re: Unpopular opinion: Jim Hawthorn > Chris Blair

When you watch a game with friends and/or in the stadium and something good happens for LSU, that initial explosion of noise that the crowd gives is what makes it so fun. Not just the excitement, but the instantaneous realization of the great play happening.

Hawthorne bottled that up and expressed it in his radio calls.

I agree with you. I don't dislike Blair, I just wish we could jump forward about ten years from now in which he'd have a little more vested interest in LSU and would broadcast his calls that way. I'm sure he'll get there, just rather Jim then than Chris now.

Blair will never be as good as Hawthorne. I don't care if he made occasional mistakes. If you don't want to go back and listen to the call after the game then he sucks. And PLEASE lose the "touchdown Tigers!" schtick.

I was a big fan of Jim Hawthorne's, more so than most people on this board. Blair is growing on me though. I like him just fine. LSU has always had exceptional radio announcers and I go back to the John Ferguson days. My one complaint about the radio broadcasts is that they need to screen the callers for the coaches shows to eliminate some of the nonsense. The only qualification for talking on the show is the length of time you have been hanging on the line and some of these people must call two hours in advance. They need screeners to ascertain that the caller is likely to add something substantive to the discussion.

Here's my biggest difference. I grew up on John Ferguson's play-by-play. Back then there was no ESPN, SEC network or anything else for that matter. You got one chance to be on ABC about every other year. You lived and died by the call on the radio. Ferguson was the best.He painted a picture for you.
Later in the 90's Hawthorne was great to listen to for baseball. Not many games televised and his play-by-play was spot on.
Today, everything is televised and I have yet to listen to one of Blair's broadcasts live. I've heard replays and most of what I've heard is bland and not from the heart and I think that's where he's losing his audience. He's got to either be all in and bleed purple and gold or find another gig.

Agreed- he definitely lacks emotion/genuine excitement. It is disappointing hearing him call huge, game changing calls like he’s a neutral observer.

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And PLEASE lose the "touchdown Tigers!" schtick.

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Preach

Agree completely. I am not sure anyone will ever replace Hawthorn in my mind. My biggest complaint about Blair is that his big calls do not get me excited and he tends to be really late on calls. Is it just me or does he not say it is a touchdown until like 10 seconds after it has happened? SOOO slow to let you know what has happened. Also in basketball and baseball he does a poor job of refreshing. If I just tuned in it should not take you 10 minutes to let me know what inning we are in or what the score is.

yep Blair sucks. In fact i'd rather listen to Buzzy, and Doug call baseball games than Blair. The fool sounds like someone has grabbed his nutsack when something exciting happens. Buzzy and Doug talk shite though out the whole game, but when something exciting happens they at actually describe it in the way it sounds like an exciting play. Same for football. From Doug Moreau's seat at least you can hear his excitement over the strained description of Blair's fake enthusiasm.

Hawthorne was really great. So many fond memories of his unique voice calling a game.

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Hawthorn may have been good 20 years ago. The last 5-10 years of listening to him call a game was excruciatingly painful. He should have retired a decade before he did IMO.

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For as good as his excitement might be, he was so negative when things weren’t going well. Made the games really tough to listen to and only added to the stress and anxiety of the games.

I’ll take even keel like Blair over bipolar like Hawthorne was.