What's March without Dick Vitale? | Page 2 | The Boneyard

What's March without Dick Vitale?

Much prefer Rafferty's game analysis & even his schtick - "onions", changes his voice pitch when he gets excited - LoL.
 
At his peak, Vitale was too much schtick and slogans, and yes, Raftery is way better, but Vitale's passion for the game is real. In case you just scrolled by the video posted above, take a couple of minutes to watch it. Its worth it.
 
Many here won't be old enough to remember, but in the early 1980's when ESPN was still pretty new and college basketball (primarily Monday Night in the Bg East) was one of the first (outside of indoor soccer and Australian rules football) live sports programming they had, Vitale was on the broadcasts (he was recently fired by the Pistons). His energy and knowledge was tremendous and made it must watch TV. Around 1983 or 1984 he moved from the game broadcasts and slowly started to become a caricature of what he initially was.

A few years later, when Jimmy Valvano (RIP) joined, their pregame, halftime and post game commentary was awesome, but sadly that only lasted a few years.

For decades he has become difficult to listen to outside of small samples here and there but he does truly love the game and did a lot to grow fan interest beginning nearly 45 years ago.

I wish him the best.
 
Kitaman said:
Nothing energizes and speeds his recovery more than broadcasting a dook game.

Tolerate him while you still can, he's one of the few broadcasting legends left.

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In the early 90s he was the guy. His energy and the crowd energy during the big games was awesome baby! But as years go on his schtick got old and then annoying and then repetitive. Now, hes just sad to listen to. He really needs to retire but he seems like a guy that will have to have the mic pulled from his cold dead hand.
 
TheChamps990411 said:
In the early 90s he was the guy. His energy and the crowd energy during the big games was awesome baby! But as years go on his schtick got old and then annoying and then repetitive. Now, hes just sad to listen to. He really needs to retire but he seems like a guy that will have to have the mic pulled from his cold dead hand.
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I don’t understand how people here don’t understand that his health at 85 right now is BAD. And coming off 4 th bout of cancer treatment he is pretty weak. ESPN owed him the chance to be on broadcasts at year end. That is it.
I guess you want him to quit and shut himself inside his house and go away? You’re a real humanitarian full of empathy. It destroyed your Duke broadcast to listen? Change the channel, there are a thousand other games on.
 
I'll always remember Dickie V. from the early Calhoun days and the early to mid-90s teams when we started getting good and games were on ESPN.
 
UCTitleTown said:
I'll always remember Dickie V. from the early Calhoun days and the early to mid-90s teams when we started getting good and games were on ESPN.
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Early in the Dream Season we played Maryland in the Big East/ACC Challenge and we whooped them, I remember freshman Burrell hit a bunch of 3's. Which was interesting b/c he didn't shoot many as the season went on. and I can still hear Dicky saying, "the big boys in the Big East better lace 'em up when they come up to Connecticut this year" and boy was he ever right.
 
jibsey said:
I don’t understand how people here don’t understand that his health at 85 right now is BAD. And coming off 4 th bout of cancer treatment he is pretty weak. ESPN owed him the chance to be on broadcasts at year end. That is it.
I guess you want him to quit and shut himself inside his house and go away? You’re a real humanitarian full of empathy. It destroyed your Duke broadcast to listen? Change the channel, there are a thousand other games on.
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I simply said its said to listen to him. Go take your BP meds and calm down.
 
FfldCntyFan said:
Many here won't be old enough to remember, but in the early 1980's when ESPN was still pretty new and college basketball (primarily Monday Night in the Bg East) was one of the first (outside of indoor soccer and Australian rules football) live sports programming they had, Vitale was on the broadcasts (he was recently fired by the Pistons). His energy and knowledge was tremendous and made it must watch TV. Around 1983 or 1984 he moved from the game broadcasts and slowly started to become a caricature of what he initially was.

A few years later, when Jimmy Valvano (RIP) joined, their pregame, halftime and post game commentary was awesome, but sadly that only lasted a few years.

For decades he has become difficult to listen to outside of small samples here and there but he does truly love the game and did a lot to grow fan interest beginning nearly 45 years ago.

I wish him the best.
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This is spot on.
 
Many here take Dick Vital too seriously. He is not a serious broadcaster, just a hype man/cheerleader for college basketball.

He's harmless and yes, he did impact the sport just through his continuous spotlighting of the teams, athletes and games.

I'm not hating on this legend as some posters are. Since 1999 Dick Vital's dook allegiance stopped bothering me.
 
bendm said:
Had to mute him, just like old times. Absolutely unbearable calling a Duke game.
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Beat me to the punch

Good man, not an analyst at all and that's OK, I wish him well, and I don't have to listen to him doing a Dook game.

Probably picked the 4 one seeds to get to the Final Four, or pretty damn close. But he's not alone, all the "experts" do, with a rare exception
 
I wish him well, but Dikky Vee is a phony. I always felt that way, but became convinced when he trashed A-Rod, who was his neighbor in Florida at the time, on national TV, during the worst part of his steroid scandal. As far as I’m concerned, Vitale showed his true colors then. Why not just keep your mouth shut and have some integrity? Did anyone really need to hear about how close you were to him, and how surprised you were at how much he’d changed, during a national broadcast of college basketball? Regardless of how all the Red Sox fans on here feel about Alex Rodriguez, that was completely classless, ego-driven self-promotion, and it disgusted me.
 
He seems like a nice enough guy and he is a genuinely enthusiatic/upbeat person but he became unbearable with Duke and turned himself into a sideshow. I also never liked that he does nothing for his alma mater Seton Hall.
 
Kitaman said:
Many here take Dick Vital too seriously. He is not a serious broadcaster, just a hype man/cheerleader for college basketball.

He's harmless and yes, he did impact the sport just through his continuous spotlighting of the teams, athletes and games.

I'm not hating on this legend as some posters are. Since 1999 Dick Vital's dook allegiance stopped bothering me.
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Have respect and spell his name correctly.
 
Dicky V had a good space in his early days of ESPN but he chomped on the Mike K bit way too hard
He is a sick man health wise and ESPN felt they were doing the right thing by allowing him to come back after his 4th cancer bout. Not for any of us to second guess that decision. As others have said, do what I do and tune into something else. I wish him nothing but the best for the remaining time he has on earth but the broadcast schtick is over - Have him on some pregame shows as a special guest or better yet, maybe Dook could do the right thing and let him handle their play by play, :p
 
He seems like a genuinely nice person. I don't enjoy his broadcasting style.
 
Most broadcast legends are hated by some portion of listeners because they are distinctive which either people love or hate. Distinctiveness invites subjective opinions. They are the spice in what would otherwise be a bland serving of boiled talking potato heads.
 
El Obrero said:
I wish him well, but Dikky Vee is a phony. I always felt that way, but became convinced when he trashed A-Rod, who was his neighbor in Florida at the time, on national TV, during the worst part of his steroid scandal. As far as I’m concerned, Vitale showed his true colors then. Why not just keep your mouth shut and have some integrity? Did anyone really need to hear about how close you were to him, and how surprised you were at how much he’d changed, during a national broadcast of college basketball? Regardless of how all the Red Sox fans on here feel about Alex Rodriguez, that was completely classless, ego-driven self-promotion, and it disgusted me.
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Nevermind Sawx fans, I’m a Yankee fan and can’t stand A-Rod. Dude is a phony to this day. Of course so is Big Papi but that’s another story…

I’ve been listening to Dukie V for a long, long time and while I love his enthusiasm for the game, he goes overboard with his schtick a lot. He doesn’t bother me at this point but I’ve also learned to tune him out.
 
huskyjawz said:
Early in the Dream Season we played Maryland in the Big East/ACC Challenge and we whooped them, I remember freshman Burrell hit a bunch of 3's. Which was interesting b/c he didn't shoot many as the season went on. and I can still hear Dicky saying, "the big boys in the Big East better lace 'em up when they come up to Connecticut this year" and boy was he ever right.
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That was the season after the dream season I believe
 
He's an infomercial pitch man and his product is Duke basketball. Once you get over that, he's entertaining at the very least.
 
Kitaman said:
Nothing energizes and speeds his recovery more than broadcasting a dook game.

Tolerate him while you still can, he's one of the few broadcasting legends left.

Expand ...

He is terrible, So obnoxious !! I have to turn the volume OFF!!!! I do fine without him !
 
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