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Larry Anderson – Former MLB Pitcher and Baseball Commentator

By PDX People

There have been many well-known people from Portland Oregon over the years including former MLB pitcher Larry Anderson.

Larry enjoyed a 17-year Major League Baseball career that saw him play for multiple teams including the Indians, Phillies and Red Sox.

He was a solid pitcher who posted a 40-39 record with 49 saves and a 3.15 ERA in close to 700 games pitched.

About Larry Anderson

His best MLB season came in 1987 when he enjoyed nine wins and 94 strikeouts.

What’s unique about his long career is that he was traded to Boston for Jeff Bagwell in 1990 and he’s the only Phillies player to have played for the Phillies in both the 1983 and 1993 World Series.

Although he had an “average” fastball, Larry had a killer slider that ultimately became his money pitch and like other great pictures from his era whose fastballs lost velocity as they got older, Larry was able to extend his career because he always had an excellent command of his slider.

In a 17-season career, Andersen posted a 40-39 record with 49 saves and a 3.15 ERA in 699 games pitched. His best season was 1987 when he recorded nine wins, 94 strikeouts, and 101​23 innings pitched in 67 games, all career highs. He is the only member of the Phillies to play in both the 1983 World Series and the 1993 World Series (Darren Daulton had been called up, but did not make a game appearance in 1983). – Wikipedia

Broadcasting Career

By the mid-1990’s, Larry’s career was winding down with the Phillies and after failing to make the club in 1995 he transitioned to a player-coach for their minor league clubs before ultimately moving onto broadcasting.

Andersen worked on both television and radio from 1998 to 2006 before moving exclusively to radio in 2007. Early in his broadcasting tenure, Andersen occasionally provided television color commentary when the Phillies were featured regionally on Fox Saturday afternoon telecasts. During the 2007 season, he began doing play-by-play work on Phillies radio broadcasts during the fifth and sixth innings but returned to full-time color commentary in 2008.

In 2012, Andersen was ranked #12 on the MLB Network Countdown of the Top 25 personalities in Major League Baseball history

Working Every Summer For 48 Years

Imagine not taking a summer break for close to 50 years….

For a baseball player turned broadcaster like Larry Anderson this he’s not been able to just relax during his summers because he’s either been on the diamond or behind a mike.

The 2018 season will mark the first time he’s taken a break during the summer since he was a teenager because the now legendary broadcaster is going to be reducing his time behind in the broadcast booth to enjoy his free time.

It was his decision.

“It doesn’t matter if this team was going to the World Series or was going to finish in last,” Andersen said Wednesday. “It had nothing to do with the baseball aspect of it. It was more just a personal decision that, in my waning years, I wanted to do some things while I was above ground.”

It is likely that Andersen does about half of the 162 games next season, with most of his work coming in home games. The Phillies have auditioned possible replacements for Andersen this season — they tried Kevin Stocker, J.C. Romero, Kevin Jordan, Doug Glanville, and current TV analyst Ben Davis in three-game stints.

Rob Brooks, the Phillies’ manager of broadcasting, said the team may not hire one person to fill Andersen’s void.

“He’s earned the right to do what he wants,” Brooks said. “We’ve been working to do what is best. It’s going to be a significant reduction.”

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