Monday Morning Brushback: Can You Believe It?

The Red Sox week in review dives into the news regarding the voice of the franchise, the voice of summer, and the voice of this game that we love.

I gotta be honest with you folks: I barely ever know what I’m gonna write when I get behind the keyboard to do this column each week.

Sure, I’ll have a general idea of what I wanna talk about — and have the commenters yell at me about, and rightfully so — but I don’t go into the writing process with a master plan and a flag to plant (I’m sure my previous musings tipped you off to these facts, but I digress).

As I was sitting at a fine watering hole Sunday afternoon, and as a piece of news came across my desk, the topic of what I’d be writing about for the Brushback became evidently clear: legendary radio play-by-play guy Joe Castiglione—a Hall of Famer—announced that he’d be retiring after over four decades in the booth calling Red Sox games.

How do I go about regular Brushback procedures after hearing that?

You don’t wanna hear about how some random schmuck feels about a guy’s pitch mix. Any steam about dropping three out of four in the Bronx can be blown off elsewhere today. You know how to read Baseball Savant; I don’t have to outline it for you.

The voice of our summer is gonna be hanging it up. The voice of the Red Sox for more than 40 years is going to start his well deserved retirement at the end of the regular season. How could I not talk about this?

Let’s play a game: go ahead and play this clip out from start to finish. Watch it and report back. Don’t worry—I’ll wait, I’m not going anywhere.

Played it? Good.

Now answer me this: how many times did you say what Castig said verbatim? I’d venture to guess you did it at least twice. Considering the fact that Joe Castiglione has been the voice in the background of countless summer cookouts with the grill sizzling, evening drives back from work when you need some company while sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic in [INSERT 495-ADJACENT COMMUNITY HERE], and nights where you just wanted some background noise, you were bound to find a high pitched-call that resonated with you.

That’s what the voice of the team—the voice of an entire season—does. Gil Santos was the same was with the Patriots; he’s what I think of when you talk about the Patriots in the fall. Sean Grande is the voice of the Celtics to a good chunk of people around here. Joe Castig is summer; I can’t separate his voice from long days, short nights, and good times. If he’s not summer, then he’s the voice of hope springing eternal in April—same idea as I just mentioned.

Having been born in 1996, I really don’t know any different than him calling games in one capacity or another. Other generations have their own voices that guided them through games; I’m lucky that Castig was the voice that I got.

I’m gonna fuck up some the details of this anecdote, so bear with me (especially you, Dad). When he was a little kid, my father would sleep over at his uncle’s house in Dorchester every now and again. His uncle there would let him and his brothers stay up late to listen to the Sox wherever they were — be it at the Fens or out on the West Coast. Ned Martin—mercy—would be there with my pops every step of the way. Martin was the voice of his summers as he was falling in love with baseball, a prelude to the love for the game he’d pass on to me, which is what has led me to writing on this website. At the snap of a finger, I’m sure Dad could recite a handful of Ned Martin calls on the spot. If you hear a beep from a phone, it’s probably my father texting me and doing exactly what I just said he’d do about twenty five words ago.

Of course, I never listened to Ned Martin. He passed in 2002.

Joe Castiglione will be that example for my kids one day. I’ll tell them about how I listened to him for damn-near thirty years. Maybe they won’t appreciate that right from the jump —hell, they probably won’t — but they’ll grow to appreciate that if they’re anything like me. God willing, they’ll be baseball fans! And if they’re baseball fans: one day, they’ll have someone who they can point to as the voice of their summers, just as I did with Castig and my old man did with Martin.

That’s sort of beautiful, isn’t it? Of course I’m appreciative for all of the years I had the privilege of listening to Joe Castiglione — in the car, on the radio, from my phone’s speaker, whatever — but the next generation will have the opportunity to have another person fill that same position in their own experience of learning and loving the game.

I’m thankful that, after all of these years, Castig was the guy I got. To answer the question he asked us on countless occasions: no, I really cannot believe it, I can’t believe how lucky we were for four decades.

Cheers to retirement, Joe.