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| I Left My Fridge In San Francisco: Verse 2
By Emily Kaiser
Edible San Francisco Autumn 2006 Jon Miller has provided the play-by-play for baseball games in San Francisco as the “Voice of the Giants” for the last ten years. A baron of the broadcasting field, Miller grew up just across the Bay in Hayward. He first practiced broadcasting as a teenager at the Oakland Coliseum, recording his own play-by-play of A’s games into a reel-to-reel tape machine on his lap in the bleacher section. The effort paid off: Miller’s warm conversational baritone recreates a past era of baseball giants, not just for Giants fans. Miller also hosts Sunday Night Baseball with Joe Morgan on ESPN and the two broadcast the World Series every fall for ESPN Radio. One recent afternoon, from the broadcast booth overlooking AT&T Park, Miller drew up his score-keeping sheet for the night’s game and talked to us about the contents of his refrigerator. ESF: Granted, during baseball season you may not see the inside of any but the hotel minibar, but if you do, what’s in your refrigerator? JM: When we’re home, I have this thing for a drink called kombucha. It’s some sort of a Tibetan tea that’s made from fermented mushrooms or something. It’s supposed to be very good for you, filled with all these antioxidants and amino acids. Name something that’s incredibly good, this is filled with it. I try to drink my two bottles a day. So the fridge at home is always filled with it. ESF: But kombucha isn’t all you keep in your fridge, is it? JM: My wife does the shopping, and she keeps the refrigerator full of field greens, vegetables, everything ready for a mixed salad. She prefers organics. I could go either way. I’m always looking for health in a bottle. I don’t want to have to spend a whole lot of time with it. I just want to have a drink and then I’m healthy. But we’re very healthy at home. ESF: And on the road? JM: When I’m on the road, I’m just the opposite. Depending on how late I’m getting in, I might go out for something. If there’s time, I might get some kombucha to keep in the little refrigerator in my hotel room. I’ll take out the beer and snacks set them on the counter, and put the kombucha in. But basically, I’m a complete wreck on the road. ESF: Do you eat before the game? JM: If there’s time for it. I didn’t have time tonight because I spent extra time talking to Felipe [Alou, San Francisco Giants manager], and talking to some other people in the house. So I didn’t get to the booth until 5:30, when it’s time to get ready. ESF: Will you eat after the game? JM: Well, hopefully, but you never know. Last night I flew in from Boston. When I got home, I turned on the computer and answered a couple of emails from my son and from my daughter. I had a bottle of kombucha. My wife had some cheese in that drawer in the fridge, some Brie and some Reblochon. So I got a few slices of those, and put them on some crackers, and then composed my emails. I’m not a wine drinker, though I know those would have gone well with some wine. I must be allergic to alcohol: I get all red and my forehead breaks out in a sweat. So no wine for me. But that can be a typical dinner, if I get home late. ESF: In your book, Confessions of a Baseball Purist, (Johns Hopkins University, 2000) you say you like to credit the food in the broadcast booth for inspiring you to be a broadcaster. You tell a funny story about watching Russ Hodges, the longtime Giants broadcaster of the 1950s and ‘60s, eating French fries during a play. JM: It might not have been a true story, because I was ten years old when it happened. Herb Caen, the columnist with the Chronicle, would write about Russ that you could hear him chewing over the air. So I don’t know if I ever actually saw it. But at banquets, where I’m sometimes invited to give a speech, I like to tell this story about my first baseball game at Candlestick Park. From my seat I could see into the broadcast booth. I’m listening to Russ on the radio at the same time. All of a sudden, at this seminal moment that would forever change my life’s path, I saw Russ Hodges say, “there’s a curve ball low and outside for ball one,” and then grab a big handful of French fries and put them all in his mouth at once. It must have been like twelve French fries. I could hear him chewing on them on my transistor. The next pitch came in, and Russ said, “there’s a fastball inside, ball two.” Then he grabbed a big cup of soda and took a big pull. I thought to myself, right there and then, “That is the life for me.’ It gets good laughs. But then a guy did a story about me in Sports Illustrated and wrote about how this changed my life. Lon Simmons, Russ’ partner, got upset because he thought, here’s Russ, not only a great friend but somebody he looked up to, who had been dead for many years, whose name does not come up in conversation much, and that maybe this was not the best way. So I changed the story. Now it’s a nameless visiting broadcaster who eats the fries. ESF: Is it considered bad form amongst broadcasters to be heard eating on the air? JM: Well, I’ve never heard it discussed. But I think that for me, as a professional broadcaster, the only thing that should ever be heard on the microphone is what you want heard. I’m very careful around a microphone. I’m always very aware of it. I’ve worked with former players just starting out in broadcasting, who have no feeling for the microphone at all. They’ll sit there eating popcorn, or they’ll have a drink, and you hear “glug, glug!” right on the air. I tell them, “You know, that can be heard.” That’s why on the radio I always use the stand mike. If I have to do something I don’t want to be audible, I can just back away. ESF: Did you have favorite foods growing up? In your book, you also write that the board game Strat-O-Matic played an important role in your baseball education; did your games allow time for snacks? JM: Strat-O-Matic first came out [in 1961] when I was a senior in high school. There were six of us who played it together. We played an entire Giants season, all 162 games. I was the scheduler, and we played the home games at my house. For the road games, I would go to the house of whoever was playing that team. The best road trip was to Lol Sorensen’s house. His family owned the Sorensen Brothers Mortuary in Hayward. His mom was Portuguese. When you would go to their house, you had to have hors d’oeuvres She would always have sliced linguisa sausage, cheese and crackers, cookies, stuff like that. So that was the best Strat-O-Matic road trip. ESF: Were there any restaurants in Hayward you liked? JM: Well, you know, I used to work at A&W Root Beer. ESF: At one of their drive-ins? JM: As an inside-worker. We had a carhop and a cook, and the inside worker. I made the milkshakes and the root beer floats. We had a microphone for the carhop to call in orders, when she was outside. At closing time, there would still be a few customers in their cars. I’d take the microphone, because you can hear the speaker outside as well. I’d do the signoff. I’d say, “Ladies and Gentlemen, A&W Root Beer, Hayward Division, is about to finish its root-beer making day. We appreciate your patronage, and remind you that we’ll be reopening tomorrow morning, 10 o’clock sharp. Now would you please join in singing our national anthem.” And then I would sing the national anthem. ESF: That’s hilarious. JM: That was my only food service job. ESF: And you managed to turn it into a broadcasting job. JM: Anything to get on a microphone! |
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© 2001 - 2008 Emily Kaiser |
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