- Joe Starkey
Joe Starkey was the sports director of KGO radio for many years in
San Francisco, California . Starkey is best known for serving as theplay-by-play announcer for theSan Francisco 49ers , and theUniversity of California, Berkeley Golden Bearscollege football games since 1975. He has also broadcast for the NFL'sMinnesota Vikings andDenver Broncos , the USFL'sOakland Invaders , and the first telecaster for the NHL'sSan Jose Sharks .Previous assignments include the
Pittsburgh Penguins and Colorado Rockies of the NHL, andbasketball games for the NBA'sGolden State Warriors and the University of California. Also he called the radio broadcasts ofSuper Bowl XXIV andSuper Bowl XXIX .Starkey was also the radio voice of the now defunct National Hockey League's Oakland (later California Golden) Seals. His trademark call, whenever the Seals scored a goal, was "What a bonanza!"
Prior to assuming play-by-play duties with the 49ers, he served as color analyst on 49ers radio broadcasts in 1987 and 1988 with the legendary
Lon Simmons handling play-by-play.When the 49ers moved their broadcasts to rival station
KNBR in 2005, Starkey had to resign from KGO in order to continue his role with the 49ers. Although Starkey is still the broadcaster for the Cal Bears on KGO radio, he is now paid by the university, not the station as had previously been the case.Starkey is most famous for his frenetic call of
The Play in the 1982 Big Game between Cal and Stanford: "Oh, the band is out on the field!". Starkey nearly lost his voice during and after this event, which he hailed as "the most amazing, sensational, dramatic, heartrending, exciting, thrilling finish in the history of college football!"External links
* [http://www.signonsandiego.com/sports/college_football/20021118-9999_1s18play_transcript.html Transcript of Joe Starkey's call of the Play]
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