September 11, 2005 -- IN HIS 24th year as a Mets TV broadcaster — more accurately, a voice of Cablevision/the Dolan Family — Fran Healy is very likely approaching his final days in the Mets' booth.
The new Comcast/Time-Warner/Mets channel next season takes over, and Cablevision is expected, as always, to make things as impossible as possible for a rival that owns the live sports programming that it used to own. That would make Healy, a Cablevision/Dolan lackey, an unlikely shipper.
And it's probably too late for a makeover.
Healy was very strong in two broadcasting categories:
1) He always put the same happy/silly face on everything Mets. Last month, after the Mets blew a 9-7, ninth-inning lead at home to lose, 12-9, to the Brewers, Healy said that the big story of the game was Mike Piazza's five RBIs. Typical.
2) Healy was always very viewer-friendly to the youngest members of the audience, meaning he spoke to everyone as if they were six-year-olds. Late Thursday night from St. Louis, Healy said this of Mickey Mantle: "Mantle may have been one of the most idolized baseball players ever." Who knew?
The saddest part of it all is that, off air, Healy is a very engaging fellow. But he long ago determined that the secret to his TV success would also be the secret to his longevity: Do it the Dolan way. And to that end, he succeeded. If he's done as a Mets' TV voice, he had a good run, a real good run.
The new Comcast/Time-Warner/Mets channel next season takes over, and Cablevision is expected, as always, to make things as impossible as possible for a rival that owns the live sports programming that it used to own. That would make Healy, a Cablevision/Dolan lackey, an unlikely shipper.
And it's probably too late for a makeover.
Healy was very strong in two broadcasting categories:
1) He always put the same happy/silly face on everything Mets. Last month, after the Mets blew a 9-7, ninth-inning lead at home to lose, 12-9, to the Brewers, Healy said that the big story of the game was Mike Piazza's five RBIs. Typical.
2) Healy was always very viewer-friendly to the youngest members of the audience, meaning he spoke to everyone as if they were six-year-olds. Late Thursday night from St. Louis, Healy said this of Mickey Mantle: "Mantle may have been one of the most idolized baseball players ever." Who knew?
The saddest part of it all is that, off air, Healy is a very engaging fellow. But he long ago determined that the secret to his TV success would also be the secret to his longevity: Do it the Dolan way. And to that end, he succeeded. If he's done as a Mets' TV voice, he had a good run, a real good run.
