Backstage Pass Radio
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Backstage Pass Radio
S6: E9: Bill Brown (Houston Astros Hall of Fame Broadcaster - Voices of the Game
Date: May 29, 2024
Name of podcast: Backstage Pass Radio
Episode title and number: S6: E9: Bill Brown (Houston Astros Hall of Fame Broadcaster - Voices of the Game
SHOW SUMMARY:
My neighbor and Hall of Fame sportscaster Bill Brown, "Brownie," steps up to the mic, not for play-by-play, but for a heart-to-heart on his 30-year love affair with sports broadcasting and the Houston Astros. As we peel back the curtain on the meticulous world of commentating, from gripping hockey games to the narrative-laden pastime of baseball, Brownie opens the vault of his personal and professional highs, including his cherished induction into the Astros' Hall of Fame. But it's not just about the roar of the crowd; we swing into his life's other passions—golf, photography, and the community ties that root us all, inspired by figures like my own father.
With Brownie's storytelling, we're carried through the rhythms of a broadcaster's game day—an early rise, pre-game prep through the final call, and the post-game wrap-up. Discover the unseen challenges, the dedication to craft, and the importance of staying nimble on your feet, especially when the unexpected rain delay throws you a curveball. Then, we step into the bittersweet reality for local broadcasters during the postseason, where the deep-seated connections to their team are put on pause, and the airwaves are commanded by national voices—a stark contrast to the familiar cadence they provide all season.
But wait, there's more than just calls and commentary. Brownie guides us through the world of sports memorabilia, sharing a poignant tale involving Nolan Ryan, and the complexities of baseball's unwritten rules, from retaliation tactics to when to hang up the headset for family time. In a reflective swing, we return to the broadcast booth after retirement, diving into Brownie's passion for writing and the controversial MLB sign-stealing scandal he experienced firsthand. Lastly, we capture the essence of life's richness as Brownie illustrates his journey into photography, threading it with the joy of golf, and the powerful act of giving back within our community, leaving us inspired to find those intersections in our own lives.
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Your Host,
Randy Hulsey
My guest today is from the Midwest city of Sedalia, missouri, and is in person with me here in the Crystal Vision studio. It's Randy Holsey with Backstage Pass Radio and I hope everyone is doing great. My guest today is an author, a photographer and a Hall of Fame sportscaster who spent 30 years as the television and radio voice of the Houston Astros. Sit tight and I will catch up with my friend and neighbor, bill Brown, when we come back and turn alerts on for this and all upcoming podcasts.
Speaker 2:And now here's your host of Backstage Pass Radio, randy Halsey.
Speaker 1:Welcome everyone to a super cool bonus episode this evening with the one and only Bill Brown Brownie. Welcome.
Speaker 3:Thank you very much, Randy. I've known your dad for many years. At last, we get to meet in person. How about that but I do want to come hear you perform very soon.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, I'm always around somewhere, so we'll get one that's close to the house and get you and Diane over there.
Speaker 3:Sound like a plan, sounds great.
Speaker 1:Well, it's great to have you here and I wanted to give dad a shout out, since you threw his name out there and he was very instrumental in getting me in front of you and saying you know you need to get, you need to get Brownie over here and talk to him. He's got a lot to a lot to talk about. I'm sure and I said I'd love to do that Hook us up.
Speaker 3:Your dad is one of those special guys who has helped so many people. He can fix anything that happens around the house or around the yard and we have a lot of widows in our community, as you're well aware and he's really helped a lot of people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're right, he's a special guy and I talk to him all the time. We joke with him a little bit about the little bit amount of money that he charges people to do things.
Speaker 3:Yes, too small.
Speaker 1:And I said, dad, you know you. You you know you're valuable to people and you you have to make it worth your time. You know you're breaking your back and he's like I just can't do it. He's just one of those guys, you know you, you meet. You meet a guy like Walt once in a blue moon that that really is genuinely there to help people and to maybe make a little bit of money to take mom out to dinner or something like that. Right, it's a special thing.
Speaker 3:So well, he's the kind of person you remember because he is so selfless, yes and um, yeah, we, everybody around the heritage, just you know, our 55 and over community, uh, he's invaluable there, we, we love him he's kind of like the uh, the heritage rock star of sorts, like everybody seems to know, dad. Yeah, and believe me, if somebody springs a leak up in the Heritage Lodge, he's right there to fix it. How about that?
Speaker 1:Well, first of all, I just learned that we were I guess that we are both members possibly of the same country club down here at Starling, is that?
Speaker 3:correct. Yes, and we'll have to play sometime. I played Houston National this morning, did you so twice a week? I doubt if you get to play that often, right?
Speaker 1:I'm not going to say that on the air because if my boss listens I don't want to tip him off that I'm not working right. We'll talk after the show. We'll talk after the show.
Speaker 3:Right, talk after the show. Right after the show, right now it's. It's a good little diversion.
Speaker 1:It's only 10 minutes from where we live, so, of course, couldn't be any better. Well, my um, my son-in-law, joined out there and he played minor league ball with the pittsburgh pirates, came back here after he got his college degree, started working and decided just out of the blue that he'd take up the game of golf, and so both of my sons got really interested. So they joined and I said you know, I've I've played golf forever and that's a reason for me to get out and start playing is to spend more time with them. So I joined, so I've been out there I guess I've been out there maybe six or seven months now and uh, I think we played uh, it was, it was last week. I haven't played in about a week because of the travels to North Dakota, of course, that I spoke of, but we have a good time and, yeah, it's a great place and it's close to the house, which is really nice.
Speaker 3:Well, and what a great way to be together as a family and joke around, have a nice, wonderful opportunity to visit as guys, and you know, there's nothing like a round of golf to get a little bit closer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree with you 100%. And speaking of golf, I had a. My past guest was recently on my show. She's a Texas Radio Music Hall of Famer herself. Her name's Dana Steele. I mentioned her to you and she was telling me on the air she's like I'm not any good at golf, but I really want to get out there and play. So how about this? Like two sportscasters, you and I and Dana can get out there and play at Sterling one day.
Speaker 3:That would be a good time. Yeah, we'll invite her out. She's been involved in several auctions at charity golf tournaments. I've played in. So she's very much on the scene and a big name in the community.
Speaker 1:She is a staple in Houston radio for sure. 20 years with KLOL here in Houston and anybody that followed rock radio back in the day that was the station and so she was wonderful to have on. She's been out in Palm Springs doing a play of all things. Have on. She's been out in Palm Springs doing a play of all things. Her mother passed from Alzheimer's and it's kind of her play of what she did to deal with her mother and the challenges of Alzheimer's disease. So it came off to be a big hit.
Speaker 3:So that's what she's doing. That's what we had with my dad. He died of Alzheimer's. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I've heard horror stories about that. You know it's a horrible, horrible thing.
Speaker 3:It's difficult and you know my mom would not put him in a facility, so I had to fly out to Phoenix and do that. Of course, and you know he didn't know us and that's that's very typical at the end of life for Alzheimer's patients. But he did have a great life and it's just, yeah, I don't know what can be done about this. I know so much money has been spent on research and there'll be a breakthrough at some point, but so many people are going to be afflicted by this.
Speaker 1:I couldn't imagine, you know. And to tie this bonus episode, I guess, back to music, I was reading something one time the daughter of Glenn Campbell, the musician Glenn Campbell, when he was in the last stages of Alzheimer's he went out and still played music, but they had teleprompters. He couldn't remember any of his lyrics, but his daughter said night after night that man never missed one note on that guitar it's incredible. I don't know how that works no no, like, where does that?
Speaker 3:is it like I don't know, I can't even wrap my head around yeah, it's, it's amyloid protein problem in the brain and, um, you know, typically I would think that he could have remembered those lyrics from from years ago for a while anyway, until it probably progressed to a late phase of his disease. But it's what you had for lunch that you can't remember.
Speaker 1:The short term then, okay, yep, and I don't know much about it and, interestingly enough, I've had multiple guests on my show who you know Alzheimer's, they're connected with Alzheimer's or somebody that's autistic on the spectrum, you know, and and I, as the podcast host, try to go out and dig up a lot of that information. So it's a learning, a learning game for me too.
Speaker 1:Right, I need to know more about all of it, but there's only so many hours in the day that you can absorb this. You're kind of a busy guy, well, and I think the older I get, the less elasticity I have in this whole brain.
Speaker 3:I don't absorb things like I used to right. True.
Speaker 1:Well, you were born in Sedalia, but did you make your way to Houston? Or, I guess let me rephrase the question what ultimately brought you to Houston?
Speaker 3:The Astros fired Gene Elston.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:And they needed another broadcaster, and that's what brought me here.
Speaker 1:That's a name I haven't heard in many, many years.
Speaker 3:Hall of Fame guy, as you know, and beloved to the fans, sure, tremendous broadcaster and they just decided that they wanted to make a change and I think it was shocking to many, many people. Of course, I got to know Gene a little bit and I interviewed him when, when in town and for a few months, we were doing a book on Astro's history and of course he was the primary Astro's historian at that point. So he was just a treasure trove of information and a wonderful broadcaster, terrific guy. But, as you know, that is the broadcasting business. That's the way things work sometimes.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, it's interesting now that I think back on Dana's interview. She had interviewed many times with the radio station and it wasn't until one of the DJs dropped an F-bomb on live radio and they fired them and called her immediately and said hey, we need you to fill in until we find somebody permanently.
Speaker 1:And she wound up just sticking right. So you never know how you're going to get the seat. It's just a matter of if and when you do get the seat. Well, later on we can go into my version of that story, sure.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you do get the same. Well, later on we can go into my version of that story, sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, you started with the Astros, I guess back in, and you correct me if I'm wrong on dates, but it was 87. Right, and you spent some time before the Astros honing your skills. Talk to me a little bit about the time with the Cincinnati Reds about the time with the Cincinnati Reds.
Speaker 3:Just a wonderful opportunity, because I had come out of Missouri with a degree in journalism, got hired to go to WOAI in San Antonio radio and TV great station, and I wanted to be a sportscaster, but they did not have any openings in sports. So I was a news reporter on radio and TV and I really wanted to do weekend sports. So then that job came open, but my boss, the news director, would not allow me to do the sports on the air. He said, well, you can write it and you can pull the slides and the film which was before videotape and hand it to the news anchorman and he'll read it. But you can't do it on the air. And I said, well, why not? He said, well, you just don't look old enough.
Speaker 1:Like nobody will take you seriously yeah.
Speaker 3:I said I thought we were supposed to be trying to appeal to a younger audience for the ratings. He said it's not that, it's a believability thing, it's a credibility issue. And can you grow a mustache? I said no, I can't.
Speaker 1:So that was the end of that. They wanted you to look like Walter Cronkite or something right yeah. Of course, wow, wow. You said something and at first I thought you were joking before we hit the record button, but you kind of started up as a DJ.
Speaker 3:How do you?
Speaker 1:mention that.
Speaker 3:Well, starting in high school, I actually got on the air in my little town of Sedalia, as you mentioned, and just did odd jobs. But finally I got on the air and I was able to be the sign-on DJ on Sunday morning, which means you put on an hour-on DJ on Sunday morning, which means you put on an hour-long preacher delivering a sermon and play that and then eventually I would fill in. You know, as I moved into my college years, I'd come back for summer employment and, oh, I'd fill in, you know, on a Saturday night for the DJ and play country songs, things of that nature. There'd be ball games. We carried Kansas City Royals and I'd just be at the control board. Nothing special there, but that is a part of the basic training that typically an announcer gets in a small town. You have to work your way up, you have to earn your way up that ladder.
Speaker 1:So that's boot camp. That is boot camp.
Speaker 3:yes, and then eventually got to do some high school football and basketball and things like that.
Speaker 1:Okay, I always wondered what the progression was. I didn't know if, being a good friend of Adam Gordon's all those years, I always wondered yeah, of course he has a degree in communications or whatever, but when does the career actually begin? Is it right out of college? I know a lot of people probably do like college radio or whatever. I know Dana did college radio at A&M right. So did you do any radio at college? Yes, okay.
Speaker 3:I did, and it was not through the University of Missouri, it was on my own. I got a job 30 miles away from Missouri, which is in Columbia, missouri, and Jefferson City, which is the capital city of Missouri. I worked for a radio station there doing play by play, and I did football and basketball high school and college on the weekends and it was the best training I had. Okay, but it did not come through the University of Missouri the weekends and it was the best training I had, but it did not come through the university of Missouri. Interesting, and that is what I encourage young broadcasters to do now. Look, you can't wait for your journalism teacher to get you a job.
Speaker 3:You have to go out and get it yourself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and what's scary about the way I don't want to talk about about the young, the young people out there in business, but things have changed a lot since we were, you know, and COVID changed a lot of the mindset around people wanting to get in the shower and get dressed in the morning and drive to work. Everything's from home on the couch, Like it's just such a different time now than it was.
Speaker 1:And I'm not a young guy, but I'm not an old guy, but I've seen a lot of change since I was a consultant out in the field, going out to customer sites and doing my magic day in and day out.
Speaker 3:Very much so, and that's just the way. Our world is different now, but yet sportscasting, especially play-by-play, is still an old profession of course it hasn't really changed that much. You still have to get on the air somewhere and do games. Yeah, you can get your own youtube channel, which I encourage young people to do if they can't get on the air anywhere. That way, way they can be seen, they have a tape, they can shop around to stations to try to get work.
Speaker 1:But other than that it's pretty difficult, but there's nothing like doing something live in front of a live audience, right? That's where you really cut your teeth, I believe, and I remember Adam being here and then the guy that came after him, ken Double. I love to just listen to those guys because it's like I always felt like I had the gift of Gab, but those guys took it to a whole other level, and hockey's not an easy sport to commentate right.
Speaker 1:And we'll talk a little bit about that. But I admired both of those guys in everything about what you guys do, especially more so now from behind the mic. Right Now that I've taken up a little side hustle here being behind the mic, I really get a better understanding of maybe a little more of what goes into it. But, the thing is, I'm still not live like you guys were, so that's the admirable part of that.
Speaker 3:There's nothing like live broadcasting, sure, and yeah, the inability to take it back and do it over again puts that focus there for you, and so I like both. I like live and taped, but, yeah, there's nothing to bring out your concentration and your focus like a live program.
Speaker 1:I concur 100%. Live program I concur 100%. Well, you spoke a little bit about baseball, basketball and you was it with the Cincinnati Swords Hockey Club?
Speaker 3:Were you doing commentating? I was and this is tough, Randy, because I did not grow up with hockey. I knew nothing about hockey, there weren't games on TV to watch back in that era and I just had to learn it from scratch and it was very, very difficult to do play by play. Now I was doing TV, which is easier than radio. There's a lot more talking on radio required and I had a great analyst and that really helps in anything you're doing If you have a partner, a good color commentator you can lean on.
Speaker 3:There is nothing as good as that Sure, but somehow we got through it. We didn't do a lot of games, but we got through it.
Speaker 1:Of course it's safe to say, with your credentials, that you're great at calling baseball games. But was it a challenge for you to call the hockey games, or did you make it through those pretty easily?
Speaker 3:No, it was a challenge. In fact, I could tell you a little story. In 1972, which was our first year in Cincinnati, we were doing the Swords games. They were an American hockey league, so a minor league, you know, and they played teams that were close by, like Cleveland, so we'd televised some of those games. But I would go out to where they played teams that were close by, like Cleveland, so we'd televise some of those games, but I would go out to where they played the Cincinnati Gardens, which was an old arena, and practice.
Speaker 3:And this is what you do you take your little tape recorder out there and you just practice and then you listen. This is the most difficult thing and I know you've done it with this show listening to and critiquing yourself. Of course it's painful, yes, when none of us seem to like ourselves, of course, and we always nitpick when we hear ourselves as well. I should have said this, of course, but I ran into al michaels okay, sure, in 1972. Well, he was was the voice of the c of the Cincinnati Reds on radio that year, and he was about to do the Winter Olympics hockey. Oh, yeah, of course, on the network, and he hadn't done hockey before either, was this?
Speaker 1:in 80? This was in 72. Okay, 72.
Speaker 3:So that was, I believe, in Japan that year he did. The one you're thinking about probably is Lake Placid in 80, when he had the Do you Believe in Miracles line when the US beat the Russians.
Speaker 2:Correct, but this was you know, and the guy was incredible.
Speaker 3:I could not believe that Al Michaels could get out all these Russian names in the play-by-play. He did an absolutely amazing job, and that taught me there that he was willing to do the homework at the same level that I was doing. Sure, and this was what was required in this business.
Speaker 1:It's funny that you mentioned that. It's not your typical names like well, there's Jim Brown coming up to the plate. You know those are easy, right, I can. I can remember Adam saying you know, you knowim brown coming up to the plate. You know those are easy right, yeah, I can. I can remember adam saying you know, you know t and one up from the point, oleg shargarotsky and it's like how do you say that and not get? Tongue-tied adam, you, you amaze me, man, you're great backhand pass to alexander solzhenitsyn on the fly.
Speaker 3:You know I mean this. Yeah, how do these guys do this? I don't.
Speaker 1:It's a treat to hear them for sure. While we're on the topic of hockey, I wanted to give a quick shout-out to Adam Gordon, who has been very instrumental in helping me get my show off the ground. He was the play-by-play announcer you know. I mentioned to you for the Houston Arrows for probably close to a decade, I think, and Adam's up in Seattle and has really helped mentor me with some recording stuff and getting things right. So, adam, if you're listening, you know, quick shout out to you. I hope all is well up there. But how do you feel like the hockey broadcast, you know, other than the names, differs from the baseball broadcast?
Speaker 3:I think hockey is more difficult because they're changing on the fly, with players coming off the bench and right onto the ice, and you know, you might have three players jumping off over the boards and skating at top speed within a few seconds, and so it's tough to get the identification right. The movement of the puck is so quick. Yes, that's different than baseball. Baseball sets itself apart from the other sports by the inactivity between pitches, makes sense. There is no time for storytelling in hockey. There's time for storytelling in baseball, sure, and things of that nature.
Speaker 3:And I, you know, I did some football, I did some basketball, and and those sports move more quickly too than baseball. So the difficult I think you know a lot of baseball guys can do basketball fairly easily. They can maybe do hockey. I mean, g Gary Thorne was great at both of those on the network level but very few guys have done both, of course, and I just thought it was extremely difficult to keep up with the pace of the hockey game. Yes, and then you had the two intermissions you had to fill.
Speaker 3:Which another job in and of itself Exactly yeah, to fill which another job in and of itself exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I can remember. You know there were, there were times when I would listen to the radio. Or just, you know, listen to adam, but listen to any radio broadcast. But these guys can paint a picture in the mind's eye if they're saying you know, stevens is tied up on the far side boards in the attack zone, you knew exactly where on the ice that play was shaping up. Right, if you knew hockey like that and to paint that picture that quick, you're almost watching this game in your mind's eye without even a TV in front of you and a good announcer can make you follow that game just like that, which is an amazing thing.
Speaker 3:Oh, it is yeah, no, it is to all of us, I think, and and uh, for a baseball broadcaster, the, the quicker pace of that description that's required is what you admire the most their ability to do that so quickly yeah, what, all things equal.
Speaker 1:If you were as good at hockey announcing as you were at baseball, is there one sport that you really would love more? Is there a sport that you love more than baseball? Or is it just baseball by default? You would think that, because you were with the Astros for 30 years, people would automatically assume oh, bill Brown. Yeah, yeah, definitely baseball's his favorite sport, but is it really your favorite sport?
Speaker 3:Yes, by far. Okay, Because I grew up, you know, when I was 14 years old and I was listening to the St Louis Cardinals and they had Harry Carey and Jack Buck, both of whom were Hall of Fame broadcasters. I would listen to them every night and that's what I wanted to do when I was 14 years old.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you knew at an early age, and that happens a lot with the musicians. If you ask them when did you know you wanted to be a musician Six years old, they knew it at a very early age and there's this common denominator with musicians that, five, six years old, there was something that hit them at that age, around that age, and it was instilled in them and it just went from there. And it sounds like that's maybe not quite as young, but even still, as a young man, you knew exactly what you wanted to do going forward.
Speaker 3:And of course, you've had this too. You've had people give you advice along the way, no matter how young you were when you decided your career path, who would try to dissuade you because the odds were too difficult for you to make it right.
Speaker 1:Of course, yeah, let's see. So Texas baseball hall of fame 2004. Texas sports caster. So Texas Baseball Hall of Fame 2004,. Texas Sportscaster of the Year. Fred Hartman Award 2012,. Houston Astros Hall of Fame 2023. You were inducted with Billy Doran, who was an Astros second baseman for what? The better part of a decade? Yep, what did those accolades?
Speaker 3:mean to Bill Brown. You know, the older you get. I think you're certainly very, very appreciative, very appreciative. Didn't even think about that when you got into the business. It wasn't, you know't on your radar screen. But the closer you get to the end of your life, shall we say, awards don't mean as much, maybe, as they would have when you were 40, we'll say, or 50. Makes sense? Yeah, they just don't. But it's a big thrill, it's a huge thrill.
Speaker 1:Well, it's career boosting for you too, right, right? Or for anybody that's receiving the accolades along the way. Yes, right, yes. Does one stand out to you that was just more special than the rest.
Speaker 3:It just kind of it resonated more, or just was more special to you well, the astros hall of fame was was totally unexpected, and I'm on the committee. We have about 10 of us on the committee, so we had been voting on this for three, four years. Once it was started, which was was pretty late in the history of the team, actually, but I didn't put myself in that company. I thought we needed to induct more players before we put another broadcaster in, because we had Milo Hamilton and Gene Elston as broadcasters and I thought we were pretty well set with that.
Speaker 3:To myself Well, maybe someday after you're gone you know they might vote you in, but let's not do that now. And so I was totally surprised, and Billy Doran was one of my very favorite players, so just the the uh coupling with him on that induction night was a special treat as well, and I hadn't seen Billy for decades, so it was a great opportunity to get together with him too where is he at now? He's in Cincinnati, is he okay?
Speaker 1:yes, okay, that's where he grew up and for some reason I flashed back to alan ashby. I know alan and his wife lived out in town lake well, you know he's played the guitar forever. Yes, he told me he told me that yeah okay for sure. He said we let's get together and we'll have to play sometime. Now I said I don't know. I don't know if I'm that good. You better be careful what you you know, be careful who you ask to come to Van Halen now.
Speaker 1:I'll warn you on that there's nothing wrong with Van Halen. I love them too. If you aspire to be a great broadcaster like yourself, share with the listeners what goes into preparing for upcoming games, regardless of the sport that you're announcing for.
Speaker 3:I hate to say this but in all honesty, during the baseball season I wasn't a very good father. I wasn't a very good husband. I wasn't good about doing things around the house because I was totally immersed in baseball. That's all I thought about. For the most part I'm exaggerating, but you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3:Sure, so you know, got up in the morning, read the box scores, watch the highlights, find out everything I could about the game that was going to happen that night, do all the research I could on the other team's starting pitcher, on the popular players on the other team, try to get something different on our guys.
Speaker 3:We'd get stats sent to us on the computer and hey, so-and-so's hitting 462 in his last 10 games and work things like that in, yeah, and then, you know, get to the ballpark about 3 o'clock for a 7 o'clock game and come home about midnight and do it all over again the next day. So it was a daily ritual. And then every you know you might be home for a week and then you're traveling, and then every three days you're traveling again. So you're getting into places at 2 and 3 in the morning, of course, and trying to manage some sleep along with a workout and, you know, getting ready for the next game. So that was kind of the lifestyle for about six months out of the year and I tell people, if you're not into that, then don't go into this business.
Speaker 1:Of course, I think that mentality applies to anything you want to be good at, whether it's the guitar or digging a ditch. I mean, if you're going to be a good ditch digger, you've got to put in the time and dig the ditches right at the end of the day, it's safe to say that you totally were into your work and you lived and breathed that for many years. Right to be a Hall of Fame broadcaster, of course, and that's what it takes to get to those levels.
Speaker 3:But I did watch the other Hall of Fame broadcasters who were in Cooperstown, you know, guys who were far better than I was, and it was no different with them. Yeah. Honestly, they didn't kick back, they just didn't kick back.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, I wanted to jump back real quick about, you know, the life of a player or the life of an official or whatever capacity you are in game operation. From a game operation standpoint, a lot of people think that it's showing up at the arena for a seven o'clock game at 6 45 and you're walking out when the game's over. And it's so much more than you're there at four. I mean, I can tell you, I can't tell you how many days I was at the arena at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. Right, there's pregame meal, there's the game. It's just a lot that goes into it. So that two-and-a-half-hour game was a five-, six-hour affair at the arena or at the stadium, right? Would you agree with that?
Speaker 3:Definitely, and there are many reasons for that.
Speaker 3:One is to stay out of traffic, and you know we were fortunate enough to get the great traffic spaces in the stadium, so we would get there early, wouldn't have to usually fight too much traffic.
Speaker 3:And then a big part of getting there early is to just get started on the routine. But a part of that is conversations, yes, and conversations with broadcasters from the other team or with the manager of the other team or players on the other team, and these are the better conversations than the on-the-air interviews usually because people are a little more relaxed three hours before a game, of course they're more likely to share some things with you. Interviews usually because people are a little more relaxed three hours before a game, of course they're more likely to share some things with you that they would not share on the air. That makes sense. And these are valuable in terms of your preparation, because in baseball it's different than hockey and basketball and football, because you have time to say something a little bit different about this player than you said last night, which is a necessity, because people get tired of the same repetitive comments being made, and so fresh information is what you're looking for every day.
Speaker 1:That makes sense and I can see where the information can from. A broadcaster could become a little stale because there's three-game homestands with baseball, where that's rarely the case with hockey. A team comes in to play locally. It might be two games and two nights and they're out and you'll never see that again the rest of the season. Whereas Cincinnati comes to town for the Astros, they're here three days. So the diehard fans are listening to that broadcast three nights in a row. And if you're saying the same thing over and over it, like you know, come on, brownie, can you give?
Speaker 1:us some different information right you have to kind of be on your game well, you do.
Speaker 3:And uh, the one thing I used to do back in the old days of manila folders and newspaper clippings and articles from magazines is collect, you know, a manila folder on we'll say the cincinnati reds, we're playing them this weekend yeah and have some stories in there and just tuck them away.
Speaker 3:so maybe they wouldn't be used at all, or maybe they'd be used the first night of the series. If there's a long delay of some kind and we needed to fill with information or something happened in the game that triggered a memory of this article but you know, back then then we used to have to fill during rain delays oh, we'd interview scouts. We'd you know it might be an hour, it might be an hour until they'd start this game again, and it was a necessity to come up with information of some sort that we thought might be somewhat entertaining.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that almost. That story almost gives me anxiety. And the reason I say that is because I'm a little more methodical in planning my show out not being a live show so I don't ever have to deal with the downtime like that, like, oh my gosh, what am I going to talk about now for 45 minutes, right, yeah, yeah, so you better have something to talk about. And it's interesting, like all of the broadcasters that even I've said in the booth with, through hockey, you know the hockey seasons and whatnot. They all have their different way of some will write on index cards some will do this.
Speaker 1:You talk about manila folders and they just adopt their own ways of of getting the material. And it's interesting. When you said Manila folders, I immediately went back to Ken double in the booth and he always had index cards and they were laid out. You'd never touch the index cards in the booth, like they were where he wanted those and they were in a certain order, and you just didn't touch them Right. And he knew his system, he knew his system.
Speaker 3:I had that and I copied it from Lanny Frateri, who did Pittsburgh Pirates for a long time, and I watched him work. One time I thought, yeah, I'm going to use that. So I had index cards on all the baseball players, okay, and it freed up my mind from trying to memorize all these things about the players. I'd just write down names. Okay, the players, I just write down names, okay. Okay, uh, jim jones, he's 27 years old. He went to the university of duquesne and he's been in the minor leagues for four years and he pitched a no-hitter in high school. You know things like that that aren't prominent but they're time fillers and they're something that somebody may not have heard about. This guy that told you something other than what you're seeing on your screen and if I had to try to remember all that without the index cards, my mind would have been just twisted in knots. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, that's interesting that you say that, and I was going to ask you that very question Did a lot of the stats that you recited, or tidbits that you recited, were a lot of them? From a percentage perspective, how many of those stats were in your brain memorized, and how much were on the manila folders in the index cards?
Speaker 3:Yeah, not many were in my brain. I can tell you that honestly.
Speaker 1:Some people just have a sponge for a brain and can just like. I'm a little that way with music and music trivia.
Speaker 1:But you know, like we're human, we can't know everything right so you have to take notes yes and and I do outlines for my show because I don't want to leave what I think are important things out and then I don't. I don't want to look what I think are important things out and then I don't want to look back and say gosh Doggett, I meant to ask him about you know it's more Exactly. Because now I'm 58 years old, I forget things these days.
Speaker 3:Well, I would start working on these index cards in November, so I do, you know, 10 of them a day all winter long, and that way it didn't seem like that big a task for the season.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you do a little bit at a time. It's like moving a grain of sand versus a boulder right at the end of the day. Well, I know there's a ton, a ton of stats in hockey, but I think baseball has to take the cake when it relates to statistic track and would you agree with?
Speaker 1:that oh no doubt no doubt, like I had, I did, I would you know I was a baseball player all my life and it's like holy cow. I can't imagine all of the stats that they keep track of you know the box scores.
Speaker 3:You know things you don't even see in the box scores true, yeah, and you know it drives some people crazy because we overdo it with the stats, and I can completely understand that, and I was one of those who tended to overdo it with stats. But I think now it's worse. I really do, because you have to remember, on television you're seeing so much statistically represented on the screen, yeah, and you have to be really careful as a broadcaster to try to stick with that until that has kind of settled in the mind of the viewer, rather than try to okay, let me top that. Oh, here's another stat that's not on this screen. No, then you're confusing people and driving them over the edge, I think Sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, there's a ton to track for sure, During your tenure with the Astros specifically, you were behind the mic for many special events and I wanted to talk about some of the memorable moments that you had the honor of calling, and I was going to throw a few of them out and I just wanted you to maybe share with the listeners and feel free to go in as deep or as shallow as you want, but your recollection of some of these Sure and the first one that I thought of was BGO's 3,000th hit right.
Speaker 3:Well, that was you know. People ask me all the time what was your biggest moment on the Astros? And that would have to be it. Okay, all the time, what was your biggest moment on the Astros? And that would have to be it. And here's another reason On television, we did not do postseason telecasts.
Speaker 1:It was all carried on the networks, so tell me what that means exactly?
Speaker 3:Well, so if the Astros were in the playoffs, playing in the division series or the league championship series or the world series, and you're an astros telecaster, you're not on the air oh, okay, you're not doing the games okay, it's national.
Speaker 1:Is it national? Yes, it's all fox or okay, that makes sense, I follow you now, whatever nbc.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, that is very disappointing if you're an astros broadcaster, because, because this is what you live for, but you can't do it. Why is that? It's just the contracts, the way the contracts are set up. Now, when I was in Cincinnati back in the 70s, at that point you could do a local telecast of the playoff games before you got to the World Series. So I got to do some playoff games with the Reds in the mid-70s and that was great fun. But because there's so much hanging on each game, you know there's so much importance, of course, but otherwise you're not on the air. Now the radio astros, radio broadcasters do every pitch of every postseason game. Okay, so had I been on radio, craig's 3,000th hit would still be one of the top moments. But calling the final out of the 2017 World Series, which is the first time the Astros had ever won a World Series, you know, depending on how my call went, that probably would have been my favorite. You know what I'm saying, of course. So the postseason games are going to trump just about anything.
Speaker 1:Is there a mindset, and I don't know why. I just thought about this, but I understand the contracts. That's the way the contracts are written. Is the thought process that the national carriers broadcast like the NBCs and the CBSes? Those guys are better commentators. What's your thoughts on you?
Speaker 3:I think you understand my question yes, I do, and you would think the answer would be yes, they're. They're paid more, they're, uh, seen by a much broader audience. They have, uh, tremendous resumes. You know, back in the 70s you were talking about a kurt gowdy and a tony kubak, and you know tremendous experience and had done local teams games too. So sure, uh sure, they would be.
Speaker 3:But in baseball it's different. I think the regional quality of a baseball broadcast sets it apart, and it's true in hockey too. But you know, your fans in Houston are used to you, whether they like you or dislike you. They get a lot of you, yes, and therefore typically they may be unhappy if you're not doing a postseason game Makes sense. But would the network guys be better? I think, yeah, you would expect that. Yes, I think a lot of people would expect that. However, the difference is the network guys are not affiliated with either team and they have to do a game right down the middle. They cannot be cheering more for one team's home run than another team's home run, or it becomes apparent and the other team's fans are really unhappy with them.
Speaker 1:I won't mention names and I'm not a critic of announcers, but I think back when the Astros were on their World Series runs, there were some national broadcasters that seemed to play favorites. I don't know if that's the case because I didn't dissect that, but if you went out and you looked at Facebook, the Houston fans stayed pissed off all the time at certain broadcasters and of course, course, everybody's an armchair quarterback. Everybody knows how it should be done and how the broadcaster should broadcast like, but none of them do that job right. So there's that piece of it. Yeah, but I was going to ask you that as an official, I was supposed to be impartial to either team. Yes, was that the way it was supposed to be for you as the Astros broadcaster, or were you on the balance scale of justice? Was it okay for you to tip towards the Astros?
Speaker 3:I think it was okay and I think it was expected for me to tilt toward the Astros. However, I always really tried as much as I could to give the other team credit, tried to be fair, tried to acknowledge the star player you know if you're playing Barry Bonds. So I was lucky enough to call his 70th home run that year, that he broke the record and hit 73, because he hit it in Houston and I tried to give it as good a call as I possibly could, even though he was not playing for our team and our team was losing at the time. Just because of the historic nature of it, and when Matt Cain of the San Francisco Giants pitched a perfect game against us in San Francisco, I you know, in the late innings I thought this is not our perfect game, but I owe it to this guy, I owe it to the fans, I owe it to baseball period to do the best job I could possibly do here of describing this perfect game, because it is so rare that you get a perfect game, yes, yes.
Speaker 1:So yeah, you've got to give him his props.
Speaker 3:right for sure, you have to give him his props. And yet I think if you were to cut the Astros short a little bit on a game-winning home run or something like that, you'd hear about it. Oh, you definitely would.
Speaker 1:The fans would be very unhappy with you. Sure, you know we were talking a little bit about memorable calls and whatnot. I know you came in I think it was one season after Mike Scott threw a no-hitter in 86. Right, but Darryl Kyle's no-hitter, which was the last one ever thrown in the Astrodome, do you have recollection of that one?
Speaker 3:I do, but not in the best way because we were not on television that night. Really. Yeah, we didn't televise all the games in the Dome back in those days and I did the middle three innings on radio, so that's the only part I had in that.
Speaker 3:So you know you wouldn't hear any interesting any of my play-by-play calls in that game. Milo hamilton, of course, did a wonderful job on radio, but yeah, so that was um. You know I I wish I had had more no hitters, it just didn't seem to break out that way. Actually, mike Fiers' no-hitter was fun, but I don't think too many Houston fans want to go back and revisit a Mike Fiers special moment, right.
Speaker 1:Well, I think that one happened. What was that? 2014 or 15? Yeah, it's somewhere in that area, yeah, and no, he, just, you know it was.
Speaker 3:It was, I think, a little bit later than that but anyway, yeah, he you know with with um the way the cheating scandal evolved and his role in it. I just don't think people want to hear much about mike fires anymore, of course.
Speaker 1:Well, you mentioned the astrodome. You know of course there's minute. From a stadium perspective, did you have a preference in stadium that you really enjoyed working in? I thought Minute.
Speaker 3:Maid was the best. I liked San Francisco, and it's been called by many different names, but Pac Bell, whatever you want to call it, I thought, was a wonderful ballpark. I love the old parks, wrigley, but Wrigley had a terrible TV booth. It was very tiny and there was hardly room to move in there. So not my favorite place. Pittsburgh was a beautiful stadium, but our booth was at the very top of the stadium, the very top, so we were looking down on some little ants running around on the field trying to identify them. That was difficult. Love Boston, fenway Park, of course, yankee Stadium these are historic places that you remember very well, but those were some of my favorites anyway.
Speaker 1:You know that top-down vantage point is a great spectator position at a hockey game because you can see the plays, the passing lanes, you can see the game open up and where the game is going. Maybe not so much for baseball, because the baseball is pretty small anyway, so you know it's probably a little bit different. Well, spectator, yes, watching it from up up high versus, you know, at, at eye level right, so to speak I'll tell you.
Speaker 3:What I didn't like, though, randy, uh, was that we had such a tremendous overview, when the ball was hit, of exactly where it was going to land, and so we could call this game, you know, like watching from a blimp or something, and tell exactly where that fielder should be headed with his second step, and yet that wasn't what he saw. Yes, that, if you're playing right field, that's not the way you see it. That makes sense, and it wasn't fair really to be all that critical because we had this advantage of a view that the player didn't have Correct.
Speaker 1:Correct. Yeah, you go down on the field at field level and see a ball coming in the air. It's certainly different than seeing it from top down right.
Speaker 3:Very much so.
Speaker 1:Because you can see a lot of things from the top down that you can't see on the field level. Well, what about from a broadcaster's perspective? Was one more conducive to you as a broadcaster, like from the Dome to Minute Maid Park? And I'm sure, just because of technology, but I didn't want to put words in your mouth. What were the accommodations like in the Dome compared to what you had at Minute Maid?
Speaker 3:The Dome was fine. We were further. We were up the first base line, probably almost even with first base on the home TV booth. It was a large booth, there was plenty of space in it, that part was good. But our vantage point and we were on the fifth floor on the elevator reading, okay. So Minute Maid was lower, it was closer to home plate and a much, much better vantage point, okay, and just the crowd, you know, being surrounded the fans were much closer to our booth at Minute Maid. They were right below us and you felt like you were a part of the game more. Of course, you felt more at a distance in the dome because the dome was designed as a multi-sport stadium and therefore the vantage point from the broadcast booths was not as close to home plate.
Speaker 1:Well, the layout was totally different too right. Exactly, yeah, in in your opinion. What are your thoughts around spending so many years in such a historical venue is the houston astrodome and seeing that stadium and the condition that it's in today and not being used like? Do you have thoughts around that?
Speaker 3:I do it's sad to see it now. Um, I was there for a card show a few months ago and I I took a picture of it with nrg in the background, which of course dwarfs the astrodome, as you know, and I thought this is sad because at the time the astrodome was built it dwarfed everything, of course, and of course it it's made Houston an international reputation. So I'm one who feels it should be preserved, but I'm one who also feels it should pay for itself. So I think it should be repurposed.
Speaker 3:There are plans out there and, um, I know a guy with one group attempting to buy the Astrodome Is that right? Yeah, and they want to repurpose it. I think you know they would, of course, have to have the permission of the Houston Livestock and Rodeo Show and the Texans, but it would be used partially for parking for those events, underground parking and then. So they'd probably build a couple of levels of that parking garage and then, coming up to ground level of that parking garage and then, coming up to ground level, maybe develop it from that point on up with maybe a hotel, restaurants, things of that nature.
Speaker 1:Dad had mentioned to me, if my memory serves me correctly, that he might have helped you or made something for you to accommodate some kind of memorabilia, and maybe my memory of what he was telling me is off, but I'm assuming that you have sports memorabilia of some kind in your home, and it made me think about the seats from the Astrodome. And does Bill Brown own a seat from the Astrodome?
Speaker 3:Well, here's what I did. I bought a couple of seats when they were on sale from the Astrodome and I gave them to an auction and I forgot how much money they brought, but it was a pretty good amount. So that's typically what I would do, so I don't have much of a collection of my own.
Speaker 3:I have a few signed baseballs. I have a sports collectible guy in Houston who is one of the tops gave me. So my prize possession was a. It's an overlay of several photos of Hank Aaron hitting the 715th home run in Atlanta and there's a picture it's hard to explain. So on this framed picture you have him swinging the bat at home plate. He's also rounding first, he's rounding second, he's rounding third, he's coming to home plate. He's being interviewed in front of the Atlanta dugout by that crowd of reporters and it's all on one and it's signed by Hank Aaron and Milo Hamilton who did the play-by-play for the Braves. So it's a wonderful, wonderful collectible. Other than that, I've got a few baseballs and I've got a few bats that were signed to me and that's all I really have.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know my big collection. You're sitting in a room now with a lot of guitars, but upstairs I had a memorabilia room that was all sports related from all the years that I spent in and around hockey. You know helmets and jerk from jerseys and countless sticks and I've dwindled that way down over the years. It's you know terry gets on me like can you clean some of this stuff up? You know, does it really?
Speaker 1:mean that much, it's like you, you know yes and no. You know I think the older I get, probably the less important it was. At the time it was very important to me to have all that, but I kept. I kept what I thought were the treasured pieces the jerseys, like the 2000 all-star game in Houston. You know where all the players sign that. So you're very selective with what you retain, because I don't, I don't live in a 7 000 square foot.
Speaker 3:Yes, you only have so much room for all the knickknacks, so to speak right, and you know at the heritage all of our homes are small so you don't have those huge collectible rooms exactly.
Speaker 1:Is there a memory that sticks out in your mind when you think back to calling games of the great nolan ryan? Is there, is there some anything that sticks out in your mind when you think back to calling games of the great Nolan Ryan? Is there anything that sticks out to you?
Speaker 3:Well, he had a 16 strikeout game that we did. I remember I think it was a two-hitter. You know, I didn't have any of his no-hitters so I missed out on that. And in 87, the thing that struck me about that year was, believe it or not, he was 8-16, but he led the league in ERA. So that was the very epitome of a tough luck pitcher who got hardly any run support. And that's what I remember the most about Nolan Ryan is the lack of run support. And of course he was the greatest strikeout pitcher by far ever. But just you know and what? What gets you to when you fortunate enough to have a job like this is?
Speaker 3:you get to know people a little bit, and so just knowing him trumps any kind of memories that I would have of any particular games that he pitched.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was a treat in and of itself right. Exactly. Well, I think if you ask 100 people you know that know anything about baseball and said what do you remember the most of Nolan Ryan? Everybody would think back to the Robin Ventura right. Where he had him in a headlock. You see that picture everywhere. Now, do you remember that game Was?
Speaker 3:that an away game. Well, he was with the Rangers then.
Speaker 1:Oh, he was Okay.
Speaker 3:I'll tell you a story that's good for your podcast. I think you know people always wondered why in? The world. Did Robin Ventura go out there to the mound? Well, he told this story years later and I don't think he signs that picture of him and nolan fighting. I don't think he will sign that if he's asked, sure that I understand that, sure, but but you know, very, very fine player.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so there was a team meeting of the white socks with ventura and his teammates before that game and they all decided they were absolutely fed up with being hit by pitches from Nolan Ryan. It had happened to them many times, apparently, and that they said well, tonight, whoever gets it has to go to the mound, and that was the agreement. So he had to be bound by that agreement. Wow, and you can see in the highlight after he gets hit and he's on his way to the mound. There's a little hesitation there, right, there's a little hesitation, and you can only imagine that in his brain it's I don't want to do this, but I have to do this, right.
Speaker 1:Sure, sure I can't back down now right, that's a funny story and a very interesting story too. I was going to ask you how common is that? You know, when we think back to hockey there's a misconception. I understand it, but a lot of people the fighting that's involved in hockey and the tough guy and hockey a lot of people don't know why the tough guy is even on the team. Why do they fight? Right? I know the story From a baseball perspective. It is a thing for a pitcher to purposely bean a batter right.
Speaker 1:Can you speak to the listeners a little bit about why that comes about? Is it bad blood? Talk to us a little bit about that.
Speaker 3:Usually, when a pitcher decides to hit a batter, he's been getting clobbered. He's tried everything he can to get this guy out.
Speaker 3:Nothing has worked, and you know, a lot of times they won't do it. I'd say it's much more likely that it would have happened 30 years ago than it would happen now. Now it's more likely just a lack of control, but sometimes what they'll do. You know, tony La Russa had a policy when he was managing the Cardinals. So if the Astros were playing the Cardinals and say, you know, roger Clemens hit Albert Pujols with a pitch, you know, roger Clemens hit Albert Pujols with a pitch. Well, tony would make sure that his pitcher would hit Jeff Bagwell, whoever was hitting third. If Pujols was his third hitter, he would hit the number three hitter.
Speaker 1:On the other team Tit for tat right, that exactly was his policy Interesting.
Speaker 3:But yet he would always say, hey, I'm not going to determine the intent of that pitcher, whether he intended to hit poo holes or not. I'm going to go to my pitching coach, dave Duncan, because he was a catcher and he deals with our pitchers and he knows the mentality, and he will be able to tell well, I don't, you know, I'm not totally buying into that philosophy either, but that's the way he handled it. And so I think what you have here in terms of retaliation is, for instance, jordan Alvarez got hit twice the other night and the Astros didn't say that the second time he got hit they felt it was intentional. They didn't say that the second time he got hit they felt it was intentional. They didn't say that. But the pitcher for the Rangers, burke, who hit him through all four pitches inside the plate that's a little suspicious, sure, but they did not retaliate. But Tucker came up and hit a home run right after that, kyle Tucker, and it really fired them up, you could tell. Now, the pitcher for the Rangers, unfortunately, was so mad and I don't know why that he broke his hand, his non-pitching hand, after that game, punching a wall. So he is now on the injured list and he took himself out of play.
Speaker 3:But yeah, the retaliation thing is funny in baseball. It could be six years later before a team would retaliate again. Yeah, it's just like these guys have the greatest memories ever An elephant's memories and you'll see a game and somebody will drill another guy and we're looking at each other. What's that all about? Yeah, and you'll later find out. Oh well, you know, eight years ago, yeah, they did this back in 71 okay, you looked at me wrong okay so you can't always explain.
Speaker 1:No, but I guess you know for the, the casual baseball fan, I could almost hear like my wife saying well, why would he purposely throw the ball? At you know well, you know. That's why there's reasons. There's different reasons, Sometimes they're personal reasons, right?
Speaker 3:You never know, they can be. Yeah, they may have something that goes back to minor league days.
Speaker 1:Yeah, much like a hockey fight A lot of times. It's nothing personal. It can be a momentum swing in a game. How do?
Speaker 1:we get the momentum swing into our side. Well, I'll call out that tough guy and we'll get the crowd into it and it'll pump us up. Or you might have taken a liberty at one of my smaller guys. You're going to have to pay the piper for that. There you go so there's a lot of different reasons, or it might just not like the way you combed your hair today. There's probably a lot of that too, that goes along, so that's interesting to get your perspective on that.
Speaker 3:Well, it could be. You know there can be many, many reasons. You're right, but it is interesting to try to anticipate when a team might, and they're smart if they don't retaliate If they have another series that season with that team. They're better off not retaliating because the umpires are going to be watching and they're watching them, and yes, they're. So you could lose a player's services for 10 days, which is not what anybody wants.
Speaker 1:Maybe a little off topic, but when a a coach or a player gets tossed from a game, there's fines involved. Isn't that correct? Yes, and I guess they all carry different weights from a monetary perspective.
Speaker 3:Yes, okay, depends on what the offense was.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:Yes, there are fines. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Well, 30 seasons is a long time. Congrats on success with the Astros over the years. You retired in 2016. Yes, is my date right there, 2016. Why did you feel like 2016 was the year for you to pull out?
Speaker 3:It's a good question and people have asked me that and I've said, look, I felt that I was slipping a little bit. I didn't feel that I was as good with names. I wasn't necessarily mispronouncing names, but sometimes a first name will not be coming to you as quickly as you're used to. So, with my age and everything, I thought, okay, I'm on the downside here and I don't want to be one of those guys who's at the mic every night on TV and people are saying, well, he doesn't remember this guy's name and this isn't what we want. And I just thought it was a good time to go out. I thought that it had been a tremendous blessing to do the games for all those years. I wanted to have some time with my family and it's been great to be with the grandkids. More We've had vacations in the summer, and this is the other thing. You can't take summer vacations in baseball. Not in baseball. You'd have to switch over to hockey for that one, right, exactly, yeah, right.
Speaker 1:Right Well, after retirement. I know you backfilled for Todd Callis after the passing of his mother and I wanted to ask you what it was like to return to the booth after, like, post-retirement.
Speaker 3:Well, there's pressure in the sense that you know, you feel there's a level of expectation there from when you last did a game three years ago, or whatever it might be.
Speaker 3:It's tough to conjure up that kind of a game at that point in your life. But it's a lot more work with the preparation, because when you're doing it every day you're just in this rhythm and the prep is the same and by the time game three of a series rolls around, you feel like you're in command of everything and you don't have to quite prep as much. But the expectations I thought were still hey, you've got to do the job that Todd Callis was doing here, and so in that sense it's a little uncomfortable feeling and there's a little more pressure that you put on yourself. But it's fun. And last year they had me do a few innings and that was just a blast last year. But I felt like I really didn't want to do that. It was a Hall of Fame night, so I did it, but I just thought, eh, I could blow this and that's not the way you want to go out.
Speaker 1:Was there any kind of? Well, I guess the prerequisite question would be to say how long after you retired was it that you came back in and backfilled for Todd? Was it years later?
Speaker 3:Yeah, maybe a couple years, I don't remember exactly. But what I was doing that first year in retirement was going to a lot of games with my camera and going down to the camera, well, by the dugout, and shooting pictures, and, and you know, the professional photographers from the newspapers and magazines were there and they'd be helping me out with hey, why am I out of focus all the time? Well, you need to do this.
Speaker 1:And I and I definitely want to get into that a little bit with you, but I but I did want to ask was there any nostalgia there, like when you jump back into the booth? Was there any warm fuzzy that you got from from it coming back?
Speaker 3:Oh sure, yeah sure, but you know how it is when you're performing and you're just focusing on that more than you're not able to really enjoy the moment. You know what?
Speaker 1:I mean, yes, I think you kind of answered the question, but is it like the whole adage of you know, once you know how to ride a bike, it's you could always get back on the bike and ride it like did you feel like man? There's some cobwebs here. I got to shake these cobwebs off because even as a musician, if I go three weeks without playing a live show and I come back on stage, it's like man. I got to get through those first three songs. I feel like I I feel a little foreign up here, right, but then you, you get, you get in the groove and you start you know jamming right?
Speaker 3:exactly no, if broadcasting is the same it is. It is the same way. I think you would feel a lot better after you had the first three innings under your belt, okay, and then you'd be able to kind of relax and say, okay, you know, I had my doubts about this and that and the other thing, and whether I could, you know, get back in the swing of this and that or whatever it was interviewing somebody during a game or whatever it might be.
Speaker 1:Well, you retired, like I said, back in 2016, but along the way, you co-authored multiple books. Talk with us about the books that you've written, if you'd be so kind.
Speaker 3:Sure, I was just so into Astro's history when I was broadcasting and we hadn't had a book on Astros history that had been written since the Colt 45s, those first three years and so I couldn't believe that. And so Mike Acosta and I put together a book. It was a photo, a large coffee table photo book, a historic book of the Astros deep in the heart. We called it, and that was kind of the beginning. And then I started doing smaller books that I could do on Amazon you know, anybody can write a book on Amazon, so the paperback type books and I did one on Jose Altuve and did another one on the 2017 Astros, the year they won the World Series, and did another one in 2019, and did a book on Sportscasting 101 about different sportscasters I've known and even hockey broadcasters I interviewed in the various sports to address the idea of a young broadcaster high school, college age who wants to go into this profession and just tell the stories of their careers, which I thought was you know, it's not a how-to book, but it's a this-is-how-I-did-it book and I thought that would be helpful.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 100%. Somebody that's been in the business forever, somebody that's, you know, a Hall of Fame broadcaster like that has to mean a lot to an up-and-comer to get that information from the goat you know, so to speak, right. Or somebody that's been around in the business forever.
Speaker 3:Sure, because I think a young broadcaster wants to ask these questions if he ever meets the Dallas Stars broadcaster. Well, that makes sense. You know, I talked to Brad Sham, who has done the Dallas Cowboys for 40 years. He's had a tremendous career, so that was interesting.
Speaker 1:Are all of the books available on Amazon or where can the listeners? If they wanted to reference or purchase any of these books, where would they go to find them?
Speaker 3:Yeah, they're all on Amazon, and I did a book because I was bored last winter.
Speaker 3:And there's a book called Baseball's Bizarre Season on Amazon, and that was about 1964. So I thought I'd pretty well worked over the Astros and wanted to go back into history and talk about one of the great pennant races, because we had that great finish the last weekend of the season last fall with the Rangers and Astros in Seattle and they could have been in a three-way tie. And so I wondered, well, when's the last time that happened? And I didn't have an answer to it. But I did remember 1964, and that was just the craziest pennant race in my lifetime. So I wanted to write about that and that you know, hey, that takes a few months.
Speaker 3:Right to research. That will keep your mind busy for a while. Which older folks are supposed to be doing?
Speaker 1:That's exactly it. Well, is there anything that's maybe, from a authoring perspective, anything you're working on these days that you want to share or that you'd like to talk about.
Speaker 3:I'm working on a children's book that I've been trying to do for a couple years called mystery of town lake, and the thing is I have to have kids do the artwork on this children's book and so I wasn't able to find the right situation in the Cy Fair School District. But I went to a private school, second Baptist, and found some very talented artistic young kids and they're going to do the drawings and yeah, so we're working on that now and then just to uh, occupy my time, uh, this summer, and I probably won't publish this or if it ever happens, it won't be under my name. It's a book on our world today and the elections coming up this fall are going to be included in there all fictictitious names. So it's a novel and yeah, it's just. I think writing is wonderful for older people, especially because we have the time we can learn by doing the research. Yes, and it's not a deadline situation, exactly.
Speaker 1:You know it's great, well, it keeps the brain moving too. You know a deadline situation. Exactly, it's great, well, it keeps the brain moving too. You know a little bit. Well, when you said you're writing a children's book, I got excited and said, oh, you mean I can actually read and understand this one. I am so excited for this children's book to come out.
Speaker 3:The most difficult part was I decided to do a rhyming book. Now, that challenged me quite a bit, too funny.
Speaker 1:You mentioned earlier, you wrote one in 2019, and it was called Astro's Golden Era the Detailed Accounts of the 2019 Season. What was so important about the 2019 season, in your opinion, that made you want to go write a book about it?
Speaker 3:well, I thought it was a compelling world series, even though the astros lost it in seven games, but, as you recall, they had the lead in game seven at home until the seventh inning and lost it to washington, but nonetheless, uh, this was that era, having won the world series in 2017. And I thought this was a time and then, of course, I did not write one after 2022, when they won their second World Series, but I'm sure somebody else did. This was a time when the Astros were challenged, because of the cheating scandal, to sort of legitimize what they had done, and I thought that they did that, even though they did fall short in 2019 by a little bit, they legitimized what they had done as a team during this era.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I wanted to touch on a couple of things about that season that I recalled when I was kind of putting my notes together, and then on the controversy, the cheating scandal or whatever, I wanted to pick your brain just a little bit on that. But 2019 was a season of 107 wins. That was an astronomical amount of wins in baseball, one of the best rosters in baseball history probably. Would you agree or disagree with that? Yes, and then I think what was there? Six of the guys that made the all mlb team that year? Yeah, what verlander clinched the cy young that year. Jordan alvarez won rookie of the year. Bregman was what runner up for american league mbp like yeah, wow.
Speaker 1:I mean that's how many accolades can one team get in a season? That's pretty amazing.
Speaker 3:Well, it is, and you know thinking about the way the front office got Verlander in 2017 and then got him back. So you know there are a lot of moves there. And then the development of Bregman and Altuve and Tucker and these homegrown guys, and I think one thing over the last few years that's been underplayed a little bit is their signing of Frambois Valdez, christian Javier Luis Garcia. All these guys are homegrown pitchers. Arkady is another one and developed after not spending a lot of money to sign them initially. So this is really, I think, the key to what they did during this era, because you're going to have to spend for Verlander, you're going to have to spend for these other free agents and your own guys, like Bregman, who have come up through the system and have compiled the statistics when they get to arbitration to be able to make that kind of money. But in order to balance out those big expenditures, somehow, teams have to develop their own guys or acquire players who aren't making a lot and develop them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that makes sense. You touched a little bit on multiple times on the signal stealing, controversy and the scandal and all of that being as in tune, and of course I'm going to tell you plead the fifth on this, if you want but being as in tune with the game as you were. Did you ever yourself suspect anything like that? Or is the broadcaster just oblivious to those kind of things? I know I was oblivious. I mean I wouldn't admit it even if I knew bill.
Speaker 3:So I'm I'm curious no, but I'll tell you honestly. Um so, because I was down in the camera box a lot on the field level in 2017, since I had retired that year, and there was nothing going on in 2016 that I am aware of. Nothing's ever been reported about that but 2017,. I can remember one game. I was sitting in the camera, well down by the Astros dugout, and I did hear a noise coming from the tunnel back to the clubhouse and it was, you know, banging on the trash can is what it was. But I had no idea what that was. I thought well, what is going on? Is there somebody loosening up to come in and pinch hit? Is he swinging a bat against something in there? I had no idea. Sure, had not heard that noise before, but if I could hear it, then I think the people at home plate could hear it. And so, looking back, now that we've read what we've read, I can piece things together. At the time I had no clue what that was.
Speaker 1:For the listeners that are not baseball followers there was I mean this was all in the news. I mean this was the topic you know everybody was talking about this. Give the 50,000-foot cliff note on how were they stealing the signals. You talked about the trash can Like what was taking place in the you know that whole stealing thing.
Speaker 3:Okay, I will place part of the blame for this on Major League Baseball. Okay, because when the replay system came in and I can't tell you whether that was 2015, it probably was, it might have been 2016. But when Major League Baseball started using replays to review and make decisions on umpire calls, baseball started using replays to review and make decisions on umpire calls. They placed all these high speed video cameras in every major league park and they placed them all around the ballpark upper deck, looking down from right field, foul pole, left field foul pole, center field, behind home plate you know all these different locations in order to get replays from different angles. So that makes sense. Yes, however, they really failed to put out a clear-cut set of operating guidelines on how these cameras could be used. Okay, so, in my opinion and you know somebody at MLB can call me full of ice, and that's fine they had the first mistake by allowing teams to use them however they could figure out was to their advantage. In other words, it was the wild, wild west. Now, they probably didn't think about it, but nonetheless, if you're going to bring anything new into a system, part of your job is to think it through, of course, and do some planning. Okay, so now they had a way of looking through these high-speed cameras, especially out in center field. They could see the catcher's signals. They could magnify like it had never been done before, and so somebody in the clubhouse, in the video room, could see the catcher's signals. They could pick up on them. Okay, two fingers, it's the second signal and it's a curveball or whatever. And then you know they they're probably going to change them at some point during the game if they realize that you're on them and you're hitting everything hard.
Speaker 3:Every kind of pitch is. You know, okay, he's got our, we're tipping our pitches. The pitcher may be tipping, but in this case it was more. We're getting from the video, according to reports, the signs, and by banging on this trash, can we're going to send an audio signal to that hitter at home plate of what this pitch is going to be?
Speaker 1:So basically, two bangs would mean a curve, three would mean a fastball or whatever. So, okay, I didn't know if there was another person involved. So it was coming from the television room, right, and then they were notifying the batter. So it was basically two people, right, okay?
Speaker 3:would be a guy in the tunnel right behind the Astros dugout with one of these monitors. So it got to the point that he was the one by doing the banging. I think this evolved several months into that season that that would be how they would relay. Before that they had some kind of a different sign. I mean, you could have somebody whistle or something like that, but that is pretty obvious to the other team. The other team is going to pick up on that, of course. Now here is the real question If the other team's pitcher is just getting blasted, why didn't they change their signs?
Speaker 3:Or here's a story from Alan Ashby and Nolan Ryan. Nolan Ryan was pitching and he was getting hit hard and Alan Ashby went to the mound. He said hey, noly, there's a runner at second base. He's relaying our signs to the hitter. They've got our signs. Nolan said what do you want to do? Allen said Well, okay, I'm going to put down a two for a curveball. You throw a fastball up and in. And that's what he did and the hitter expecting a ball breaking down and away from him being a right-handed hitter, whoever he was then got flipped when it was headed for his left shoulder. Yeah, and everybody, according to Alan Ashby on the Reds bench jumped up in the air. They knew they had been had and you know what that was the end of that for that night? Of course, of course it was so during the cheating scandal. Why didn't any team do this? If they all said later on that they were convinced that the Astros had their signs, why didn't they do something about it? Sure, that's a question.
Speaker 1:I've thought about this over and over again and maybe this is just a randyism, or maybe it's just my thought process, I don't know. Good, bad or indifferent, but isn't privacy incumbent upon the person that has the intellect? In other words, if that catcher is given signs it's, is it not incumbent upon him to protect those signs? Yes, I mean. I mean, if I can see his signs, like if I'm sitting in the dugout and I can see his sign, well, shame on him, right? How can you tell me that I'm guilty of stealing signs when he's clearly maybe his hands too far down in the crotch area and he's, and you can see the painted nails or whatever right isn't? Isn't incumbency upon them to protect that? That?
Speaker 3:is on them.
Speaker 1:But I also see where Major League Baseball, with the cameras, might have failed, because, you know, look at technology, these days. You can see a gnat on a baseball with the resolution, so it's not hard to catch the catcher's signals and whatnot right?
Speaker 3:But when all is said and done and all the information has been processed and all the reams of material have been written about that season and about the cheating scandal, yes, I don't think there's any doubt that they did it, but did they really benefit by it? That's still very much in question. Sure, Because how did they score all those runs at Dodger Stadium? You know?
Speaker 1:Of course.
Speaker 3:And then you know at home they really didn't hit any better than they did on the road when all was said and done. So, that makes it a little questionable.
Speaker 1:Food for thought, yeah. It's interesting and it's an interesting topic and it's one that I'm sure people could talk about for hours if they had time to talk about it. But thanks for sharing your intellect on that and it's interesting to hear because I never really followed that too close. I just have other things going on in my life and just intertwined in all of that. But I always wondered like, what is that all about? What's all the hoopla about? But I understand it a little bit better now with your explanation.
Speaker 3:And of course now with Pitchcom, this solves all of that, because it's just an audio earpiece to the pitcher and the catcher doesn't put fingers down. He presses a button on his catcher's mitt and there's a voice in the pitcher's ear that says sinker down and in really, and so there is no way to steal signs now interesting, and you know what?
Speaker 1:I guess I've never paid any attention to that. I just don't watch baseball much anymore. But I had no idea that. So the catchers are not even giving signals.
Speaker 3:Hand signals to the pitchers no, they're pressing a button on their glove, or the pitcher can initiate, and he can press a button on his club that tells the catcher what he's throwing and see, this is the other thing too. I don't know if you remember mark portugal, sure, okay, so portugal was was one pitcher I remember who used this system, and this is why I would fault the opposing teams against the Astros also for doing in 2017 or failing to do. Portugal would have, and many other pitchers have used this down through the years. A system of a catcher would put down a sign. Say he'd put down 1-2-3, and the second sign was the hot sign, so it was a 2, say he'd put down one, two, three, and the second sign was the hot sign, so it was a two. It was a curveball.
Speaker 3:But say Portugal didn't want to throw a two. Well, instead of shaking him off, he would just go right into his windup. He'd take his glove, his left hand, and flick it on his left thigh twice To change the sign. He's changed the sign, okay. Now he's advanced it to you. Put down a two the first time he flicks his left thigh. We're now up to a three the second time he flicks it. Now we're rolling back over to a one. So I'm going to throw a fastball here and the catcher knows it, and here comes the pitch. Before anybody can figure out what he's done, he's already changed the sign and he's delivering the pitch. And this is age-old stuff. Why didn't anybody come up with this?
Speaker 1:in 2017? Just a real-time changing of the sign? That's interesting to know that. Well, the whole thing with the glove I feel like I went to sleep last week and just woke up and and like I had no idea that they were doing this with, uh, you know, like I'm a technologist by trade, like when did technology just pass me by? Well right, but I had. I don't watch baseball like that right and it's.
Speaker 3:Things are at warp speed now. They are changing so fast in this game, man they it man?
Speaker 1:They really are. Well, that tells me I better start keeping up with life a little bit and get out of the vortex that I'm in, I guess. Well, I wanted to shift to photography real quick for you. Where did the love come from?
Speaker 3:I don't know. I guess over a period of years I've liked it, but I never really bought a Nikon until probably 2017, and decided I wanted to do this. And it's not a really expensive, elaborate camera, but I did get this super big, long lens for sports, and sports is tough to photograph. Baseball is really difficult to photograph. You can be shooting the batter and now he hits a fly ball to right center and somebody's making a diving catch and you're changing your focus and all this. I just was not quick enough to adapt and do what the Karen Warrens of the Houston Chronicle can do so well, but I developed a great appreciation, so I love to go to national parks now. There, you have plenty of time to set your focus.
Speaker 1:Exactly, the birds move a little bit slower than the players do well was so. Was it a long time hobby for you, or was it something you picked up after retirement? When did the love of photography even begin for you?
Speaker 3:you know, a little bit before retirement I would say and um, of course, you know, then it becomes a little bit of an obsession, sometimes to the point that your wife says well, you know, I really don't want to sit out here in the woods for three hours and wait for something to fly by. So why don't you go do that on your own?
Speaker 1:I knew that was coming.
Speaker 3:I knew that was coming. Yeah, you're on your own pal. Yeah, I knew that was coming.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're on your own pal. Yeah Well, as a photographer, what is the satisfaction for you as it relates to images caught in time, like what drew you to the camera, like, was there pictures that you've seen over the years that just like wow? You know you think of. Bobby Orr in the air after you know like amazing photo, right, that was it. Is that? Yeah, okay, that's it.
Speaker 3:Just admiring all these wonderful photographs I've seen in sports and I used to get the big photo books you know, on sports but also just vacations that we were able to take and the beauty that we were able to see. And then, you know, putting them up on the wall there in the office was, was a big.
Speaker 1:You know you get a pop out of that, right, yep, yep. Well, has this turned into a professional adventure for you, or is it? Is it still kind of you're a hobbyist? Talk to the listeners a little bit about that.
Speaker 3:I've used a few of my photos in books, but I found out in 2017, I wanted to do a photo book on the Astros season, when they won the World Series, and that's when I wanted to do a children's book.
Speaker 3:So I had the theme of Altuve, who grew up very poor, didn't have supplies to play baseball and his dad worked two or three jobs. He was told to go home from a tryout camp. And Springer, who had the stuttering problem, and Correa, also didn't have very much money but he wanted to learn the English language. So his dad got a third job so he could send him to a more expensive school and learn English, because he was going to be a star baseball player and do interviews someday. So I thought all these three guys were great examples for children overcoming obstacles, and I had photos of all three of them and other shots that I had taken of action during the astros games and put it into a children's book. And then I discovered I wouldn't be allowed to publish that book because of copyright issues, so that was frustrating, is that?
Speaker 1:from the Major League Baseball.
Speaker 3:Yes, okay, gotcha. And so I said, really, even for charity? And the answer I got was no, you can't even do a book for charity. So, okay, we're into big, big business here and major league baseball wants to control all the books, that's fine, but we have to do things that don't involve that, obviously. So let's move in some other direction. So you know, I mean you've done shutterfly books, right, you go to a national park, we went to glacier national park, beautiful, beautiful park in montana, yeah and uh, put together a book that we have sitting on the coffee table. That's fine. That does it for me, sure there's nothing professional.
Speaker 3:So for listeners out there that need some type of photography services, there's nothing that you yourself offer up by that I was asked to do some family portraits by a family that I know and love and I declined because I'm not very good at that.
Speaker 1:My dad and I have always talked about the wedding photographer and it's like you get one shot to get the wedding right and if you don't, you might wind up in the back of a trunk somewhere, right if you? If you, uh, mess up the wrong family.
Speaker 3:You know what I mean. You're hitting right at the fact that I don't want to work for people that's uh, that's a little stressful for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I wanted to jump back just real quick, as we kind of wind down here, jump back over to golf. Uh, just for a minute. Did you watch any of the masters? I know you're a golfer like I love the tournament. I sat there as we kind of wind down here, jump back over to golf just for a minute. Did you watch any of the Masters? I know you're a golfer, like I love the tournament.
Speaker 3:I sat there Sunday and watched from beginning to end. It was fascinating. The holy grail, the holy grail of tournaments and I still want to go there once in my life. Yeah, I was rooting for Scheffler and I was a little worried because those first four holes were a little shaky. Yes, they were, but it just made you appreciate how much concentration is required under extreme pressure for these guys to do what he did. Just incredible shot making, did not make mistakes.
Speaker 1:No, no. And you know there was something that was posted on social media in the last couple of weeks and they were trying to put in perspective just how difficult Augusta National is to play. And they said take a 12 handicapper. Right, I don't know if you saw this too, but for the listeners, take a 12 handicapper. This is a golfer. That 12 handicap is pretty respectable, off handicap, right. If you can go out and shoot an 82 84 on a good day of golf, that's very respectable. So take that 12 handicapper, send them to augusta. And they said they would have a hard time breaking 100. I believe it. Right with the slope. Yes, the greens are like putting on, you know tabletops yes.
Speaker 1:Just like it's crazy.
Speaker 3:Well, and did you ever play Tour 18?
Speaker 1:here I have not played that course, you know they have the three amen corner holes.
Speaker 3:Yes, so I played 12, which is the par three, okay, and hit a seven iron. Not that great, but it hit the front of the green and then it bounced, you know. Hit the front of the green and then it bounced you know, it's a very small green Bounced up over the shrubs in the back and I never found it. It's a tiny green. You have to hit your spot perfectly and get the right shot up in the air when it spins and all these things that above you know, 18, 20 handicapped guys can't do.
Speaker 1:No, we can't do it all yeah, and that those are for the listeners though. The tour 18 course that bill is speaking of are replica holes from some of the the greatest golf courses in the world and, to my understanding, the everything is a replica of those holes. So when you talk about a postage stamp size green, it's just that. It's not bigger, it's that size. So you really get a feeling of how damn good these pros really hit the ball.
Speaker 3:And just the elevation you talked about with these greens, and you know how that can affect you as a golfer. When the green is 25 feet higher than where you're hitting the ball, of course, you just can't see that landing zone at all. I don't care how many times you go up there and look no good luck.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, well, talk to me about so you know we're on this golf thing. Talk to me a little bit about the putting tournament you have in your backyard. I've seen some posts of this lately. When did it start and what was the whole idea behind it?
Speaker 3:We have. You know we all have small yards in the Heritage. It's a 55 and over community. We don't want to do yard work. We don't want to pay people a lot to do our yard work. But we have a little bit larger than average side yard in our patio in the back so we hadn't done anything with it no landscaper or anything like that and I came up with the idea of putting in a putting green, and so we spent you know, pretty good amount of money to do that and there.
Speaker 3:So there are four holes on this putting green and uh, oh, I would say the longest putt wouldn't be longer than about 25 feet. Okay, if that. And uh, you know, I put it in. Then I wasn't using it very much and I thought, well, I don't think I had much of a plan for this because I'm not out here practicing and it's artificial turf, so it's not what you're putting on at the golf course, and I I just came up with the idea of, hey, I want to have a tournament on this and let's do a charity thing. So we have a veterans committee there in the Heritage and we have some fundraisers throughout the year and then at the end of the year we've raised usually about $3,000, $3,500, and we apportion that money among'll say, 10 different military charities okay so not not a whole lot of money for each one, but it's something, it's what we do.
Speaker 3:And, um, I thought, well, let's, let's just give the money to that. Yeah and uh, so we have, you know, 20, 25 golfers come over and we compete and I set out the course as far as how we putt the different holes, and we get some pizzas and some beer and have a good time. And so there have been four of them now. Okay, and this year, randy, I had my granddaughter, emma, who's 20. She went to a place near Fargo, north Dakota, which is an art place and she's a good little artist, and I sent her a photo of Amen Corner, of the 12th Green, which we were just talking about, with the beautiful flowers behind the green and all that, and the bunkers and the Ben Hogan walking bridge and all this, and she painted that on this dish, small plate, dinner plate and then they put it in the kiln and baked it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and it is gorgeous, so the winner got that.
Speaker 1:Wow, so that's the Stanley Cup of the Bill Brown Golf Tournament.
Speaker 3:Right, that's awesome. So that's the.
Speaker 1:Heritage Masters. That's super cool. So who can play in the Heritage Masters?
Speaker 3:Well, I have to invite you, so I've gotten myself in some trouble now Getting outsiders in, you mean, yeah, people want to come in from other states and things like that. So you know, and it's just not practical, so it's you know, got to be small enough. I don't want to be putting it on Facebook in advance again, like I did this year Of course, Of course.
Speaker 1:Well, I was going to pick on you a little bit and say will you? Take honorary non-town Lakers in this thing Because I know some of the players Andy Coulter was out there playing and whatnot, but that sounds like a super fun way to utilize the investment for sure, but giving back to the charities is really special, as well.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, you've been over there. We have a very giving community. There are a lot of charity events and it's just. I think not only is it a place to live in comfort in retirement, but you know we have people out on our cul-de-sac almost every night. We're standing out there for 15, 20 minutes just talking like people did in the 1950s.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, you don't see that much anymore. You know it's like ships passing in the night and I was having a conversation with somebody the other day that I know a lot of people on the street but there's some that if they walked past my house I wouldn't even know who they were. People just get so busy in everyday life and have 50,000 things going on. A lot of the people have young kids, so they're in sports and doing all those things now.
Speaker 1:It's good to take that time and converse with the neighbors. The tournament sounds like a really good way to do that.
Speaker 3:Well, you know you need, I think, when you're retired, if you're blessed enough to be in good health, to just value your time and decide how you want to spend it.
Speaker 1:For sure I agree with you 100%. What's on the horizon for Bill Brown?
Speaker 3:Well, you know, when you're 76, you're pretty much not buying green bananas. But you know, my wife has some knee problems, so hopefully not surgery for her. But if so, I'll be doing a little nursemaid action. But you know I mean nothing that's super exciting or thrilling. In the scheme of things, compared to years gone by, that's fine yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I was going to say at our age or when we start creeping up there, you know, the surgeries are what we look forward to, like. That's the highlight of our lives. What surgery are we? Having this week.
Speaker 1:I've got to have a joint replacement on my right foot, on my toe, and I'm going to try to get that done in the late June time frame because I have some downtime for summer shows and I don't have to go carry gear and put it on stage, so I'm going to try to take that time to recover. But yeah, it's always something it is. Something's always breaking down. It's like wait. Why does that hurt today?
Speaker 3:Yeah, and the funny thing is I started playing pickleball, so I've had four falls on the pickleball court. So then that's another issue altogether. Wow, you know, try to have some fun and be active, and sometimes it gets out of hand.
Speaker 1:That's what you get for being productive. I guess I don't know what to tell you. Going to have to put some padding on the floors there on the pickleball court? Well, that's fairly new for the Heritage, and have people really taken to that?
Speaker 3:Oh, they have, you know, and Fred Caldwell, who developed Town Lake, has been so good. They have a foundation and so folks in the Heritage can apply for money from that Town Lake Foundation and if they choose us, as they did this year, to uh, be the recipient of something like almost a hundred thousand dollars and we can put in a couple of pickleball courts, sure, yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:It is well you. You threw out fred caldwell's name and I think he's possibly directly involved of the. There's a festival called the Taste of Cy Fair Okay, and they do it in Off Fry Road in Bridgeland and Chris, my lead guitarist, and I have been the featured musicians for that festival for the last three years. That would be a great one to come out to in October when the weather cools down and it's a nice outdoor where a lot of the local restaurants and breweries are out there and basically they bring everything in at no cost and people pay tickets to get in and they get to go out and sample all the different food and beer and everything. So that's a big SciFair thing and I think Caldwell's directly involved in that with SciHope and some of the other charities. I'm not sure, but that's possible.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Larry Durker and his wife Linda are very involved with SciHope and some of the other charities. I'm not sure, but that's possible. Yeah, Larry Durker and his wife Linda are very involved with SciHope.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:And they're building a bunch of baseball fields for kids and they define it as an at-risk family. Okay, and so they have. Usually there's one parent who's working and the kid gets home from school and there's nobody home, and so there's a place for them to go, whether it's playing ball on the ball field or going to a trailer to do some studying, or they might have a backpack with some power bars in there if they're getting hungry and aren't going to have dinner for a while. So you know, it's a very valuable charity for Cypress.
Speaker 1:Yeah, in my Larry Durker story I now that you mentioned that. I remember seeing him and his wife at, uh, the Taste of Cy Fair and she I didn't know it at the time, but she came up to the stage and she said, hi, I wanted to let you know I'm really enjoying your music, I love this stuff. And I said, oh hi, you know, thank you so much. I'm really enjoying your music, I love this stuff. And I said, oh hi, you know, thank you so much. I'm Randy Holsey. She said, oh, I know who you are. I'm on the board or something for you know, cy Hope or whatever. I said, oh, great to meet you. And then, as she walked away, she walked away with Larry and I'm like, wait, that was Larry. And I had no idea right.
Speaker 3:I didn't tie that back and I didn't even know he lived in town. Well, they live in Memorial now. Oh, Memorial. Okay, I got you, but I've been told not by him but by some other people that Jim Crane came out and Larry and Linda explained the whole Sci-Ho program to him and he said that he would be making a donation through the Astros Foundation of a million and a half dollars to that, I hope for the baseball fields.
Speaker 1:Amazing. Yeah, Wow, what a great guy. Yep, Very cool. Well, is there any social media Bill that you have that you'd like to shout out for people to maybe follow you on? I know you mentioned I'm 76 years old like I'm through with some of that stuff. These days.
Speaker 1:But I'm so used to asking the artist you know on my show, like, is there anything that you're promoting or, uh, you know a stage that I can put anything on for you to to my listeners? I mean, I have tons of them all over the world and I didn't know if there was something that was near and dear to your heart, whether it's personal or charity, that you would point somebody out.
Speaker 3:Well, that's nice of you to ask. I'm on Facebook. I have almost the maximum number of followers there, on Instagram too, but my wife and I are involved with the Cypher Educational Foundation, okay, and we have an event called Salute to Our Heroes. We've done it for 15 years now and we have that in October. We always have a military speaker, but the money goes to scholarships for Cypher students who are going on to college. So we always have that and that's near and dear to us and that's kind of our next big thing coming up and is there some way that listeners can find information?
Speaker 3:Yeah, they can go to wwwthecfeforg and get the website there, and we have usually about 500 people or more who come to the dinner, and we have a hotel near I-10 and Eldridge, so it's something for the fall and we look forward to that every year.
Speaker 1:Well, I ask the listeners to go out and check that website out. When you have time. And, Bill, this has been an absolute pleasure to have you here in the studio. Very much of a treat for me.
Speaker 1:So thanks so much for being here. Pleasure's all mine. I appreciate you making the time to drive over and sit down and share your story with the listeners, and thanks for so many wonderful years behind the mic with the Astros. I posted something earlier that I was going to have you in the studio tonight and people started commenting and liking right away.
Speaker 1:It's like, oh, that's so cool, that's so cool, so I'm glad to have you here. Thank you, randy. I wish you and Diane, the rest of the family, the best and I'm sure we'll be running into you over there in Town Lake from time to time.
Speaker 3:Sounds good, god bless you and thank you for the time, Thank you for the time.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. I ask the listeners to like, share and subscribe to the podcast on Facebook at Backstage Pass Radio Podcast, on Instagram at Backstage Pass Radio, twitter at Backstage Pass PC and on the website at BackstagePassRadiocom. You guys take care of yourselves and each other and we will see you right back here on the next episode of Backstage Pass Radio.
Speaker 2:Thanks so much for joining us. We hope you enjoyed today's episode of Backstage Pass Radio. Thanks so much for joining us. We hope you enjoyed today's episode of Backstage Pass Radio. Make sure to follow Randy on Facebook and Instagram at RandyHulseyMusic, and on Twitter at RHulseyMusic. Also, make sure to like, subscribe and turn on alerts for upcoming podcasts. If you enjoyed the podcast, make sure to share the link with a friend and tell them backstage pass radio is the best show on the web for everything music. We'll see you next time right here on backstage pass radio.
