Heels On The Field: A Baseball Blog

Phillies Broadcaster Tom McCarthy Inducted Into The Trenton Baseball HOF

Here is the official press release from the Trenton Thunder on Phillies broadcaster and former Thunder broadcaster Tom McCarthy.

 

TOM MCCARTHY INDUCTED INTO TRENTON BASEBALL HALL OF FAME

(Trenton, NJ) – Former Trenton Thunder radio broadcaster Tom McCarthy was inducted into the Trenton Baseball Hall of Fame in a ceremony before the Thunder vs. Reading Phillies game tonight at Waterfront Park.

The ceremony included an recorded message from McCarthy's former Trenton broadcast partner and current Tampa Bay Rays announcer Andy Freed, as well as presentations from Foleys New York and the Philadelphia Phillies.  In addition, the home radio booth inside the press box at Waterfront Park  was renamed in McCarthy's honor.

A graduate of the College of New Jersey and current resident of Allentown, NJ, Tom McCarthy was with the Trenton Thunder for the first six seasons in franchise history. He was hired as Director of Public and Media Relations in 1993 and promoted to Assistant General Manager in 1996, while also working as one of the team's broadcasters, doing play-by-play on radio and television.  After the 1999 season, he left the Thunder to pursue a full-time career in broadcasting, creating the first local-driven show on ESPN Radio 1680 AM.

McCarthy is in his second year as the television play-by-play man for the Philadelphia Phillies. He spent five seasons with the Philadelphia Phillies (2001–2005) as a radio play-by-play voice and as their pre-game and post-game radio host before spending two seasons as a play-by-play announcer for the New York Mets on WFAN.

 

McCarthy is the sixteenth member of Trenton Baseball Hall of Fame joining George Case, Harold “Bus” Saidt, James Maloney, Al Downing, Steve Braun, Bob Ryan, Tony Clark, Nomar Garciaparra, Samuel Plumeri Sr., Michael DeCello, Mo Cunningham, David Eckstein, Ken Macha, Sonny Pittaro and DeMarlo Hale

Catcher's Corner: Sal Fasano

This is the first installment of this feature of the 2011 baseball season.

Usually a minor league catcher is spotlighted, but instead New Hampshire Fisher Cats Manager, former major league catcher Sal Fasano is the focus. Fasano's career in the majors spanned twelve years, spending time with the Royals, Athletics, and Blue Jays, among others, before retiring in 2008 with the Cleveland Indians.

A quick note: When first meeting Fasano, he was with the Phillies. I was sitting in the dugout with a few other writers and as he went to the field for BP, he turned to us, and with a wink, said, "Just remember: catchers make the best managers."

The Fisher Cats currently lead the Eastern League by a game in the Eastern Division.

 

Transitional Ease

Really the only difficult thing about it, is that you don't have to worry about yourself anymore. You have to worry about the kids. For the most part, it's been easy. As catchers, we see the game a little bit differently. Everybody looks at us the whole time and we have the whole view of the field. We have such interaction between the pitchers and the coaches and the other players, so it's one of those things that's easy, because it's easy to slow the game down.

 

Getting Personal

The hardest thing and the mistake most coaches make is that a lot of times they have a perception of what catching is. I have a belief that every body is different, not everybody, every body type. So when you take that into account you understand their personal mechanics, then you try to get the most out of them as players, rather than trying to do it the way I did it or someone else. Thurman Munson was one of the best catchers of all-time, but I can't make someone into Thurman Munson. [Players] are going to evolve into who they are.

 

Chemistry Leads To Winning?

There's a lot of things that are really enjoyable, but we have twenty come-from-behind victories and I think it's a testament to these guys that they don't feel like they're going to lose. They're going to do whatever they can to win. Some of our walk-off victories or last inning heroics have been fun because they really are a team in all senses of the word. They care about each other. To me, seeing them grow as a unit has been tremendous for me and my favorite part.

 

Talk To Me, Goose

The hardest thing wasn't the physical attributes, it was taking pride in the fact that I had a personal relationship with each pitcher and understood their game plan and adjust. That's the hardest thing to develop. No matter how hard you work on it, you just need to see more pitches. At the end of a twenty-year career you think, there's not a pitch I didn't see. Everyone has his personality.

 

To The Memory Bank

One of my favorites was catching Kevin Appier in Oakland. He was getting to the point where he was being a little ginger on the mound, he wasn't really being aggressive. I actually got in his face and stuck my finger in his chest, and I was a rookie at the time. I told him he had to pick it up. After the game, I'm scared to death because I think I'm going to get yelled at. And he came up to me and said, "That's exactly what I needed." He actually gave me a lot of confidence and the Royals just inducted him in their Hall of Fame- it's nice to be part of good players careers. Most of my memories are the relationships, not so much the game and what I do.