Former Twin Ron Coomer was on NESN this afternoon working with Don Orsillo as a fill-in color analyst.
Baseball was talked about, indoor voices were used. It was terrific.
Jerry Remy wasn’t on air shamelessly trying to sell his retarded RemDog merchandise. Dennis Eckersley was not yelling into his mic about hair, cheese, paint, happy zones, ect. Dave Roberts wasn’t on air celebrating his life and acting like every baseball player is perfect.
Coomer just let the baseball conversation flow; he talked about the Twins, he talked about the Red Sox, he talked about playing for Terry Francona.
Then, in the 8th inning, with Denard Span, Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau coming to bat for the Twins, he talked about using Jonathan Papelbon.
That’s right, a former player and current analyst brought up Bill James’ idea of using a relief ace when the situation mattered the most. Against the heart of the Twins order in the 8th was the perfect opportunity.
Of course, Hideki Okajima pitched the 8th, Papelbon pitched the 9th, and the Sox won the game 3-1.
It all worked out and it was a nice change of pace to have a good partner working with Orsillo on a NESN broadcast.
