While not quite Fire Joe Morgan, or even Heave The Hawk, Shut Up Tim McCarver
is another example of the angry interwebber in action, as profiled by the South Florida Sun Sentinel’s Mike Bernadino.
The man behind the site is Thomas Baiter, a 32-year-old advertising supervisor for a New York cable network. It all began during the 2004 American League playoffs after Baiter and his friends heard “one too many McCarverisms.”
“I mentioned to a friend how it would be pretty funny to dedicate a Web site to skewering this guy,” Baiter wrote in an e-mail message. “I figured we couldn’t be the only people in America yelling at their TVs after some of the things he said.”
Baiter, who has never heard from McCarver or any of his representatives, also sponsors McCarver’s page on baseball-reference.com and, with the playoffs in full swing, reports that “traffic is really climbing again.”
Baiter says he grew up listening to McCarver on Mets broadcasts and enjoyed his work then but has been put off by McCarver’s devolution to a “suck-up and a generalist.”
This from the broadcaster, who Joe Buck dubbed “Sophocles of The Diamond”, Sophocles having the 1st name of Tim:
Note that this burst of brilliance was 1st heard on Saturday, 9/10/05. It was John Olerud’s Homer in Red Sox-Yankees. As Olerud was a good hitter & a quiet man, “Sophocles “came up with this;
“Mime, In The Rock Band, is beginning to make noise.”
Some cackling giggle followed.
Right before Bill Mueller’s walf-off homer in 2004 after the Varitek/A-Rod fight. Tim let this gem escape his brain. “The best way to get a hit off of Mariano Rivera right now is to hit a broken bat single” followed by his I’m so clever chuckle. .02 nano seconds later cue Joe Buck “There’s a drive, deep to right and this ball is in the Red Sox bullpen. Home Run!!! and the Red Sox win on Bill Mueller’s heroics!” Tim sat there in stunned silence.
Remember when Tim McCarver passed the runner after a grand slam. Anyone who can pull something that bad cannot possibly have a clue what he is talking about. Remember McCarver We already know what your about to say, it is something very obvious to the viewers on TV.