This story was excerpted from Adam McCalvy¡¯s Brewers Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.
MILWAUKEE -- Since 1995, the Brewers¡¯ television booth has been home to many memorable play-by-play men -- from Jim Paschke (¡®95-¡¯96) to Matt Vasgersian (¡®97-2001) to Daron Sutton (¡®02-¡¯06) to the current mix of Brian Anderson with Matt Lepay and now Jeff Levering, plus the voices of Len Kasper and Craig Coshun from time to time over the years.
But there¡¯s been only one Rock.
The Brewers celebrated Bill ¡°Rock¡± Schroeder¡¯s 30 years of color commentary during Friday¡¯s 6-5 loss to the Reds, bringing back all of his former broadcast partners with the exception of Kasper, the radio voice of the White Sox, who got a jump on festivities when he caught up with Schroeder on the Brewers¡¯ last homestand. One by one, they took turns calling an inning alongside their former partner.
¡°It¡¯s stunning, the whole day,¡± Schroeder said. ¡°I can¡¯t believe it¡¯s been 30 years. Every year gets better.¡±
If you missed it, you can still catch up on some great stories about Rock. Anderson hosted a special edition of the ¡°Brewers Unfiltered¡± podcast earlier this week featuring Paschke, Vasgersian and Sutton. Here are some highlights:
Jim Paschke: ¡°He was my stockbroker before we started doing baseball together. Rock was a stockbroker. I was happy to get him up in the booth, to be honest with you.¡±
Matt Vasgersian: ¡°I'm surprised that telecast actually got out of the state of Wisconsin, because in those early days it was over the air. There was this little thing called the Wisconsin Sports Network with a graphics package that looked like it was pulled right out of a high school volleyball tournament someplace in Oconomowoc.¡±
Daron Sutton: ¡°It's Rock. I mean, that's the one tie that binds. I know we may tell some off-color stories but he was good to me. He put up with me. I was a superball bouncing all over the booth, even if we were trying to sell Eric Young as an older cleanup hitter and Lenny Harris hitting fifth right behind him.¡±
Brian Anderson: ¡°Me, Matt, Daron, we all kind of came in as the guys that Rock ¡®led,¡¯ if that makes sense. He was the older brother for us. But [Paschke] was the older brother for him. So, your perspective on Rock and all of this lineage of Brewers television announcers, that's a totally different thing for you.¡±
Paschke: ¡°Bill came in raring to go. He wanted to read all the commercials right away and do all the promos, all of that. We had to kind of slow things down a little bit. He credits me with telling him, ¡®Don't be a former player in the booth, become a broadcaster who used to play baseball.¡¯ I don't know why I said that. But he remembers that. And I guess it was decent advice, because he certainly has become that. He's a broadcaster now after 30 years.¡±
Anderson: ¡°I just find it amazing that all of us, in such different ways, have carved out such a piece of Brewers television. I do think Rock is obviously such a big part of that. The fact Rock has navigated all of his analysis around all of us is commendable. That's the secret sauce to me. I think it has to do with that backup catcher mentality. ¡ He's trying to navigate us through a game or a broadcast, and there was no difference from when he was catching and trying to navigate a pitcher through a game.¡±
Sutton: ¡°Not only that, but it¡¯s the backup catcher catching the fringy prospect in Spring Training. We were also that sometimes. He¡¯d go out and catch our bad bullpens, too.¡±
Paschke: ¡°It's being authentic. That's why people in Wisconsin appreciate what we do. And you can't fake that.¡±
Anderson: ¡°Speaking of authentic Rock, one of my favorite stories to tell has to do with Matt. Matt was always really gracious. When I was in the Minor Leagues and with a lot of Minor League announcers, Matt would let us come watch him. We were so desperate to tap into the big league side of things. And Matt invited me to the Astrodome and I met Bill and we spent an entire day together. We had two meals. I sat in the booth. We shared stories. We had laughs. We had drinks. That was probably 1998. Now, fast forward to the winter of 2006, Daron is now going to Arizona and [the Brewers are] doing the interview process and I've got an audition to do. ¡
¡°I'm pretty fired up about this because I'm walking into this audition, and I've already met Rock. Like, we're boys. We're pretty tight, I'm guessing at that point, because we've just spent a whole day together years prior. I walk in there, all the executives are there, and I stick my hand out, ¡®Rock, great to see you again!¡¯ And he says, ¡®Hey, Bill Schroeder. Nice to meet you.¡¯ You can imagine. I was like, ¡®Well, I just lost this job.¡¯¡±
Sutton: ¡°We pulled one over on him. Rock played 15 minutes for the Angels, right? Very forgotten years, but he got paid. And John Walsh and I think Mitch Riggin or Matt Gangl, one of the two great directors were there, we were all in on it. We played a West Coast swing where we went San Diego, then Anaheim, and then up the road to L.A. all in one big fell swoop. ¡ We basically had a plant [in Anaheim]. We had a sign made and between every inning, this sign would go up under the booth at The Big A: ¡®Bill Schroeder, welcome home. Always an Angel.¡¯ ¡ He couldn¡¯t believe it. It meant the world to him. I don¡¯t know if, to this day, he knows that it was a false thing that we came up with.¡±
Vasgersian: ¡°There's so many Schroeder stories that I'd like to get into that better discretion prevents me from entertaining. Those are the good ones. That's the gold.¡±