ABSTRACT
The most visible agents of sports media processes are, unquestionably, the sportscasters. They have the power to shape and frame a story like no other by using vivid and dramatic forms of language (Wenner, 1989). Sports fans (see Real and Mechikoff, 1992) can often imitate their all-time favorite sportscasters whose vocal styles and personalities have become etched within elaborate memories of sport experiences. Viewers in the United States, for example, have certain sporting moments that are indelibly coupled with the language of the sportscaster, such as Kirk Gibson’s walk-off home run in the 1988 Major League Baseball World Series when Jack Buck exclaimed, “I don’t believe what I just saw!”1 and Bobby Thompson’s “shot heard ‘round the world’”.2 Furthermore, “even with the express purpose of providing play-by-play descriptions of moves and skills and results, ‘game’ announcing provides a goodly portion of dramatic commentary” (Wenner, 1989, p. 30).
