grounder, to an abreu snare on a liner to right. while i believe that the genuineness of his statements insure that they are not themselves bromidic, i wouldn't mind if he came up with different ways of complimenting players, or even if he didn't do it so often on relatively routine plays.

kay was his usual self. "the yankees are writing a GLOVE story," he declared after the mientkiewicz play, and he also said that the last time the giants and yankees played each other in san francisco during the regular season was... in the 1962 world series. kay and flaherty disagreed on mauer's sac bunt that moved the tying run into scoring position, and kay kept hounding flaherty, either trying to get him to cave in or trying to lure him into a superfluous conflict. flaherty didn't bite, and seemed to take a small degree of satisfaction in what happened next: "the sac bunt worked," he said, when the next batter, cuddyer, singled home the tying run.

so long live john flaherty. i fear that he won't be popular, with his steady tone and his penchant for quiet, so please feel free to contact the yes network to offer your support (info at yesnetwork.com). and listen this friday, when he + ken singleton will broadcast the game without interference from kay! not bad for our wonderful backup catcher, who started his career behind rich gedman and ended it, 849 hits later, with a .252 career average and 80 home runs, behind jorge posada.