Great sports announcer Bill Mazer passes (92)

Loved listening to Mazer, he could talk about anything — not just sports — in an entertaining and engaging way, and bing wisdom and life lessons in as he grew older and more boddhisatva like. Always remember a day I was home sick, and Mazer described the pure, silver voice of the great opera singer Jussi Bjoerling ... and then he played one of the singers pieces, and it was just as incredible and timeless as promised. RIP Maze.

Lotsa folk will remember him from his Channel 5 days as its sports guy, who everyone tried to stump with trivia questions — it was rare Mazer didn't know the answer, but he was so much more than merely a sports guy, you came out a more rounded person by virtue of having listened to him.

Last week I was trying to remember his name and I couldn't, and wondering what had become of him, why I hadn't heard of him in so long...bummer of a way to get your answer, but thanks for the memories Mazer.

according to the Post,

Mazer, who also taught at St. John’s, was fascinated by the former Ron Artest, Metta World Peace, who attended the university when Mazer worked there. When a Post basketball reporter joined his Westchester show, Mazer never failed to turn the conversation to Artest. He lived to see the day when World Peace became a Knick.

 

http://nypost.com/2013/10/23/bill-mazer-broadcasting-great-dead-at-92/

Now that I didn't know. Funny how things work out.

The host of “Sports Extra” on Ch. 5 in the 1970s and 1980s, Mazer also broadcast Knicks games in the mid-1960s. He also was a broadcaster for the Nets, Rangers, Islanders and Buffalo Bills and prided himself on his encyclopedic knowledge of New York sports dating to the days of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig.

 

Mazer did the first-ever television broadcast of a college basketball game in 1948. He was one of the original talk-show hosts for WFAN.

“He had the ability to take sports facts and trivia and relate it to the here and now,’’ his son Arnie told The Post. “He combined the experience of seeing sports of the 1920s and related it to the present day. He could easily relate the past to the present and the present to the past and the past to the future.’’

 

Mazer’s last stint was as a radio host for WVOS in Westchester which he did until he was 88. His funeral service will be held Sunday in White Plains.

 

http://nypost.com/2013/10/23/bill-mazer-broadcasting-great-dead-at-92/

Glad someone posted this.

His heyday was well before my time, but I did catch him on the tail end of his career when WFAN in NY was in its infancy and he was one of the main guys there. He was really the pioneer of sports talk radio. He started sports radio long before sports ever on the radar of Americana as it is today, long before cynicism entered into sports.

I always remembered the remotes he would do from Mickey Mantles restaurant, he would get some fabulous guests all the time. The best part is that you would always hear the plates clanging and people talking in the background.