The Baseball Hall of Fame completed a five-day sprint of awards announcements Wednesday by naming the late Jack Graney the recipient of the 2022 Ford C. Frick award for excellence in broadcasting.
Graney, believed to be the first player who jumped from the playing field to the broadcast booth, spent nearly 30 years as a radio announcer for the Cleveland Indians before the advent of television.
The 46th winner of the Frick award, he received the top total on the eight-man Broadcast Beginnings ballot. He beat out Pat Flanagan, Waite Hoyt, France Laux, Rosey Rowswell, Hal Totten, Ty Tyson, and Bert Wilson.
During his tenure as a Cleveland broadcaster, Graney described the play of such future Hall of Famers as Earl Averill, Bob Feller, Lou Boudreau, Larry Doby, and Satchel Paige.
According to Hall of Fame president Josh Rawitch, “Jack Graney was a pioneer in the broadcast industry, not only establishing a model for game descriptions in the earliest days of radio but also for blazing a trail for former players to transition to the broadcast booth.”
Rawitch cited Graney’s attention to detail and love for the game, skills he said made him a radio legend beyond Ohio’s North Coast.
A native of Ontario, Canada, Graney spent 14 years as an outfielder for the Indians before launching his broadcast career in 1932.
He began as a left-handed pitcher for the Cleveland Naps, named for star player Napoleon Lajoie, in 1908 but returned two years later as an outfielder. He twice led the American League in walks and helped the Indians win the 1920 World Series, their first world championship.
Before he became the first player-turned-broadcaster, Graney was part of two other baseball “firsts.” In 1914, he was the first man to bat against Babe Ruth, then a pitcher, and two years later became the first player of the Modern Era (post 1900) to wear a number on his uniform. He retired in 1922 with 1,178 hits and a .354 on-base percentage.
After a 10-year gap, when he worked in automotive sales, Graney returned to baseball when Cleveland station WHK-AM began broadcasting the Indians and wanted a well-known local name to be its primary broadcaster. Graney got the call, spending most of the next 22 years working for such local outlets as WHK, WJW, WGAR, and WERE. His partners included the 1997 Frick award winner, Jimmy Dudley.
Graney’s voice was heard by a national audience twice in 1935, when he broadcast the All-Star Game from Cleveland and the World Series between the Detroit Tigers and Chicago Cubs.
The Frick award is named for the former sportswriter, broadcaster, and executive who was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1970.
Writers and broadcasters are recognized in an area of the building not far from the gallery of plaques given to players, managers, umpires, and executives.
Graney was chosen by a 16-member committee consisting of 13 previous recipients and three baseball broadcasting historians. Vin Scully, 94, was the oldest member of that group.
Graney, who died in
1978, will be recognized posthumously during the Hall of Fame Awards Presentation one day before the 2022 Hall of Fame Inductions, slated for July 24, 2022. Also to be honored that day will be Tim Kurkjian, named the winner of the Baseball Writers Association of America Career Excellence Award Tuesday.
That same weekend, plaques will be unveiled for at least six new members, chosen by a pair of Era Committees earlier this week: Bud Fowler Gil Hodges, Jim Kaat, Minnie Minoso, Tony Oliva, and Buck O’Neil. Their selection increases the number of Hall of Famers to 339, a figure that will grow if the ongoing BBWAA election unveils any additional candidates next month.
