At the risk of sounding redundant, seeing as my colleague Bret Sims as already posted a wonderful little ditty on Mr. Packer, it's time for me to lay down the smack on Billy Packer.
It can be debated as to whether or not the game has passed Packer by or whether his style of color commentating hasn't kept up with the modern era of sports media. But what cannot be debated is what comes out of his mouth. That is usually something moronic; therefore by extension, he is a moron.
I can stomach the fact that Packer has crossed the line between announcing and personal opinion. Most notably, he pulled this stunt several seasons ago when the NCAA Selection Committee chose to put in more mid-majors than ever before at the expense of some larger conference bubble teams. In an interview with the committee head on Selection Sunday, Packer got into an argument about how he believed that the tournament would now be watered down because no matter how good a mid-major team appears to be, they never could be in the class of a major conference team due to talent level. Instead of arguing his personal opinion, he should have been questioning the committee on how and why they came to such a decision.
Never mind the fact that Packer completely ignored the fact that, at that point, the college ranks had been losing major high-school talent as they headed straight to the NBA. Those consistent defections had leveled the playing field for all teams for all conferences. Not the fact that the selection committee had some bias against large power conferences (or at least that's the way Billy Goat saw it). When the mid-majors (Butler, Gonzaga, etc.) had deep runs in that year's tourney--thus proving the committee was correct--crotchety old Packer refused to admit that he was wrong.
Jackass.
But what I can't stomach are the moronic things that he says during the game. Most the time they are so riduculously stupid that it distracts me from the game I'm watching. I understand that most of you will say, "Hey, just turn off the sound on your TV." Well as someone who has aspirations of being in sports media as a play-by-play announcer, or sports talk show host, that really doesn't work for me. What would work for me is if CBS politely, or not so politely, pushed out Packer.
Or pushed him off a cliff. Either one works.
Here are just two doozies from last night's National Championship game.
With about 45 seconds to go in overtime, Memphis is down by five. As they are about to inbound the ball on the side, Packer says, "Jim, they need a three and a two to tie. So they don't have to get a three this trip, but they are going to have to get one." Memphis elects to take the shot at the three. Douglas-Roberts miss fires, Kansas rebounds and Memphis immediately fouls. As the players are walking to the other end....
Packer: "Jim I really don't agree with that at all. They didn't need a three."
Really Billy? Considering they were down by five with a very limited amount of possessions left in the game, I think they actually did need a three. Maybe not that particular trip down the floor, but eventually. I'm no MIT graduate, but my remedial math skills say that 3+2=5. But worse, you just said the very same thing (wait, double-checking quote above...yep, that's what he said) not more than 15 seconds before hand. Is the senility finally starting to get to you Billy?
But my favorite quote from last night's contest had to be this gem:
Packer: (utttered shortly before OT began) "Well Jim, Kansas certainly is no stranger to overtime in National Championship games. They had to go to overtime in the 1959 National Championship game." Yep. You read that right. 1959.
Never mind the fact that outside of Packer himself, there might have been 2 people in the nation that can remember that particular game, what the hell does that have to do with the OT in 2008? None of the players on the court were born then, most of the player's parents weren't born then and some of the player's grandparents weren't born then.
Are you kidding me with that? It's those type of statements that take us as audience members right out of the action, not put us further in the action.
I now fully understand why Jim Nantz always works The Masters golf tournament after the NCAA National Championship game on such a short turnaround. It's not because The Masters is so great (although it is), it's because he has to get the taste of working with Billy Packer for three weeks out of his mouth.
Oooh. Unfortunate choice of words. No one wants Billy Packer in your mouth.
And no one wants him calling anymore NCAA tournament games either.
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