By Rick Kaempfer
CUBS PRE AND POST MAN
2
015 has been a historic season for the
Cubs. They may still be playing in the
same home ball park, but they have a
brand new radio home for the first time in 90
years; WBBM Newsradio (AM 780). They also
have a new voice in the radio booth before,
during, and after games. That voice belongs to
longtime Chicago sports reporter Mark Grote.
He is thrilled to be part of the team.
"I grew up in Itasca and lived and died
with the Cubs growing up," he says. "A lot of
that has worn off because I was in the business
for so long before I started here, but there's no
doubt it's in my blood."
Grote is not a newcomer to sports radio, or
even a new comer to WBBM. In fact, it's the
station that gave him his radio start in
Chicago.
"Jeff Joniak and Josh Liss were the guys
that brought me in to work at WBBM originally about a decade ago. When the full-time
It also helps that Grote has a mentor in the
booth with him; Cubs radio color man Ron
Coomer. "Everyone in baseball knows and
likes Ron. He's one of those legitimately good
guys. He's been absolutely great to me here in
my rookie season. He introduces me to the
people I need to know, and makes sure I don't
make a fool of myself by telling me the little
etiquette issues involved in the broadcast
booth and the clubhouse. Coomer has been
the most important person for me, to get me
through this year."
Grote's view from the booth has also multiplied his admiration for Cubs radio play by
play man Pat Hughes. "I've always thought
Pat was great, but when I sit and watch him,
and see what he sees, it's pretty amazing
because he absolutely nails it. Baseball is a difficult play by play sport because you need to
be entertaining enough to fill up the space
during the down time when nothing is going
L to R: Ron Coomer, Mark Grote and Pat Hughes
morning anchor job opened at The Score (AM
670) in 2010, I moved over there. It was a little
strange because the bosses all worked for the
same company. (WBBM Program Director)
Ron Gleason still gives me a hard time about
picking the Score over them, but they understood. "
Grote provided updates for Mully and
Hanley in the morning, and he also co-hosted
a sports talk show on the weekends with the
Chicago Tribune's resident cynic Steve
Rosenbloom. "That was fantastic fun. We had
a great chemistry and really liked working
together. I miss it a little bit, but right now I'm
focused on this gig and I'm very much enjoying it. This has been an unbelievable opportunity."
Although, doing the pre and postgame
shows for the Cubs is a much more time consuming gig than the average fan understands.
"There's about five hours of prep that goes
into a baseball game," Grote admits. "You're in
the clubhouse four hours before the game
starts; talking to players, trying to get interviews, and it's not always easy to get exactly
what you want when you go into a clubhouse.
There are some days when the player that you
would like to speak to is not interested in
speaking for whatever reason. It's not like I
can just go in there and say 'we want him, him
and him,' and they give them to us. We have
to work for it too."
But when part of your job is to do an interview with the manager every day, it sure helps
when the manager has the personality and
temperament of this current Cubs skipper.
"Joe Maddon is like a dream. He is incredibly
accommodating. Usually when we talk to Joe,
and we finish the interview, he kind of gives
us the look like ‘Is that all you got?' He usually wants to talk even more."
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july 2015
on, but then all of a sudden complete chaos
breaks out. Pat is able to effortlessly switch
back and forth without missing a beat. He is
legitimately as good as it gets. He never
phones it in. Never. For someone who has been
doing it as long as he has, that's pretty amazing."
The other thing that has amazed Grote this
year is the travel. He expected it to be a grind,
but admits it's actually been fun. "This is my
first time flying with a team, and they obviously have chartered flights – which are pretty amazing. I call it ‘rich people's stuff'
because the bus pulls right up to the plane,
and you're treated like kings on the plane. I
hate to say it, but I love that part of it. I still
love the travel too because I haven't spent a lot
of time in some of these other cities or stadiums before. The way the team plans the travel, the actual logistics of it, they make everything so easy. This is going to ruin me forever.
(Laughs) How am I going to deal with flyin