Texas Rangers’ iron man hits 3,000 with the hope of being a part of a World Series of his own
Chuck Morgan deserves better than this, because not only does celebrating a Ripkenish streak in front look weird, it’s just wrong.
On Saturday, the home voice of the Texas Rangers will serve as the team’s public address announcer for his 3,000th consecutive MLB game.
The amount of hours Morgan has spent at Texas Rangers’ home games since 1983 is enough to bring mathematicians to tears.
Though no official records for PA streaks are kept, the Rangers are certain that Morgan’s run that began on April 4, 1983 is the longest active run in MLB.
Much as the late Bob Sheppard was to the New York Yankees and New York Giants, Morgan has been the soundtrack to a Texas Rangers game from Arlington Stadium to the Ballpark and now to the Mall.
For multiple generations of Texas Rangers fans Chuck is the voice of their game memories. He brought the ‘Dot Race’ to Arlington, and made sure to keep the Cotton Eye Joe a staple of the seventh-inning stretch.
No one could love the Texas Rangers more than Chuck. When the Rangers’ cattle barn opens to the public for Rangers games, be sure to congratulate, and thank, him on his achievement.
“Never in my life did I think we’d have baseball games without fans and supply fake crowd noise,” Morgan said this week in a phone interview. “I guess it is a crowning achievement the World Series is coming here, and the Rangers are not in it.”
About that.
Chuck said he will be the PA man for the playoff games to be played at Globe Life —- the National League Division and Championship series, and the World Series.
He expects maybe 12,000 fans to be allowed in the place, but that figure is unofficial.
He also said he has reached out to MLB about using pre-recorded tracks of the respective team home public address announcers to call out the players as they come to bat.
“It’s the least we can do to give (the players) some feel of their home stadium,” Morgan said.
Like everyone else, Chuck can only make the best of this mess.
The Texas Rangers’ Bob Sheppard
With the exception of Philadelphia Phillies’ PA man Dan Baker, who has served with the club for 49 years, no one in MLB has done it longer than Chuck.
Chuck has spent 37 years with the Rangers. Then there was that weird year in 2001 when he left to take a similar job with the Kansas City Royals.
It was an odd sound, hearing Chuck’s voice as the home announcer at Kauffman Stadium. It lasted one year, and he returned in Arlington in ‘02.
Much like with Yankee Stadium, and the Yankees with Sheppard, the only voice we can remember at Rangers games is Chuck.
Sheppard was the PA man of the New York Giants from 1956 to 2006, and the Yankees from 1951 to 2007.
For one memorable game, however, Sheppard relinquished his seat to Chuck.
From 1977 to ‘79, Chuck was the PA man for the minor league Nashville Sounds, which in the final year became an affiliate of the Yankees.
“Some fans approached (late Yankees owner George Steinbrenner) if I could do the PA for the Yankees in Yankee Stadium,” Morgan said. “I did the next to the last game of the season in ‘79. I sat next to Bob on Friday night and watched him do it. I did the game the next day.
“He was great about it. He was there at the start, and said he was going to go home and take a nap. He had a Giants game the next day.”
Doing a Dallas Cowboys game is not on Chuck’s bucket list.
Chuck Morgan’s remaining to do
Chuck is 65, with no intention of retiring.
“I really only have one thing left and that’s to see the Rangers win the World Series,” he said. “I would love to be able to say that. You know, when they won the pennant (in 2010 and ‘11), those were big moments.
“They were special, and watching Alex Rodriguez strikeout to end (Game 6 of the 2010 ALCS) is probably the most memorable. When they took a 3-2 lead (after Game 5 of the 2011 World Series), that was euphoric.”
And it’s just not the World Series.
“So the biggest moment has yet to come,” he said.
Whenever that day happens, Chuck will be there for it.
“Right now I’ll be here as long as they will let me be,” he said. “There will come a time when people will say, ‘Chuck needs to hang it up.’”
Until then, the next time you see him be sure to congratulate, and thank, him.
