Elliott called out for being a 'homer' announcer
Home team play by play and color commentators are usually the worst to listen to unless they get their paychecks from your team. The majority of announcers have a home team bias that even the truth won't change their mind on an obvious call. For San Antonio Spurs fans, Sean Elliott isn't immune to this. Alongside Bill Land, these two men are very popular among Spurs fans who listen in to the games on Fox Sports Southwest.
Last week, Elliott was mentioned by NBA.com writer John Schuhmann's article "Air Check" last week which was dedicated to announcers from various teams for some funny, weird, and head shaking moments. Elliott's play-by-play during the game against the Oklahoma City Thunder made it to the list in the latter category. He criticizes Elliott for "not changing his stripes" during the game that aired on NBA TV.
I guess that means that Diaw is allowed to hold down Serge Ibaka‘s arm as the rebound comes their way.
After the second call, Elliott says “Ibaka looked like he had that rebound anyways.” Well no, he didn’t once he got fouled.
Then, “Ibaka gets rewarded for not boxing out.” Actually, Diaw gets punished for pushing Ibaka in the back.
Bottom line, a foul is a foul, even if it happens 94 feet from the basket.
“Two wrongs just make it wrong,” Elliott says.
That’s exactly what those who were listening to him were thinking.
Elliott is one of the few announcers who not only knows the game, but he also makes it enjoyable with his jokes during the game. It shouldn't be he's a homer for the team who writes his paychecks and won an NBA championship with in 1999. If you watch any other teams, you'll get the same result with probably less homerism than Elliott but not by far. It's something that's expected when you tune into a local broadcast.
What do you think Spurs fans? Did Elliott go too far in his homerism or is it something that's normal during a home team broadcast?
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Homerism exists in all announcers. They are supposed to be a voice to the home teams fans. I will say there are worse examples like this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nv8FDvoz0A
Seriously, can't even get a "He hits it," or "It went in." No inflection? This clip shows bad announcing/commentating. Sean and Bill are doing a great job and I'd rather watch them then most national broadcasters. Oh how I miss Bob Costas.
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i get a kick out of people calling announcers hired by the team homers. they're doing what they were hired to do. how about worrying about the national announcers who also tend to show bias when they're supposed to be 100% neutral?
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the Spurs local broadcasts has been rated as one of the top local broadcast ratings for the past few years, and in fact, they were at the top in Nielsen ratings back in 2011 (http://www.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/print-edition/2011/04/22/san-antonio-spurs-outpace-the-rest-of.html?page=all). part of the reason for that is because of Bill & Sean. they might be a little homerism, but they know their stuff when it comes to basketball.
There's no shame in having bad announcers like Sean Elliott and Bill Land. It's not an indictment on the San Antonio Spurs organization. It doesn't tarnish the on court and off court accomplishments of the team you root for. Announcing is a hard job to have in broadcasting because it's always a thin line between being entertaining and/or overbearing. This is true of the most seasoned announcer and especially of former players turned analysts. Watch games on NBATV and listen to former players announce like Clyde Drexler for the Rockets, Stacey King for the Bulls, Matt Harpring for the Jazz and if you can stomach them just like you can for Sean Elliott then let us face it, you've bad taste. But having bad taste can also be correctable if you can differentiate between what good announcing is and what bad announcing is. Unfortunately, this is a harder task when over multiple years your ears have been bludgeoned by Sean Elliott's rants and Bill Land's shrills of ecstasy. "Oh MaaaaMaaaaaaa!"
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I don't get why Bill & Sean are always criticized for being homers. I understand it might get a little out of hand once in a while, but I've heard Sean admit when he's wrong on some plays. Plus, all local announcers tend to be a little biased. The only ones who aren't are the Nets and Knicks announcers, but that's because they have guys who usually do national broadcasts ("The Czar" for the Nets and Mike Breen for the Knicks). Oh well. Whenever I have the choice to watch a Spurs game on ESPN or Bill & Sean, I always choose Bill & Sean.
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What gets me is that Sean & Bill *know* they're homers, and make fun of themselves for it. How many announcers do you hear talking about taking off their fan goggles, or "They don't need to review that; they can just ask us!", etc. Nobody seems to catch those moments; too busy being annoyed, I guess.
Maybe NBATV should just provide their own announcers, but then people complain about national announcers too.
@sa2ny2004 @projectspurs @JRG1023 He's owned up to the Spurs being wrong plenty of times. Yes to Spurs bias, but he'll backtrack on replay.
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Sure he's a Homer, but he played for this team for many years and has loyalties to them. That is partly why he got the job as an announcer anyway. If you tune into a local broadcast then what do you expect. Maybe he should preface every game to let fans of other teams know that he once played for the spurs and will be their official Homer for the evening. Or they can just give a quick shot of his retired jersey hanging from the rafters... I think he's earned the right to be a Homer!
Sean is a homer, no doubt. Many fans of many teams complain about him. But there is nobody in the same league as Tommy Heinsohn. I saw that guy get screaming mad about the officiating in a game that the Celtics won, and I didn't think the calls were bad (note: _not_ a game the Spurs played in).
What BartTBF said! That's the original homer if there was one. But I'm ok with that....they're paid by the teams. @JRG1023 @projectspurs
@sa2ny2004 @BartTBF @JRG1023 lol... I love Tommy. I think he believes the Celtics have committed 2 fouls this season
