Skip Caray was the son of baseball announcer Harry Caray, and the father of St Louis Cardinals play-by-play announcer and former fellow Braves broadcaster Chip Caray; another son, Josh Caray, is the play-by-play announcer for the minor league Rocket City Trash Pandas.
21 Facts About Skip Caray
2.
Skip Caray studied television and radio at the University of Missouri where he received a degree in journalism, and was a member of Phi Gamma Delta.
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Skip Caray began his career in St Louis calling Saint Louis University and St Louis Hawks basketball games.
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In 1968, Caray moved with the Hawks to Atlanta, where he called Atlanta Flames hockey games and did morning sportscasts on WSB-AM.
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In 1976, Skip Caray was added to the broadcast team for the Braves, a position he held until his death.
6.
Skip Caray called Marquis Grissom catching the final out in center field.
7.
Skip Caray was inducted into the Atlanta Braves Hall of Fame in 2004 alongside long-time Braves broadcaster Pete Van Wieren.
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Skip Caray has been recognized with six Georgia Sportscaster-of-the Year awards from the National Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association, as well as a Georgia-area Emmy award.
9.
On December 18,2006, the Braves organization announced that Skip Caray had signed three-year contracts to continue doing Braves game broadcasts on their radio network.
10.
However, Skip Caray only announced ten games on TBS in the 2007 season before being relegated to Peachtree TV.
11.
In 2000, NBC hired Skip Caray to do play-by-play with Joe Morgan on the AL Division Series between the New York Yankees and Oakland Athletics.
12.
Skip Caray was filling in for Bob Costas, who sat out the Division Series after anchoring NBC's prime time coverage of the Summer Olympic Games from Sydney, Australia.
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Skip Caray called play-by-play for the first two seasons of the TNT network's Sunday night NFL coverage as well as TBS' coverage of the NBA and college football, and anchored TBS' coverage of the 1990 Goodwill Games.
14.
Skip Caray made his motion picture debut in the 1985 movie The Slugger's Wife, starring Michael O'Keefe, Randy Quaid and Rebecca De Mornay.
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Skip Caray frequently mocked his participation in the film on-air, and referred to it as one of the worst movies ever made, often saying that the actors in the movie probably watched it as the in-flight movie on their way back to Los Angeles.
16.
Skip Caray was the lead play-by-play man for The Baseball Network's regional coverage of Braves games during that ill-fated experiment's two seasons usually alongside the opposing team's secondary play-by-play man or color commentator.
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Skip Caray's broadcasts were characterized by his witty and sarcastic sense of humor, a personality trait that endeared him to most fans, but alienated him from some.
18.
For example, during a particularly long losing streak in the 1980s, Skip Caray declared at the start of a game against the Pittsburgh Pirates, "And, like lambs to the slaughter, the Braves take the field".
19.
Skip Caray was known for his tendency to identify the hometowns of fans who catch foul balls during Braves games in jest.
20.
Skip Caray had been suffering from failing health for nearly a year prior, but returned to work for the 2008 season, calling a game on radio as recently as three days before his death.
21.
Tributes to Skip Caray were given on all of the Atlanta television stations that evening and on WGST-AM the next morning.