I know what you’re wondering, Avid Reader: Tell us, wise and benevolent one, what you think of Dick Vitale being voted into the Basketball Hall of Fame?
Glad you asked, AR. I’m torn, actually. For me, Dick Vitale’s career has always seemed like a Saturday Night Live sketch about a deliberately annoying sports broadcaster. That anyone has a reaction to Dick Vitale’s work other than complete annoyance is, if true, and it must be true, one of the remarkable facts of modern life.
Further, I would submit that the standard for annoyance, in this case, is not merely personal and subjective. Vitale is just bad at his job. Example: When you hear broadcasters talk about their craft, one thing they’ll say is there’s often a moment in a game when the drama and excitement and sights and sounds are at their peak, and part of a broadcaster’s job is to see that moment coming and, when it does, shut the hell up and let the pictures and sounds tell the story.
What does Dicky V do when that moment comes? Hint: Not shut the hell up.
ITS AWESOME BABY!!! WITH A CAPITAL AAAA!!! IT’S UNBELIEVABLE!!! WE’RE ROCKING AND ROLLING IN CHAMPAIGN-URBANA!!!!….
(That last part is true, by the way. Not that they actually were rocking and rolling in Champaign-Urbana - I’ve been there, and it seems unlikely - but that Vitale actually bellowed it.)
I used to think Vitale was tolerable in a studio setting, where the Pavlovian motivation to go nuts isn’t there. But for this year’s NCAAs they had Bobby Knight in the studio, and Vitale’s love for Knight goes beyond man-crush to something that appears romantic or even sexual…. he just can’t keep his hands off the General. Yuck.)
But having said all that…..
Again, I’m torn. Not because Vitale’s a nice guy who loves college basketball. (By that criterion, I’m a hall of famer.)
I’m torn because there seem to be people, many of them, who connect Dick Vitale to college basketball the way they do Keith Jackson to college football. Those people must be dumb or crazy, but halls of fame are for dumb and crazy people too, I guess.
