The following is a list of the national
television and
radio networks and announcers that have broadcast
National League Championship Series games over the years. It does not include any announcers who may have appeared on local broadcasts produced by the participating teams.
The
2010 NLCS did not air in some Philadelphia-area homes after
Cablevision pulled local Fox station
WTXF off its lineup on October 16 as the result of a carriage dispute with
News Corporation, Fox's parent company.[3]
Brian Anderson took over for
Ernie Johnson as the lead play-by-play man for
TBS during the 2011 postseason because Johnson had to care for his son Michael (who suffered from
Muscular dystrophy and was placed in intensive care around the same time as the playoffs).[4]
Nielsen ratings for Game 7 of the
2012 NLCS between the
San Francisco Giants and
St. Louis Cardinals showed that 31.8% of households in the St. Louis area watched the game compared with 27.5 in the San Francisco Bay Area. Nationally, Nielsen found that 8.1 million viewers saw this game, a 4.9% share of households. The rating peaked at 5.8 at 7:30 p.m. (Central Time Zone) before declining as viewers switched to Monday Night Football or the
presidential debate.[5]
Beginning in
2014, when
Fox Sports began a new television contract with
Major League Baseball,
FS1 airs 40 regular season MLB games (mostly on Saturdays), along with up to 15
post-season games (eight Divisional Series games and one best-of-7 League Championship Series). The deal resulted in a reduction of MLB coverage on the
Fox network, which will air 12 regular season games, the
All-Star Game, and the
World Series.[6]
In
2001, Game 5 of the
NLCS and Game 4 of the
ALCS were split between
Fox and
Fox Sports Net. This came off the heels of Fox airing an
NFLdoubleheader that particular day (October 21).
In
2002, Game 1 of the
NLCS and Game 2 of the
ALCS were split between
Fox and
Fox Sports Net. The regional split was done in order for Fox to avoid televising a weekday afternoon game.
In
2003, Game 1 of the
ALCS and Game 2 of the
NLCS were split between
Fox and
FX.
In
2004, Game 1 of the
NLCS and Game 2 of the
ALCS were split between
Fox and
Fox Sports Net. Also in
2004, Game 5 of the ALCS ran way into the time slot of Game 5 of the NLCS. As a result, the first seven innings of the NLCS game were shown on
FX, except in the home markets of the teams competing in the NLCS, which saw the conclusion of the ALCS on FX and the NLCS on Fox.
In
2005, Game 1 of the
NLCS and Game 2 of the
ALCS were split between
Fox and
FX.
The
2007 NLCS on
TBS marked the first time that a League Championship Series was exclusively broadcast on a
cable television network.
The
1990 postseason started on a Thursday,[20] while
World Series started on a Tuesday due to the brief
lockout.
In
1990, Major League Baseball and
CBS went with some rather unconventional scheduling during the LCS round, with two consecutive scheduled off-days[21] in the
NLCS after Game 2.
In
1991,
CBS didn't come on the air for baseball for weeknight LCS telecasts until 8:30 p.m.
ET. Instead, they opted to show programming such as Rescue 911 at 8 p.m. rather than a baseball pregame show.[22]
The rather messy
1995 arrangement was courtesy of "The Baseball Network", which was Major League Baseball's in-house production facility. ABC and NBC (who essentially, distributed the telecasts rather than produce them by themselves like in the past) shared the same on-air graphics and even the microphone “flags” had the "Baseball Network" logo on it with the respective network logo. In addition, the first four games of both of the
1995 League Championship Series were regionally televised.
Even though
Dick Enberg did play-by-play for the 1981 NLCS for NBC,
Merle Harmon was, for the most part, NBC's backup baseball play-by-play man (serving behind
Joe Garagiola, who called that year's
ALCS for NBC with
Tony Kubek) in
1981. Harmon's broadcast partner during this period was
Ron Luciano.[44] Bryon Day[45] covered the postgame interviews for NBC following the Los Angeles Dodgers' victory in Game 5.
Game 1 of the
1982 NLCS had to be played twice. In the first attempt (on October 6), the
Atlanta Braves led against the
St. Louis Cardinals 1–0 behind
Phil Niekro. The game was three outs away becoming official when the umpire stopped it. When the rain did not subside, the game was cancelled.[46] Game 1 began from the start the following night in a pitching match-up of
Pascual Pérez for the Braves and longtime Cardinal starter
Bob Forsch.
ABC's
Jim Lampley interviewed the winners in the
Cardinals' clubhouse after clinching the National League pennant in Game 3.
1983 marked the last year that the local flagship television stations for the competing teams were allowed to produce their own League Championship Series broadcasts. In
1982, Major League Baseball recognized a problem with this due to the emergence of
cable superstations such as
WTBS in
Atlanta and
WGN-TV in
Chicago. When
TBS tried to petition for the right to do a "local"
Braves broadcast of the
1982 NLCS,[47] Major League Baseball got a
Philadelphia federal court[48][49] to ban[50] them on the grounds that as a cable superstation, TBS could not have a nationwide telecast competing with
ABC's.
On Thursday, October 10, 1985, NBC didn't come on the air for Game 2[52] of the
NLCS until 8:30 p.m.
ET to avoid disrupting The Cosby Show at 8.[53] NBC would do the same thing for Thursday night games in subsequent postseasons.
Dick Enberg hosted the 1985 NLCS
pregame shows with
Joe Morgan.[54] It was Enberg who broke the news to most of the nation that
Vince Coleman was injured before Game 4. NBC even aired an interview with one of the few people who actually saw the incident, a
Dodger batboy.
On October 15, 1986, Game 6 of the
NLCS ran so long (lasting for 16 innings, 5 hours and 29 minutes), it bumped up against the start time of Game 7 of the
ALCS (also on
ABC).
Jack Whitaker[55] served as an essayist during ABC's coverage of the 1986 NLCS.
During Game 6 of the NLCS,
ABC color commentator
Tim McCarver left the booth during the bottom of the 16th, in order to cover the expected celebration in the
New York Mets' clubhouse. As a result, play-by-play man
Keith Jackson was on the air by himself for a short time. Eventually, McCarver rejoined the broadcast just before the end of the game, watching the action on a monitor in the Mets' clubhouse, then doing the postgame interviews with the Mets.
Corey McPherrin, a sports anchor with
WABC (ABC's flagship station out of
New York) interviewed
Mike Scott when he was presented with the 1986 NLCS MVP award after Game 6.
NBC used
Don Sutton as a pre and postgame analyst for their 1987 LCS coverage.
Marv Albert went back-and-forth during both 1987 LCS.[56] He hosted the pregame for Game 1[57] of the
NLCS with
Joe Morgan,[58] and in fact had to read the lineups to the viewing audience. There was a problem with the
St. Louis P.A. feed, so he ended up reading the script from the
Cardinal dugout while the players were introduced to the crowd. He then went to
Minnesota the next night to host the
ALCS pregame with Don Sutton.
Jimmy Cefalo hosted the pregame coverage for Game 5 of the NLCS, as Marv Albert was away on a
boxing assignment for NBC.
NBC play-by-play man
Vin Scully was unable to call Game 2 of the
1989 NLCS because he had come down with
laryngitis.[64] Thus, number two play-by-play man,
Bob Costas filled-in for him.[64] Around the same time, Costas was assigned to call the
American League Championship Series between
Oakland and
Toronto. Game 2 of the NLCS occurred on Thursday, October 5, which was an off day[65] for the ALCS. NBC then decided to fly Costas from Toronto to Chicago to substitute for Scully on Thursday night. Afterwards, Costas flew back to Toronto, where he resumed work on the ALCS the next night.
NBC used
Mike Schmidt as a guest analyst (
Marv Albert served as the
pregame host) for Game 1 of the NLCS. Schmidt subsequently, did on-field reporting for the series. Schmidt also provided periodic commentary (albeit, taped prior to the playoffs) for
ABC during the
1988 NLCS.
In
1970, NBC televised the second games of both League Championship Series on a regional basis. Some markets got the
NLCS at 1 p.m.
ET along with a 4 p.m.
NFL game while other markets got the
ALCS at 4 p.m. along with a 1 p.m. NFL game.
Except for Game 1 in both series, all games in
1975 were regionally televised. Game 3 of both League Championship Series were aired in
prime time, the first time such an occurrence happened.
1976 marked the first time that all LCS games were televised nationally.
In the early years of the League Championship Series,[70] NBC typically televised a doubleheader on the opening Saturday, followed by a single game on Sunday (because of
NFL coverage). They then covered the weekday games with a 1.5 hour overlap, joining the second game in progress when the first one ended. NBC usually swapped announcer crews after Game 2.
From
1969 to
1983, the Major League Baseball television contract allowed a local TV station in the market of each competing team to also carry the LCS games. So in 1969, for example,
Mets fans in
New York could choose to watch either the NBC telecast or
Lindsey Nelson,
Bob Murphy and
Ralph Kiner on
WOR-TV.
Surviving telecasts
For all of the League Championship Series telecasts spanning from 1969 to 1975, only Game 2 of the
1972 American League Championship Series (
Oakland vs.
Detroit) is known to exist. However, the copy on the trade circuit of Game 2 of the 1972 ALCS is missing the
Bert Campaneris-
Lerrin LaGrow brawl. There are some instances where the only brief glimpse of telecast footage of an early LCS game can be seen in a surviving newscast from that night. For instance, the last out of the
1973 National League Championship Series as described by
Jim Simpson was played on that night's NBC Nightly News, but other than that, the entire game is gone. On the day the
New York Mets and
Baltimore Orioles wrapped up their respective League Championship Series in 1969, a feature story on the CBS Evening News showed telecast clips of the
ALCS game (there's no original sound, just voiceover narration). This is all that likely remains of anything from that third game of the
Orioles-
Twins series.
While all telecasts of World Series games starting with
1975 are accounted for and exist, the LCS is still a spotty situation through the late 1970s:
1976 ALCS - Only Game 5 from the
ABC vault is known to exist.
1976 NLCS - An off-air recording of Game 3, taped in the
Portland market is the only game that is known to exist. Apparently, this copy which makes the trade circuit is the only extant version because a second-hand story says that the ABC vault copy has no sound.
1977 - Major League Baseball has in the vault, Game 3 of the
NLCS (from the
Philadelphia Phillies' local
NBC affiliate) and apparently has all of Game 4 of the NLCS. Also, both the
WPIX and
NBC versions of Game 5 of the
ALCS (both of which are also out there in terms of off-air recordings) are known to exist. Earlier games of the NLCS and ALCS have not surfaced and may not exist in the vault.
1978 - Trade collectors have all four games of the
ALCS (the
ABC version) but only Game 4 of the
NLCS (again, the source copies are those taped by those at home).
1969 - Locally, the NLCS was broadcast in New York City by
WOR-TV, the Mets' flagship TV station, and
WNBC-TV, the New York City, New York NBC affiliate, and in Atlanta by
WSB-TV, the Braves' flagship TV station and Atlanta, Georgia NBC affiliate.
National radio
From 1969 to 1975, there was no official national radio network coverage of the League Championship Series.
NBC only had the national radio rights to the
All-Star Game and
World Series during this period. Instead, national coverage was provided by local team radio broadcasts being
syndicated nationally over
ad hoc networks.
From 1969 to present, with the exception of the period between 1969 and 1975, the non-national radio broadcasts of the
National League Championship Series were broadcast on the
flagship station and the radio network of the teams participating in the National League Championship Series.