Idiots Write About Sports

As always, Ken Arneson sets the bar high for A’s bloggers with this recollection, plus a collection of previous posts that chronicled Bill King’s genius.
Elephants in Oakland says a few nice words and passes along a link to the Holy Roller call — one of my favorite play-by-play calls ever. (And I say that as a Charger fan.)
KNBR has a tribute page.
If you’re a Baseball Prospectus subscriber — and you should be — check out James Click’s fine article.
And I found this paragraph in Ray Ratto’s column particularly compelling:

…[Bill King] was fearless. He said what he saw, not what he was told to say. He was accurate always, and he was witheringly critical when it was required. Listeners knew they were getting the straight deal every time, because he not only wouldn’t lie to gussy up a player’s profile, he couldn’t. He wasn’t trained that way, as so many broadcasters are now. He loathed homers, announcers who tart up the home team because they think they are providing a service, because being a homer requires an essential dishonesty he could not abide.

We all have our different reasons for appreciating different broadcasters, and I think that sentiment above comes the closest to articulating what I most admired about Bill King.