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Experienced Starter w/First Big Contract
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Re: Gil Santos retiring
Longtime Boston WBZ sportscaster Santos retires
1/29/2009, 4:32 p.m. EST
By MARK PRATT
The Associated Press
BOSTON (AP) — The first contract sportscaster Gil Santos signed with WBZ radio was for 13 weeks.
If they liked him, they said, they'd keep him.
They loved him.
Santos is retiring from the station after a 38-year run that covered six Boston Celtics NBA championships, three New England Patriots Super Bowl wins, two Boston Red Sox World Series crowns, world record-setting Boston Marathon finishes and two Boston Bruins Stanley Cup titles.
"I have been a lucky guy," he said in summing up his career.
Santos has spent a half-century in broadcasting during which his silky, deep voice became a comforting sound to generations of New England sports fans, both through his morning reports on the radio and as the play-by-play voice of the Patriots, a job he will continue after his retirement Friday.
Santos, 70, had planned on staying at the station until 2010, but a white-knuckle car ride into work from his home south of Boston during an ice storm in December convinced him that it was time to step aside.
"I love the work, but I just don't want to drive through this junk anymore," Santos, wearing a glittering Patriots Super Bowl ring, said just days before his final morning broadcast. "And let's face it, 3:30 in the morning is an awful time to get up."
He'll continue to do the Patriots' games on WBZ's sister station, WBCN-FM, because play-by-play is what he loves most. He calls the Patriots 20-17 Super Bowl win over the St. Louis Rams in New Orleans in 2002 the highlight of his career.
Santos, who's also been the radio voice of Boston College and Penn State football, did television broadcasts for the NBA's Boston Celtics during the Larry Bird era in the 1980s when the team won three championships.
But on television, you're talking about a game the viewers can already see.
"On radio, you're an artist," he said. "You're painting a picture on a canvas, because the listeners can't see it. And that's a lot more fun."
Santos is old school, said Gary LaPierre, a 42-year veteran of the station who retired two years ago after working side-by-side with Santos for three decades.
He's unassuming, he's not flamboyant, he doesn't need catch phrases or pizazz," LaPierre said. "He was just good."
Right up to his final day at WBZ, Santos wrote his scripts on yellow paper using a vintage 1950s typewriter.
Yet he also embraced technology, using the Internet to prepare for upcoming Patriots games by reading as much as possible on the team's opponent.
"He's more prepared than (Patriots coach Bill) Belichick," LaPierre said. "He knows what the other team is, what they are not, and what the Patriots are going to do to against them."
It was that preparation that stands out to his partners on the air.
"Obviously he has a gift of a great voice," said Patriots color analyst Gino Cappelletti, a former Patriots wide receiver and kicker who has worked with Santos for 25 years. "But he also is one who's really a stickler for preparation. Sometimes I sit there and marvel."
His familiar voice made him the radio station's biggest celebrity.
"High school tours would come through the newsroom, and kids would hear that 'clack, clack, clack' of the typewriter, and they'd say 'What the heck is that?' because 14-year-olds these days have never heard a typewriter," Lapierre said. "But as soon as they found it was Gil, they flocked to his desk. He was the highlight of the tour."
The Fairhaven native's professional career began in 1959 when he was hired by WNBH-AM in New Bedford to be a disc jockey and play-by-play man for local high school football and basketball broadcasts.
Santos hadn't even finished college, but he landed the only job he'd ever wanted since he was 10 years old and listened to the Rose Bowl on New Year's Day.
"Mel Allen was doing the game and he said, 'It's 80 degrees and sunny here in Pasadena,' and I was thinking, 'Geez, it's snowing here, it's 80 degrees there, and this guy's there to broadcast the game. What a great way to make a living,' and that's when I decided that's what I wanted to do."
Santos plans on pretty much doing nothing in February. He'll eventually seek some part-time work, and continue to do commercial voiceovers. He'll still watch sports, but now it will be his grandson Jacob's hockey games, and granddaughter Hannah's softball games. He's looking forward to staying up past 8 p.m. with Roberta, his wife of 48 years.
The station, meanwhile, is still looking for someone to permanently take over Santos' early morning shift.
"But we'll never replace him," said programming director Peter Casey.
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