Broadcast review: Dewayne Staats' low-key call works for Rays games

Jesse Spector

Broadcast review: Dewayne Staats' low-key call works for Rays games image
With 162 games in a season for each team, a fan watching an entire year’s worth of games on television will spend 19 days, 19 hours and 12 minutes in front of a rectangle showing baseball. This is a lot of time, and it is only natural — especially in today’s world — that there will be distractions.

So, how do broadcasters bring you into the game? This year, Sporting News is grading announcers on how they grab your attention. This time, it’s the Rays on Fox Sports Florida with Dewayne Staats and Brian Anderson.

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HOME RUN CALLS

The Rays trailed the Blue Jays by a run on Sunday afternoon when Evan Longoria came to the plate in the sixth inning against Marcus Stroman. By the time Longoria was done, the Rays no longer trailed.

Staats and Anderson reach a lull in their conversation about Stroman’s path to the majors when the right-hander delivers his 2-1 pitch. That sets up Staats perfectly for his call.

“LONG ONE!” he exclaims. “Off the bat of Longoria! THAT BABY’S OUTTA HERE! A 2-1 pitch. Longoria connects to tie this game.”

There’s a pause as Longoria circles the bases, and Staats continues, “Evan’s fifth home run. It’s a 1-1 ballgame.”

The initial jolt of Staats’ call is great, because it grabs your attention if you’ve drifted off. He doesn’t follow it by going over the top with theatrics. It’s just a crisp, well-delivered home run call.

Anderson follows: “Having strikeouts in the first two at-bats, you know he’s looking at video, figuring out what he can do. He had the count in his favor, and he finally got a pitch that hung over the plate. Not a whole lot of action on that pitch right there. Evan out in front, and he ties the game.”

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The reason Longoria’s blast tied the game was that there was another home run earlier, by Josh Donaldson off Jake Odorizzi. On a 2-2 pitch, it came as Staats was recapping the season series between Tampa Bay and Toronto.

Seamlessly, he went into his call: “There’s a long one, back into left. Guyer… will watch this one get out of here, and Donaldson belts his ninth home run of the year to give Toronto a 1-0 lead.”

Anderson: “And I believe that was a cutter from Jake Odorizzi that was left out over the plate, very similar to the two-run homer that Manny Machado hit off of him in Baltimore. Jake Odorizzi trying to use all of his pitches, and that is a fastball that definitely cut. You see where Conger is set up. That front-door cutter, or it was just a fastball that he got around and yanked to the middle of the plate. Either way, you miss your location, that’s the risk that you take.”

It’s good that Anderson, a former pitcher, is there to provide quality analysis, because on the “opposition” home run, Staats is not as strong as on his call for the Rays. It’s an oddity for an announcer who is not generally the rah-rah sort, but having Anderson there with instant recall for a previous homer allowed by Odorizzi is the highlight in this instance, when otherwise the call is a bit too low-key.

Grade: 6 out of 10

GREAT DEFENSIVE PLAYS

The “Must C” videos on MLB.com are eye-opening because they give you the chance to see the same play, multiple times, with different announcers making the calls. For Steven Souza Jr.’s diving catch on a Chris Davis drive on April 27, the video includes Staats and Anderson, Rays radio and Orioles TV.

In this case, you really get an appreciation for how low-key Staats is, especially compared to the nonstop talking that is necessary for a radio announcer. Being low-key, however, does not mean low-energy, and Staats nails it when he elevates his voice to yell, “SOUZA! OH, WHAT A GRAB!”

It allows Staats to provide a better call than Gary Thorne, an excellent broadcaster in his own right, but a very wordy one who in this case trips over his own call a bit by talking about the wall when the wall never came into play.

For baseball on television, you don’t necessarily need all the words. There are times when it would benefit Staats to add a bit more, but minimalism on a big play like this allows the action to speak louder than appropriately loud words.

Grade: 8 out of 10

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EIGHTH INNING BLOWOUTS

Lopsided games are rare for the Rays, as a pitching-dominant team that tends to play lower-scoring contests on both sides of the ball. On April 24 in New York, though, Tampa Bay got an excellent performance from starter Drew Smyly, while the Rays pounded four home runs off Michael Pineda.

The Rays led 5-0 after one inning, and by the time it got to the eighth, Tampa Bay had a 7-1 lead.

Staats introduces new Yankees reliever Nick Goody and Anderson gets off a half-hearted name pun. Then, they just proceed as if it’s the third inning of a close game, calling the action as it happens until throwing to Todd Kalas to promote a Chris Archer bobblehead… and Kalas has a brief word with Rays owner Stuart Sternberg, asking, “Enjoying today?”

“How could you not?” Sternberg replies from his front-row seat in the Bronx.

This is one of the better house ads that a baseball broadcast will ever run, and Staats and Anderson get a chuckle out of it, but there’s little that makes you shy away from seeing if there might be a better game on another channel. This is where Staats being understated lets him down, because even a Logan Forsythe home run gets very little pop: “Fly ball… hit deep to right… Beltran will watch this one get out, and Forsythe has homered!”

These kind of situations can be dangerous, because announcers have more of an opportunity to wander into areas that get them in trouble, but that doesn’t mean that just whiling away the remaining time in the game makes for compelling television. The bottom of the eighth inning of this game is an effective sleep aid.

Grade: 4 out of 10

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REPLAY REVIEWS

In the second inning of a 5-1 game on April 21, Hanley Ramirez hit a little nubber up the third base line that Odorizzi fielded and fired to first for an out to end the inning. The Red Sox decided to challenge.

Staats’ initial call was very strong: “Check swing, this is gonna be a tough play. Odorizzi – off balance throw – OUT at first base! The stretch by Pearce on the off-balance throw from Odorizzi.”

Then, it goes downhill. 

“We’ve seen the downside of reviewing plays,” Staats says. “Without question.”

“You’re destroying this ballgame,” Anderson adds.

“I mean, they’re talking about speeding the game up,” Staats says. “The stretch, and is the foot on the bag is gonna be the question.”

“Oh boy,” Anderson says. “Clear and convincing enough to overturn? Again, that’s gonna be a subjective call.”

Anderson adds that his “knee-jerk” reaction is that the call on the field will stand because it’s too close to overturn. He winds up being right about that, but it’s really not all so bad as for Staats to call it “the worst-case scenario for contested plays,” even with another review a few pitches earlier.

The replay system isn’t perfect, but it’s getting better all the time as everyone gets more and more used to it. This game took four hours and 16 minutes for the Rays to grind out a 12-8 win. Would it really have made that much of a difference if it had been 4:12 for the same result? Nobody is getting hurt by this, and by grousing about it in the third year of the system, you’re basically telling the audience that your product is unappealing for a very silly reason.

Grade: 3 out of 10 

WALK-OFFS

It should come as no surprise that when it comes to a single play to decide a game, Staats keeps it simple. That was exactly what happened on Saturday, when Curt Casali singled off Brett Cecil to lift the Rays to victory over the Blue Jays.

“BASE HIT!” Staats yells as the ball sails past the drawn-in infield. “RAYS WIN! Casali drives in Miller! The Rays walk it off – in the bottom of the ninth! 4-3, Tampa Bay!”

Anderson proceeds to recap the inning, focusing at the end on praise for Casali’s patience at the plate through the decisive at-bat. It’s simple and effective.

It’s also worth noting Staats’ approach on Brett Gardner’s home run to beat the Rays a week earlier.

“LONG ONE TO RIGHT!” Staats calls. “That one is gone. 3-2, New York. Gardner hits it out. His third hit of the day, accounting for the third run of the ballgame for New York, and the Yankees win it 3-2 on a long one to right off the bat of Brett Gardner. How about that?”

Anderson notes the pitch from Erasmo Ramirez being similar to one that Chase Headley grounded out on, but that being behind on the count to Gardner, he had to come back over the plate.

It doesn’t take a ton of words to succeed on television calls. Sometimes, Staats can be sparse to a fault, and Anderson is not so loquacious as to fill all the air. On walk-offs, the formula is just right.

Grade: 10 out of 10

FINAL GRADE: 31 out of 50

Jesse Spector