Latest / Retro Sports Radio: Classic Games from History / 1956 • Baseball Clip • Yogi Berra discusses baseball with Ed Sullivan

Transcript

1956 • Baseball Clip • Yogi Berra discusses baseball with Ed Sullivan · Retro Sports Radio: Classic Games from History

• 0:00
  I once said you can observe a lot by watching.
• 0:02
  Well, back when I was a kid, the only way to see a ball player up close was listening.
• 0:07
  Don't quote me on that. Let me explain first.
• 0:10
  Growing up poor in Elizabeth Avenue in St. Louis during the 1930s,
• 0:14
  there were two kinds of free entertainment, playing ball and listening to the radio.
• 0:19
  Free was good in those days because time was tough.
• 0:23
  Sometimes on Saturday we got to baseball games for free.
• 0:26
  We would sit up at the top of left field stands at Sportsman's Park with the Cardinals and Outhold
• 0:31
  Gang en route for Joe Medwick, Frankie Fish and the Dean Brothers.
• 0:36
  From the distance you don't get to know the players too well.
• 0:39
  A lot of what we knew about big leaguers came from the newspaper and back of bubble gum cards.
• 0:46
  What you really got to feel for the players was on radio.
• 0:49
  From play by play man, you would get little pieces of information that would help build a picture of
• 0:55
  a player. France locks did the Cardinal games back then and also the St. Louis Browns.
• 1:01
  Sometimes ball players would read commercials. Sometimes they were in the interview.
• 1:06
  And man, how we loved it. They made a guest appearance on one of the big programs
• 1:10
  and hammed it up with the cash.
• 1:13
  Radio was still a big deal when I came out with the Yankees at the end of the 46th season.
• 1:18
  I went to some programs and did plenty of interviews during my career.
• 1:21
  They used to joke that I had a face made for radio.
• 1:25
  My best pal, Joe Gargiola made a nice living calling games on radio for the Cardinals after
• 1:29
  he retired in 1955. By then television had started to take over and baseball and radio
• 1:35
  kept going on like old friends.
• 1:38
  I bet fans still listen to most of their games on radio, especially when they're not watching
• 1:42
  them on TV. That you can quote me on.
• 1:46
  For this collection, I listened to a bunch of shows and picked up the ones that remind me
• 1:50
  of how baseball and radio teamed up.
• 1:54
  Jack Benny, Bob Hope, and Fred Ellen. Those were the superstars of radio.
• 1:58
  Actors Jimmy Stewart, Gary Cooper. They were top guys back then.
• 2:03
  Bill Stern. He was like one man ESPN.
• 2:07
  And what a pleasure to hear from old friends.
• 2:09
  When I listened to Jackie Robinson, Ted Williams, Joe DiMaggio, Casey Stinger on these old programs,
• 2:15
  I can't believe they go back 50 or 60 years.
• 2:18
  One of the guys on Radio Spirit said that I might be the only person in life to understand
• 2:22
  that Casey was talking about.
• 2:24
  I told him the more things change, the more they stay the same.
• 2:28
  I was the only guy who understood him, back then too.