Skip Caray Dies...

[ghstoga 10]

...my thoughts and prayers are with his family and his Braves family.

[bluefieldRocks 14]

agreed...

 

RIP

[GetMoney55 11]

Sad day in sports.

[HurricaneWarning 212]

I always enjoyed hearing Skip call the Braves games. God bless his family.

[GHS06 10]

I was completely crushed when I first heard this. I've probably listened to a 1000 games he has called. There was never a dull moment when he was in the booth. He will be sorely missed. RIP Skip.

[Lance 228]

grew up listening to him and his dad...very sad.

 

RIP

[trublue 939]

He WILL be missed. I was at the famous Sid Bream "slide"game (Pirates) when he made the call that forever will identify his legacy....."Braves win, Braves win, Braves win". Of course, I didn't hear it at the game but the 1000's of replays later. Again, he WILL be missed....

 

Here is a link to the AJC w/many fans writing about their memories of Skip, if you so choose to read. Some are very funny.

 

http://www.ajc.com/blogs/content/shared-...it_his_way.html

 

Following is an excerpt:

 

By Tom Lea

 

August 4, 2008 12:21 AM | Link to this

 

One of the all-time greats. My favorite comment came shortly after Ted Turner forbid his newscasters on CNN from using the word “foreign†since his network had developed a global reach. Instead, they were to use the word “international.†Being a loyal employee of Mr. Turner… Skip was calling a Braves game when the batter called time and backed of the batter’s box, as Skip explained, because “he had an international object in his eye.â€

 

 

[tbgfan 856]

Chipper, Cox, other Braves mourn Caray

Broadcast partner Van Wieren says his honesty will be missed

 

By CARROLL ROGERS

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Published on: 08/03/08

News of Skip Caray's passing hit the Braves family hard -- his longtime broadcast partner, and players who identified this organization with Caray long before they ever became a part of it, even the most veteran of players, Tom Glavine, Chipper Jones and John Smoltz.

 

Smoltz and Caray's broadcast partner Pete Van Wieren were on the Braves' charter flight to San Francisco when they learned of Caray's death.

 

"It's a sad day," Smoltz said. "There are no words. Sad doesn't do it justice. I will always remember Skip for his humor and his ability to go about life the way he did. I gained so much respect for what he did and how long he did it."

 

Jones was at home with his family on Sunday evening when he was informed.

 

"I figured Skip Caray is as much a part of Atlanta Braves baseball as any of us," said Jones, who will rejoin the team in Arizona later this week. "We all grew up listening to Skip, whether it be on TV or radio. Any time the guys on ESPN imitate [you] calling the highlights, you're pretty much a legend. From a fan's standpoint, he's going to be a huge loss for them because he relayed the games to fans for so long."

 

The loss transcends the game for players. Jones said his friendship with Caray was formed over long charter flights and daily visits in the clubhouse.

 

"He always made a note to come by my locker and shake my hand, ask me how I was doing, how the family was, how my kids were," Jones said. "Personally over the last 15, 16, 17 years, I haven't gotten his play-by-play on the radio or TV, but I had a lot of plane flight conversations with him. I really respected him, as well as the whole Caray family. They have a pretty good legacy working over there. It's a sad day for Braves baseball."

 

Said manager Bobby Cox: "This was completely unexpected and is a complete loss. I had just spoken with Skip this week when we did the radio show and I didn't know he wasn't feeling well. He seemed in his normal good spirits. We've all lost a very good friend. For me, he was a good buddy -- at the park and away from the park. We always had a lot of great laughs. He will be very sorely missed."

 

Cox tapped a napping Van Wieren on the shoulder during the flight to inform him of Caray's death.

 

Fans related so well to Caray, Van Wieren said, because he told it like it was, even if he couched it in humor.

 

"But behind the humor there was an honesty and a commitment to telling it like he believed it to be that never, ever varied," Van Wieren said. "If he didn't like it that a game was two minutes late getting started, everybody knew about it. If he had an opinion on a player, he said it. And he had a way of saying it that was sometimes humorous. The way he could take a bad ball game, in some of those bad years especially, and turn it into a fun broadcast, whether it was by talking about something in the game or whether it was talking about something that didn't have anything to do with the game, maybe it was a movie that was coming up after the game or maybe it was a restaurant that he'd gone to. It could have been anything. He was just a very entertaining broadcaster and a very good one. The game was still the most important thing, but if game was decided by the fourth or fifth inning, people would still watch the rest of the game just to hear what he had to say about things. That's a very, very unique ability."

 

Caray's health had deteriorated over the past year, and he faced several close calls during a hospital stay last fall. But Caray, who was broadcasting only home games this season, worked as recently as Thursday's game before taking the weekend off.

 

"Regardless of how much you prepare yourself for it, you're always surprised," Glavine said. "Skip, of late, seemed to be doing a lot better. His immediate future was off of everybody's minds. It's a surprise, a shock."

 

Glavine said he'll cherish the relationship he developed with Caray over the years.

 

"We were able to joke around with one another, laugh at one another, and we also had a mutual respect for one another," Glavine said. "I'll miss that, seeing him around the game, taking a jab or two."

 

He knows it will be a difficult loss for Braves fans, too.

 

"For so long, he was what people associated with the Atlanta Braves," Glavine said. "Turn on TBS, and there was Skip. Good times, bad times, that was the constant. The voice people identify the Braves with is Skip Caray. That's going to be missed.

 

"Not only are the Braves losing somebody special from their organization, baseball is too."

 

It'll be especially tough for the players who knew him for so long.

 

"It's wild how when somebody spends so much time in one organization and has had the history that he's had, it's very difficult to have it abruptly end, especially while he's doing it," Smoltz said. "Unfortunately he ended up dying doing something he loved. It'll be a tough day, a tough week."

 

For Jones, this was the most tragic turn of a Braves season already marred by injuries and disappointment.

 

"You sit back and as a Brave, and anybody affiliated with the Braves, you wonder what else could happen to this team this year," Jones said. "It's been one blow after another."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Caray 'part of Braves baseball'

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I was completely crushed when I first heard this. I've probably listened to a 1000 games he has called. There was never a dull moment when he was in the booth. He will be sorely missed. RIP Skip.

 

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