Joe Buck Explains Why It Seems He Hates The Cowboys (Kinda)

FOX Lead Voice Joe Buck Explains Why It Seems He Hates The Dallas Cowboys (Kinda)
Joe Buck Explains Why It Seems He Hates The Cowboys (Kinda)
Joe Buck Explains Why It Seems He Hates The Cowboys (Kinda) /

FRISCO - Joe Buck works big games. The Dallas Cowboys play big games. (Or, at least, games with big audiences.) So, we "know'' Joe Buck.

And he knows we think he hates the Dallas Cowboys. He explains:

"Not only am I attached to this angst and at times failure, but I'm also screaming for the team that just won it," Buck said on his podcast Daddy Issues with Joe Buck and Oliver Hudson (via Radio.com). "So it's almost double. Not only do you have to see my face and my gigantic head, but you have to listen to me get excited (for the "other'' team), which you don't all year.

"So you're watching in Boston or in New York, and it's 'state-run TV.' ... It's 'We're the best, we're the best...yay, we just hit a home run ... Boo, the other team just hit a home run.' 

"And then I show up when you care the most, and not only did you lose, but I'm screaming and yelling because another team just beat you. It's all so natural. But that's just kind of the life I have to (accept). It's either that or don't do it, there's no way around that."

Buck, now 50, has been the lead announcer for FOX's MLB coverage since 1996, and has been the No. 1 NFL play-by-play guy since 2002. (Working alongside partner Troy Aikman, of course, who deals with the same sort of "homer vs. critic'' criticism.) Joe seems to be talking mostly about baseball here; he's surely not suggesting that the Cowboys radio broadcasts sound "state-run.'' 

Even when it comes to baseball, though, there needs to be an admission tucked in here. Buck has an allegiance to the St. Louis Cardinals. His dad Jack was their legendary voice, and Joe came up doing Cardinals games. Therefore, maybe, when Texas Rangers fans sensed a bias during the 2011 World Series. ... they were on to something.

Generally, though, it's probably more about our ears and our sensibilities than it is Buck's bias. Again, he uses a baseball example to offer a frank take that would suggest, if transferred to the NFL, that he might actually be in favor of the Cowboys.

"Here's how I think: Yankees, when they're good, everybody (in media) is happy. Red Sox, when they're good, everybody at FOX - therefore I - we're all happy,'' Buck said. "Cubs, same thing. Dodgers, same thing. These are all fanbases that think I don't root for them or hate them or I root against them - I would be literally cutting off my own paycheck in essence or the happiness with my network if I rooted against these teams. 

"Now, when the Red Sox and Yankees play, I don't care who wins, I didn't grow up in that, so I get excited for a big play and that's it. But the big-market teams, those are the ones at the end of the day that you want in the biggest games. ... (But) when the (Yankees and Red Sox) play each other, I don't give a s---."

The truth is, most people in our business "root'' for one thing: Good stories. Well, that revenue. The Dallas Cowboys provide FOX with all of that and more. Therefore, the beneficiaries, including Joe Buck, like the Cowboys just fine.


Published
Mike Fisher
MIKE FISHER

Mike Fisher - as a newspaper beat writer and columnist and on radio and TV, where he is an Emmy winner - has covered the NFL since 1983 and the Dallas Cowboys since 1990, is the author of two best-selling books on the Cowboys.