Lost Ballparks

Best of Lost Ballparks: Jon Miller (HOF 1998)

• Mike Koser • Season 1 • Episode 6

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(This episode was recorded in 2022). We’re curating the most downloaded episodes for new listeners discovering Lost Ballparks. If you’re a longtime listener, thank you for being part of this incredible community!

Jon Miller, the longtime voice of the San Francisco Giants has been broadcasting major league baseball games for nearly 50 years.  For 2 decades he and Joe Morgan called the ESPN Sunday Night Game of the Week. Naturally, after a career of that length, he has been to many old Lost Ballparks and he is sharing his first hand experiences on this week's episode. 

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Mike Koser:

Show Open

Jon Miller:

Very pleasant Good afternoon, everyone, wherever you may be. And more than 50,000 of you are right here at Memorial Stadium. We know that for sure.

Announcer:

Show Open

Mike Koser:

He's been broadcasting major league baseball games for nearly five decades. And since 1997 has been the much beloved voice of the San Francisco Giants. The one and only, Jon Miller.

Jon Miller:

Game audio

Mike Koser:

The unmistakable voice of Jon Miller on the Giants flagship station, KNBR. Jon let's start in 1962, you're 10 years old, you and your Dad are going to Candlestick Park to watch Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal, Orlando Cepeda and the SF Giants, . So in 62, was that your first Major League Baseball game?

Jon Miller:

Yes, I went to Candlestick in April of 62 with my dad and my godfather. The Giants played the Dodgers. It was the Giants Dodgers' first matchup of that season at Candlestick, what ended up being uh just an an amazing season. And the Giants beat the Dodgers 19-8, and it made such an impression on me. I not only remembered the final game totals and the winning and losing pitchers and who hit home runs, I even remembered the the paid attendance for that game. And Billy Odell pitched a complete game 15 hitter threw 172 pitches, by the way. Uh when people tell you that they never kept track of pitch counts in those days, don't believe them. They did. Billy Odell went into the ninth inning with a 19-3 lead, and the Dodgers got five runs in the ninth, and the Giants actually got their bullpen busy. And the Hall of Fame baseball writer Bob Stevens, who was covering the Giants for the Chronicle, actually asked Alvin Dark if he was a little bit irritated that in a monumental blowout he had to get his bullpen busy in the ninth inning. And he said, No, no. I know that Billy was just trying to throw strikes and get the game over with. That's all that was going on there. He wasn't tired because he had only thrown a hundred and fifty pitches. And that was a a a direct quote in the in the chronicle. And that meant he'd thrown a hundred and fifty pitches through eight innings going into the ninth inning. He had thrown a hundred and fifty, and that's why he knew he wasn't tired. He threw twenty-two more in that ninth inning. So a lot of crazy things about that game, but uh that made such a huge impression on a a ten-year-old kid sitting in the upper deck who was freezing to death, by the way. It was a cold, foggy night at at the stick.

Mike Koser:

So w walk me through it. What were your first impressions as you walk through the gate and get to your seats at uh at candlestick?

Jon Miller:

I was mesmerized at just how perfect the the grass looked. It was so well manicured at candlestick and candlestick, uh, I I did uh read in the papers the World Series, of course, took place at Candlestick and Yankee Stadium later that year, after the Giants won the pennant, and the Yankee infielders, uh Bobby Richardson, Clete Boyer, and uh Tony Kubek and whatnot, all commented about wow, the the the grass is just perfect. So well manicured, you could not have a better infield than this. And that is exactly the way it looked to me when we first walked in into the upper deck, and then there it was under the lights, and the game had already started. We were in such a long line of traffic on the Bayshore Freeway to get to candlestick, and then had to wait in uh the ticket line to get tickets. Uh the Giants got the bases loaded in the first inning, which we were listening to on my dad's transistor radio while we were waiting to get tickets.

Announcer:

First time between the San Francisco Giants and the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers.

Jon Miller:

And then we finally got up there in the second inning. That was the original candlestick layout.

Mike Koser:

Yeah, that's right, because in 62, the outfield is wide open.

Jon Miller:

Yeah, the uh in right field they had three big bleacher sections like high school football stadium bleachers, and that's all that was in, and they were more toward right center field, and in left field there was a a wire fence, but behind that general admission seats, so they weren't bleacher seats, but uh there were actual seats out there. But kids would jump down from the seats to go chase home run balls when they would clear the fence. Uh when Candlestick first opened in 1960, it was much deeper to center field and left center than it became later on. And the Giants hit so few home runs that they said, Well, wait a minute, this is not the Giants. Willie Mays only hit twenty-nine home runs that year. And, you know, Willie'd already had one year over fifty home runs and he would have another a little bit later on. So it was it was too hard to hit home runs because the the wind generally knocked balls down to left field anyway. Willie actually told me years later, when I got to to know him so well, seeing him at the ballpark all the time when I came to the Giants to broadcast the games, that uh he changed his swing to uh take balls that normally you would try to pull, balls on the inside part of the plate, and he would go with an inside out swing trying to hit 'em to right field where you could get up into the jet stream and and a ball could get pushed. So that's how he started to take advantage of of the peculiarities of of Candlestick Park.

Mike Koser:

Okay, so fast forward eight to ten years, I think, and you're still going to games at Candlestick, only now you're taking your tape recorder with you and recording yourself doing play-by-play. Is that right?

Jon Miller:

Yes. So I usually sat in the upper deck somewhere where I could uh you know be alone, and when the A's came out in 68, I would sit in the bleachers at the Coliseum and usually bring a buddy, and we broadcast the games together. I had been at a small TV station in Santa Rosa, California, Channel 50, that went broke, and I'd been doing all the sports and play by play and whatnot. So when they went off the air, I got one of our technicians who brought a b a bunch of audio equipment, and we actually sat in an empty booth at Caddlestick for a Giants Phillies game on a Tuesday night. I broadcast the game into the tape recorder, uh, and it turned out to be a really good game. And that was the tape that Monty Moore heard when the A's needed an announcer uh after the 73 season going into 74. And then and then he offered me the job.

Mike Koser:

So uh 22 years of age in 1974. Here you are, uh part of the Oakland A's broadcast team.

Jon Miller:

Bellanger beat the A's this year with a suicide squeeze bunt. He's swinging away at this one, hits a drive to left center field, long run for Billy North, and he makes the catch. Going back to first base is Etchebarren and Billy North, who is playing in right center field after a long run to left center, made an amazing catch to take one away from Marc Bellanger.

Mike Koser:

I mean, such poise for a 22-year-old.

Jon Miller:

Well, I was just a such a kid, and when the A's job came up, I thought, well, Charlie Finley is the owner of the team, lives in Chicago. He's never gonna hire me, and he makes all those decisions himself. But then I thought, well, obviously, if I don't send a tape to him, of course I won't get the job. And I probably don't have any chance of getting it even if I do, but I I just should go ahead and send it. Anyway, so it was an incredible opportunity for me to say the least.

Mike Koser:

Well, yeah, what a team.

Jon Miller:

What a team, a great team, and you know, one of the great teams of all time. They won the World Series that year for the third consecutive year, and truly one of the great teams of all time. And they played the game in such a sound, fundamental way, it was the the perfect spot for a a a young guy like me who knew nothing to learn the game. It was like getting my postgraduate degree in baseball, how the game is played. I I could not have been in a better spot, and I I uh you know, thank my lucky stars to this day.

Mike Koser:

Okay, so I gotta ask, uh in 74, was Harvey the rabbit, the mechanical rabbit, was he still at the Coliseum?

Jon Miller:

I don't remember that he was there in 74, but I r I remember being at the Coliseum the night that he made his debut. There were two different things. There was Harvey the rabbit would pop up out of the ground. He was sort of hidden beneath the ground, just off the dirt circle around home plate. When the umpire needed uh uh more baseballs, he could step on this button and the rabbit would pop up. The rabbit had a basket on his head and he could pull out all these the the new baseballs that he needed. Uh there was another button that he could push that would uh activate these little uh bits of uh air jets in the middle of home plate, you know, dust off home plate without the umpire having to get out his uh little whisk broom to do it. I don't know that that ever actually worked. I think there'll be a this big cloud of dust at home plate, and then all the dust would settle right back down on home plate. But uh I remember being there that night and uh public address announcer uh Roy Steele was reading the script to introduce it, and he said, Now, ladies and gentlemen, uh, direct your attention to the area by home plate, and here is Little Harvey. And and Little Harvey not only came up, but he he had lights on him and they were flashing and and whatnot. Charlie was always looking for things to uh promote the team.

Mike Koser:

Yeah, honestly, that's what I love about these old ballparks is that each one of them had their own unique features or characteristics. So speaking of which, I'd love to run through some of the ballparks that you've been to over your nearly fifty-year career, starting in Minnesota with uh Metropolitan Stadium, where the twins played from sixty-one to eighty-one.

Jon Miller:

A very unique ballpark because it was a multi-purpose stadium. They had three decks of seats that basically just went from maybe almost third base and around to almost first base, and then two decks of seating that went the rest of the way down the right field line to the corner, and then the decks ended before you got to third base going down the left field line, and they had a big section of bleachers that were just added in, because it had originally been a minor league ballpark. In left field they had a double deck because that was part of the football configuration in left field behind the left field, and they sold those as bleacher seats, and they had the big old timey scoreboard in right field, and the twins, of course, it was an outdoor ballpark, and I you know, I it it seemed like every time we went there there was always a rain delay. And they used to have uh these uh flamethrowers that they would bring out to try to dry off the dirt on the infield after the a rain delay had ended. That's the only place I've ever seen that. They had these flamethrowers trying to help dry off the infield dirt, so they had a great press room down deep within the catacombs of the ballpark. And man, that was the best one in in in the American League. The food was just great, and you get a full hot meal, and you know, one night a week was steak night, Fridays were you know fish night, and uh and it was just great stuff. So and the people who ran that for them, the waiters and the chef and whatnot, they were there for years, and then when they moved into the Metrodome in the early 80s, uh they all moved over there. So uh uh anyway, we we got to know all those people really well. Just just great people.

Mike Koser:

What did you think of Comiskey Park?

Jon Miller:

Comiskey Park. I used to love Comiskey Park because that was real old-timey baseball. I used to love going there, and they had the the great organist who was one of the first real organists who was part of the scene. You know, baseball had played music in ballparks for a long time. There were having an organist between innings entertainment and pregame and all that was not unusual. But Nancy Faust was part of the scene there, and she had certain songs for different players when they walked up to the plate, and then she had, you know, the White Sox had hit a home run. And even though, you know, maybe I wasn't happy to see him do it, because better broadcast for me and my audience, if my team was hitting home runs, the place would go nuts, and then she'd play this uh song on the organ that the fans would sing along to. Uh, you know, na na, hey, hey, goodbye. Or when a pitcher got removed, a visiting team pitcher got knocked out of the box, the manager go out and remove him, and then she'd play Nana Hey Hey Goodbye there too. And uh and they'd sing goodbye to that pitcher as he walked off the field. It was just a great scene there. I think I secretly, probably like just about everybody else in baseball, had a crush on her. She certainly knew how to uh entertain and put on a show, and that's what made going to uh Comiskey Park at that time special. And and they had a great press room that it was called the Bards Room. And you know, you always uh I remember going in there, there was a big fireplace in there, and you'd see Bill Veeck, uh 74 my first year. Bill Veeck owned the White Sox, and uh so you'd see him down there, and when the game was over, we'd go back down there. It was like a post-game club for the media and some of the executives with the White Sox, and that was just kind of a cool spot. And to hear Bill Veeck tell stories and whatnot after games was was a great treat.

Mike Koser:

So and you were at Tiger Stadium when it was still ballpark green, because they didn't they didn't paint it uh blue and orange, that didn't happen in I think '77.

Jon Miller:

Yeah, that my first year it was uh still a dark green. My first year in 74 at the broadcast booths, Ernie Harwell and Paul Carey, the Tigers broadcasters, they were over sort of above the visiting team's on deck circle. And the visiting booth was sort of above the Tigers on deck circle, and we kind of looked straight up the first base and right field lines from our vantage point. So we were separated, uh, the visiting booth and the the home team booth. And uh the only way you could get into those booths was to get up into the upper deck, walk down to the first row, and then you'd climb down there was a like a little hatch door, like you were going into a submarine. You'd open that up, and then you'd walk down these this ladder to get down in there. Usually about the fifth inning, uh an usher would come in and open your hatch shell between innings and ask if you uh ask us if we wanted anything, and he'd toss some hot dogs down, like it was feeding time at the zoo, you know. He'd toss some hot dogs down to us, and then if if we wanted a coke or something, he'd drop down a couple of cokes to us and uh but in seventy-nine they had done a sort of a remodel of the the broadcast levels and put it all together in one big new booth complex right behind home plate. I mean, and these booths were so close. You know, you were right at that point, we were right on the backstop. You could get killed by a foul ball coming back. That's what was so special about broadcasting a game at Tiger Stadium. It was an historic park and a really cool park with asymmetrical dimensions. You had the home run porch in right. The upper deck was overhanging the lower deck. It was about ten to twelve feet closer to home plate, the first row of the upper deck, than the first row of the lower deck. I remember having this discussion with Alan Trammell years ago, just asking him, I said, Do you think that there are more home runs because of that overhang in the upper deck at right field? And he said, He said, No, I I've always felt if you hit a ball that either hit the facing of the second deck or landed in the first row, that that still would have landed in the seats in the lower deck. So I don't think that it does. But then he said there was one night with a strong wind blowing out to right field, and Lou Whittaker hit a high fly ball, one where the second baseman was racing out as if for a pop-up, and the ball got up in the wind and the right fielder started going back, and then got under the ball, and then the ball hit the facing of the second deck. And he thought maybe that was one where the wind, the ball was dropping straight down and would have been caught, but the wind caused it to uh to hit off the second deck. But as a broadcaster, and especially a radio broadcaster, it gave dimension to how well a ball was hit as you described it. There's a deep drive to right, way back there, he's at the wall, gone into the lower deck, deep to right field, and it's off the facing of the second deck, or you know, it's halfway up into the second deck. That's a long one, or it hits the rooftop. Whoa! Whereas, say, Fenway Park, which had so many distinctive features to it, there's a ball, a home run to right, right center, into the bullpen, it clears the bullpen into the bleachers or way back into the bleachers. That's all you had, you know, to to try to give uh you know scope to how well a ball was hit. But Tiger Stadium did all of that really for you. So the uh that was w one one of my favorite parks as a broadcaster, because you also could hear what was going on at home plate. I remember Frank Robinson got upset with an umpire. He came out, and I I could hear exactly what he was shouting at the umpire. Frank was complaining that the umpire had told Lance Parrish not to throw the ball to first base. The uh runner was not eligible to run on strike three that had bounced away from Parrish because there was a runner at first at the time with less than two out. And uh so he told us, No, he can't he can't run. And Parrish, you know, Parrish had raced after the ball to his right and slid over onto his knees to get it, and was had his arm cocked ready to throw to first, and the umpire said, No, he can't run. And so Parrish didn't throw. So then Frank came out, and you know, any other ballpark you'd see Frank come out and you w you're kind of wondering what what's he talking about? But I could hear Frank say, uh, what are you doing telling him not to throw? And the guy says, Well, the runner can't run. I was just telling him. He says, Well, what are you, a coach for the Tigers? If he wants to throw it, let him throw it. If he doesn't know the rule, uh, why do you have to coach him? Maybe he'll throw a wild one or something. And uh and I thought, well, that's a good point. So what is he telling him not to? Because and I heard the umpire tell him not to throw. So uh you were just so close to the action. It was always such a disappointment you'd leave Tiger Stadium after a series and you'd be back in any other ballpark, and how far away you were. To me, that was the greatest place to broadcast the game that there ever was.

Mike Koser:

Uh in 1980, by the way, you're invited to be part of the Boston Red Sox broadcast team. What an honor. And uh I so I'm just curious about your impressions. Uh uh you had been to Fenway at that point before, but now broadcasting games for the Boston Red Sox and historic Fenway Park must have been something else.

Jon Miller:

Well, that that was a thrill. Uh and I I remember the first game I ever did, it was the A's first trip, and here they were, you know, they're the two-time defending world champions. And the Red Sox were in first place in the East, so these were big games, and the Fenway was sold out. And the Red Sox won that game, and I had to go down to do an interview with a star of the game. Yastrzemski had a couple of hits and I don't know, threw out a guy in the bases from left field and whatnot. So I decided, well, I want to get Carl Yastrzemski. Everywhere else, what you did is there was a line set up and some earphones and a microphone set up in the corner of your dugout, the visiting team dugout on the road. And you'd take that player across the field to the other team's dugout and you do the interview. But we had a union thing going at Fenway where the union was saying, if we wanted to do that, we had to have a second engineer. We hired a guy who engineered the game from up in the booth, and then they wanted to uh have us pay for a second engineer for just for that post-game thing. Our station was a little too cheap to do that, and the engineer strung a microphone cable down the screen. They had a backstop, a low backstop, and then a screen that protected the people behind the screen at Fenway at that time. And the booth was a lot lower down at the top of that screen than it is now, and he tied off the microphone down on the backstop. So I had to take Yastrzemski over to the backstop. Uh but I'll never forget, here's Carl Yastrzemski the you know, the great Yastrzemski, and we start out, we're going over to the backstop. He says, Where are we going? I says, Oh, uh sorry, the it's a union thing, but we have to I have to get the microphone there in the backstop, and we're gonna do it right there. So there were all these fans still in the stands, you know, and and they wanted Yaz's autograph. So he did it, and I pulled that microphone back as far away from the backstop as it would go. You know, so we're we're just not right there where where the fans can reach out and touch him. And it was like a studio audience. Uh I say, Carl Yastrzemski, Monty, uh, two doubles, and he threw out uh Billy North trying to stretch a single into a double. Another great night for the legendary Yastrzemski. And then the people all cheered and uh applauded like I was doing the Oprah show or something. Welcome, please welcome Carl Yastrzemski. And uh and and I thanked him profusely, and he then he had to walk over to the corner of the backstop and start signing autographs for all these people, because what was he gonna do? He's now you know, I I'd had him out there and he's gonna look bad if he didn't do it, you know. So uh you could never say anything bad about Yastrzemski to me. Because there I was twenty-two years old and interviewing the the great Yaz, and uh and he didn't have to he could as soon as I told him where we were doing it, he could have just turned, oh, I'm not going out there, come on, forget it. But he did and and and gave me a thoughtful, very good interview, and uh and it was such a thrill decades later when all of a sudden Mike Yastrzemski shows up in a giant uniform at uh Oracle Park and his grandson. And I was just so thrilled and uh later on when I did Red Sox games with Ken Coleman, you know, Yaz by that time, 1980, 81, 82, when I was in Boston, uh, he was older by far than any of his teammates.

Mike Koser:

Yeah, I think in 1980, I think he was forty.

Jon Miller:

Yeah, he was he was forty years old. So a lot of times if we had a night off in a city, then Carl would go out to dinner with me and Ken Coleman and maybe one of the writers or whoever was available. And uh, you know, so we we spent a lot of time with him on the road because we were generally speaking, except for me, we we were much more his age than uh than his teammates were, you know. So but and I remember seeing Mike's dad at the ballpark and uh and Carl's dad was at every game, sat in uh Mrs. Yawkey's uh private box at Fenway Park. So i it was always kind of a Yastrzemski family affair in those days.

Mike Koser:

And fast forward to 1983, and you are now broadcasting for the Baltimore Orioles, and what a what a year to join the team.

Jon Miller:

game audio

Mike Koser:

One of the things that I loved about Memorial Stadium was how perfectly situated it was in a neighborhood. I remember someone once saying that it felt like going to like a local neighborhood pub. Did you have that feeling too when you broadcast games from there?

Jon Miller:

Well, there was a writer, a columnist at the Baltimore Sun named Dan Rodericks, who also later had a talk show on the station that carried the games, uh, WBAL. And when the Orioles were about to leave Memorial Stadium and and m move to their their beautiful new ballpark downtown, Camden Yards, uh, he wrote an essay that he delivered on the on the radio, and he he quoted uh some philosopher uh who had written something about neighborhood taverns, that every neighborhood, every community needed what the philosopher called that great good place to gather a sense of community, uh rubbing elbows with good friends, uh becoming good friends, uh a a place for people to just get together and that's what helped make a community a community. And so then he extended the the whole notion of that to Memorial Stadium. That that's what it was, that great good place in the Waverley section, the Waverley neighborhood of Baltimore. You know, m Memorial Stadium it was uh a unique ballpark and it was built, you know, they had the big pillars that supported the upper deck, so on a sellout crowd night you could be one of those people who were behind a pillar who had an obstructed view of the game. But I think the neighborhood aspect of the Orioles was all about who they were. You know it was a town of neighborhoods. It had that sort of second city feeling. They were so close to Washington DC and suffered in the comparison to Washington DC the way Brooklyn did to Manhattan. There was a this little feeling of uh uh inferiority complex uh in Baltimore. But uh I I really loved my whole time in Baltimore, and it was one of the great things that ever happened to me. And Memorial Stadium, you know, Rex Barney was the the old Dodger pitcher, was the public address announcer, and uh when there was a foul ball into the seats if a fan made the catch on it, which always brings a cheer from the crowd, then he would shout on the PA system, give that fan a contract. And then an usher would run down with a contract, and and and give him the they had these little contracts made up. Or if a fan conversely dropped a foul ball, Rex would say, Give that fan an error, and the fans would cheer again. So uh anyway, uh it that was a lot of fun at that ballpark.

Mike Koser:

So by 1997, you begin your tenure with the San Francisco Giants, and I imagine for a kid who saw his first Major League Baseball game in 1962 at ten years old at Candlestick Park, coming back to officially broadcast as a member of the San Francisco Giants broadcast team had to feel pretty special.

Jon Miller:

Well it was very exciting for me, and they had a great classic pennant race with the Dodgers that year. Eleven games left in the season. They were two games behind by the Dodgers, and they had a two-game series at Candlestick on a Tuesday and a Wednesday, night game and a day game, respectively. And they really needed to win both of them. Although Dusty Baker was avoiding trying to just was trying not to have to say that, because of what what if they lost a game? Then what are you gonna say? But they they clearly have their best shot to overtake the Dodgers, they needed to win them both. And they did. Barry Bonds hit one into the upper deck in right field, which as a kid there was no upper deck in right field. At Candlestick in the 49ers stadium configuration, that was just a a spectacular clout. And it was a two-run homer first inning of the game, and they won the game two to one. So now game two, they're they're down by one game, and they blew a five to one lead, and the game went extra innings, and then Brian Johnson hit a home run against the wind to left field to uh end the game, walk-off home run. Those are moments that in a great historic rivalry that you savor and that you'll never forget. What could be the a better scenario for a guy to come back home in his first year as a broadcaster for the Giants than to be in right in the middle of a Giants Dodger classic pennant race. So uh so I'll never forget that.

Mike Koser:

Well, after nearly 50 years of broadcasting, John, you've experienced a lot of baseball history. And you know what? I just I feel honored that uh you have spent some time with us, revisiting that history today.

Jon Miller:

I consider myself to be the really uh as lucky as anybody could ever possibly be, and and I really miss a lot of the old classic ballparks, and it's always such a thrill to do a game at Fenway even today, still as classic a ballpark and as much fun of a ballpark as the a as it ever was, and to go to Wrigley Fields for the for the same reasons. But uh I I think that uh there have been some great new ballparks that I really enjoy going to as well, but uh to have been at Tiger Stadium and been at that previous incarnation of Yankee Stadium and some of those ballparks, Comiskey Park. Uh I uh for me that's something that uh I I've always considered uh a a great blessing. And and and something that those kind of ballparks helped, I think, made a lot of fans and helped make baseball the the the special kind of a sport that it is. I think that's part of the attraction of the game. So uh and why I like your Instagram feed so much.

Mike Koser:

Thank you, John. I really, really appreciate it. Thank you for listening to the podcast. 

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Mike Koser

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