ESPN’s announcers in the photo well experiment

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Anybody watching ESPN’s Dodgers-Cardinals television broadcast, where analysts Orel Hershiser and Steve Phillips are working the game from photo wells near the dugouts? Has it been noticeably bad or good?

Seems kind of neutral. Not at all like when Chicago Cubs broadcaster Harry Caray used to take off his shirt and report from the Wrigley Field bleachers with some beery-headed observations that often didn’t make sense. But Caray always had the professional Steve Stone to lead the fans gently back to the action when Harry was having too much fun.

Honestly, if ESPN hadn’t told us this was happening would you have even noticed Dan Shulman was alone in the booth? At least, so far, neither Hershiser nor Phillips have been nailed in the chin by a baseball a la Erin Andrews a few weeks ago.

-- Diane Pucin