OLD VandyMania.com (ARCHIVE)

VirginiaDore wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 8:26 pm Holy Smokes, what a ball game! We’ve had good broadcasters in my 50-plus years of fandom, better in fact than most announcers for other (and often more prominent) athletic programs which I’ve been obliged to tune in on occasion, but Paul Eels was the one you felt like you knew and loved, at least speaking for myself. Partly because his warm personality and smile were so endearing, partly because he knew his stuff and appeared to have a genuine and deep love for Vandy, and partly because you saw and heard him every night on WSM-TV. You really DID know him, if only vicariously. It still pains me to remember his departure for Arkansas and especially his tragic and premature death.

VirginiaDore wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 11:29 pm Read the above linked articles with interest; thanks for posting. Larry Munson’s time at Vanderbilt predated mine, so I’m in no position to compare him to Paul Eels. However, rankings that would place John Ward ahead of Eels are suspect (at best) in my view. I had the same debate with my UT-loving cousin about 1973. For reasons I can no longer remember (and now can’t even imagine), I used to listen to Ward’s broadcast of Tennessee basketball occasionally. By the time a game ended, I had heard “Bottom!”, “Write it down!”, and “You walked, 23” (or 32, or whatever; fill in your own number) so many times I was ready to throw up. Next game it was like somebody wound him up and he started all over again.