LOL KNBR Callers or: How I learned to stop worrying and love the callers

Hello, BASG readers! Greetings from the snarky scamp behind @LOLKNBRCallers!

Steve Berman writes his first Radio Wars post from his mother’s basement

Now let’s get something straight right from the start. This may be a blog, but I am NOT a blogger. As any loyal listener of The Gary Radnich Show (with Larry Krueger) will tell you, all bloggers are basement-bound freeloaders just looking to get their grubby little hands on a piece of the sports media pie (and free press box hot dogs).

So, needless to say, when Bay Area Sports Guy approached me about joining his team I was cautious. “I need to add some more humor to my site and I can pay you in delicious east coast style pizza from Amici’s East Coast Pizzeria.” he told me.

We discussed how a weekly recap of the funniest tweets might bring more traffic to his site and he assured me the toppings were fresh and that Amici’s could serve me with 12 fine locations across the Bay Area, the People’s Republic of China, and introducing their newest location in La Jolla.

I told him I would consider the offer, but that under NO circumstances would I sell out to the same Cars-4-Brats greed mongers who had watered down my beloved Sports Leader and sought to extinguish all light from our souls with their incessant jingles. I cannot, and will not, be bought. No sir-eee, Bob.

At this moment, I realize some of you (okay perhaps ALL of you) are wondering what the hell it is exactly you are reading. You came here for BASG’s hard-hitting analysis of the limited skirmish they call Radio Wars. You’re already one-third of the way through this article and not even once have I questioned Lee Hammer’s intelligence or the intestinal fortitude of fill-in host, Kevin Lynch. You’re not exactly sure what a LOL KNBR Caller even is! Jeez!

Well, allow me to explain.

Has this ever happened to you? You get into your car with your significant other, or a coworker, or … it doesn’t really matter, but you’re with a person who isn’t quite as fanatical about sports as you are. You flip on the radio and as usual it’s tuned to KNBR. You and your passenger make small talk during the commercials. Rick Barry finishes his lecture on personal appearance. You scribble Dr. Rosanelli’s phone number on a piece of scratch paper and now the show is back on.

Tom Tolbert introduces a new topic and in that moment you can feel the energy in the car shift. Your passenger smiles politely. Is she judging you by the fact that you listen to sports talk radio every day? Could she possibly think less of you just because you’re more concerned with Timmy’s fastball than universal health care? You can’t help but feel a little bit self-conscious. Briefly you consider changing the channel to NPR, but you talk yourself out of it. Stick to your guns. Tolbert is capable of leading an intelligent discussion, right? Right. You convince yourself it’s going to be fine. What’s he talking about anyway? Oh, the Giants pitching rotation. Okay, it’s probably not a topic of concern for Steve Inskeep and his friends down the dial, but thank the Gods; AT LEAST BYRNES ISN’T CO-HOSTING TODAY. Phew! Your passenger is listening intently. Tolbert is cracking jokes and you’re just a few minutes from your destination. Who says sports talk radio can’t be entertaining and informative?

And then…he says those 6 little words, “Let’s take a few phone calls” and your heart sinks. “Let’s go to Salty Balty in Clovis.” he says. “What’s shaking, Salty?” What? NO. Not Salty! Anyone but Salty! And at that moment you know you’re doomed. Salty is in rare form. He rants like a lunatic for several minutes. He wants Brian Sabean’s head on a platter. By the end of the call he is practically hyperventilating. Your mind wanders as you envision a middle-aged man in a faded Kevin Frandsen shirsey, literally frothing at the mouth. Your passenger shifts uncomfortably. It’s all over. You hear the Sleep Train whistle and realize the commercials are back. Mercifully, the segment has ended, but inevitably there comes a moment when your wife, or coworker, or whoever it is in the car with you, asks the question you’ve been dreading all along. “Ummm … do you actually listen to this stuff all day?” (sigh)

How LOL KNBR Callers Got His Groove Back

Such is life for a “normal” KNBR listener. For every lazy summer afternoon spent listening to the great Jon Miller and David B. Flemming, there is a postgame show not far behind with Ron in Livermore waiting on hold at 808-KNBR, ready to flash his credentials (he used to pitch in high school!) and describe for you in detail why he thinks Brandon Belt SUCKS. As fans of sports talk radio, we have learned to roll with the good, the bad, and the salty. But how do we reconcile the fact that our friends and family are whispering behind our backs and rolling their eyes at us, as we so willingly subject ourselves to the absurdity of KNBR callers? How do we answer the question posed in the autobiographical story … ahhh … I mean purely hypothetical situation above? The answer is simple! We resort to defamatory statements and childish name-calling on the internet!

And so, born out of my own love/hate relationship with KNBR, and their constant stream of callers, I created an anonymous Twitter account to document the idiocy of your average KNBR caller. The concept is simple enough; callers make outlandish statements about local sports teams and we, the presumably informed sports fans, laugh at them and feel better about ourselves. Yay!

And it’s pretty awesome.

Like… super awesome.

It really is.

And before you ask, the quotes are not made up. There is no need for poetic license.

The jokes write themselves…

Wow. That last one is just… Wow. Check the date. That was during the MLB playoffs.

Anyway, this concludes your introduction to LOL KNBR Callers. I hope you enjoyed it! All kidding aside, for my money nobody covers the local sports radio game like Bay Area Sports Guy, so I am really excited to be a part of his team. Over the next few months, I plan to share some of the best (worst?) tweets of the week and occasionally go way, waaaay inside, to delve even deeper into some of today’s most fascinating trends in LOL KNBR calling. You can expect the kind of in-depth analysis showcased by this KNBR caller:

Thanks for reading and don’t forget to try the linguini with clam sauce next time you’re at Amici’s East Coast Pizzeria. It’s excellent!