Lifelong Phillies Fan Stuns As Announcer For 1 Inning In Radio Booth

PHILADELPHIA, PA — "Painter de-livers. It's a check swing. It's a called strike three, he got him."

Radio listeners to the Phillies game against the Washington Nationals on Aug. 5 would have been totally nonplussed had they tuned in to the top of the third inning and heard the call.

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But this was no official replacement for longtime announcer Scott Franzke, nor was it a gag callback to the classic era of pre-television baseball to go along with the Field of Dreams game this week.

No, this was Lewis Kalb, a 73-year-old Medford Lakes, New Jersey substitute teacher, who had won the chance to call a half an inning by placing the winning $22,000 bid in the Phillies charity auction.

Kalb, who described himself as a lifelong Phillies fan, announced the inning with ease. And it wasn't just his timing and knowledge that have him suddenly appearing in media around the nation. It was that distinctive voice, with the kind of lilt you only ever seem to hear on radio, and affectations that felt pulled from Bobby Thomson's shot heard round the world.

He even had time to comment on the weather ("it's taken me about two hours to dry off") and chat with Larry Andersen and Franzke, who asked if the heavy rain had made more lakes in Medford Lakes.

"There's been a drought of course," Kalb said, and then without missing a beat, "Swung on and popped up into shallow left field. Playable. And caught out there by Brandon Marsh."

Kalb later told The Athletic that he does have a little practice at this. He's been the play by play voice for thousands of recreational league and school games for decades.

But not every experienced announcer and baseball fan would've quite been able to pull off Kalb's presence.

Painter did his part, striking out two and facing just four batters in the roughly seven minute half-inning.

Kalb's broadcast was an instant hit in the baseball world and beyond, and he has since made a national media tour of sorts. Fans have called for the Phillies to give him a contract. Maybe they will. Maybe they won't. But it doesn't matter. Kalb, like Moonlight Graham in Field of Dreams, has made his one appearance.