Photo by: All Pro Photography/Dale Sparks
Zangrilli, Galusky WVU’s Odd Couple
April 24, 2018 02:13 PM | Baseball, Blog
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - It's amazing the things you can learn listening to a West Virginia University baseball game on the radio these days.
Recently, I learned how to deal with a woodpecker at 4 a.m. if one should ever invade my HVAC system. I've also gotten tips on hunting, fishing, car insurance, movies, rock and roll, geography, investments … you name it.
Oh, and by the way, I've also learned a lot about the great game of baseball, too.
The Dan Zangrilli-Ernie Galusky pairing for Mountaineer Sports Network from IMG broadcasts is about as unlikely as Snoop Dog-Martha Stewart, Dan a lifelong Yinzer from Pittsburgh who grew up in Dormont before trekking 1.8 miles away to Brookline, and Ernie, a red-blooded American and lifelong resident of Preston County who probably owns more camouflage than Stan Ridgway.
About the only thing these two guys have in common is a love of baseball - which makes them a real modern-day radio odd couple.
"I'm supposed to be the city guy from Pittsburgh, but yet I'm the one who owns a 1985 Ford F-150 truck," Zangrilli says. "Well, ask Ernie what type of truck he drives … a Toyota!"
Zangrilli is now in his second year calling West Virginia University baseball and women's basketball games. You may also be familiar with his work previewing WVU football games with Jed Drenning and Dale Wolfley on the popular Mountaineer Tailgate Show, or the weekly podcast he does for WVUsports.com.
You might also be aware that he once worked for the Pittsburgh Pirates Radio Network as studio host of the Pirates' Pregame Show on 93.7 The Fan. He did that for six years, working nearly 170 games in one season in 2013 alongside former studio analyst Kevin Orie.
"Except for maybe a wedding or my parents' anniversary, I did all of them that year," Zangrilli says proudly.
Dan's been on the air since the week of 9/11 when he was just a sophomore at Keystone Oaks High. He had to ride the bus to the first game he ever called (high school football) because he did not yet possess a driver's license at the time.
"It was Keystone Oaks-West Mifflin," he recalled. "It was on the Internet and a station in Carnegie that no longer exists. I can't even remember the call letters anymore."
Zangrilli continued broadcasting games when he attended Clarion University, doing New York-Penn League games in State College, Pennsylvania, for two years during the summertime until he graduated.
From there, he moved up to Double-A Altoona where he worked for three years until 2010, mostly by himself but occasionally with former Pirates reliever Stan Belinda - yes, that Stan Belinda who couldn't get the final out of game seven of the 1992 NLCS against the Atlanta Braves - or former Pirates coach Rich Donnelly and former hockey play-by-play man Paul Steigerwald.
During the six years he did the wrap-around coverage for the Pirates, Dan was consistently praised for doing his homework, his insightful interviews and his strong baseball knowledge, especially analytics.
Galusky will be the first to admit that he has a hard time spelling analytics, let alone speaking about it eloquently. His baseball background includes four years as a college player at Davis & Elkins, one year as an assistant coach at D&E and three more years as an assistant coach at West Virginia.
Ernie coached the Morgantown Post 2 American Legion team to three state championships and four national regional berths, developing two players (Jedd Gyorko and Josh Judy) good enough to make the big leagues before calling it a career in 2011.
Galusky has also been running the baseball program at Pro Performance Center since 2004, coordinating one of the most successful travel teams in the region now comprised of more than 120 players ages seven through 13.
In the meantime, he began analyzing WVU baseball games on the local radio station in 2008 and continued working Mountaineer games when IMG secured the broadcasting rights in 2013.
Like Dan, Ernie has outstanding baseball knowledge with an uncanny knack of explaining situations in a way that makes it understandable to the common fan. He will let you know when things aren't going well for the Mountaineers, too, yet he realizes that he's dealing with college players and not professionals.
He's even honest when evaluating the play of his nephew, current WVU shortstop Jimmy Galusky.
"Ernie is as good as anybody I've ever worked with," Zangrilli says. "You either get somebody with a strong background in baseball and little knowledge of the radio side of things or vice versa.
"He has both."
Which means when things get a little slow, which can sometimes happen in baseball, that's when they can pivot to other entertaining topics, such as last Saturday when Dan had his early-morning encounter with Mr. Woodpecker.
The very next day, Ernie said he had the same thing happen at his house except the woodpecker he dealt with went to town on his siding, meaning Saturday's conversation spilled over into Sunday with the two taking us along for the ride.
Did Ernie really get a visit from Mr. Woodpecker? Dan admits he isn't 100 percent certain but concedes Ernie's story did sound reasonably convincing.
"He said he is going to text me a picture so we'll see," Zangrilli noted.
For the last two years Dan has been trying to get Ernie on Twitter, sometimes soliciting the listeners to help. Recently, he asked everyone to message the IMG account to tell them from where they were listening.
The responses he got were overwhelming.
"We had like 60 come in 30 seconds after I did it," Zangrilli marveled. "We even had somebody listening on their phone in the air!"
These days, the broadcasts are not just confined to your car or your home transistor radio. They are now available on your smart phones or mobile devices through IMG's TuneIn app, or you can watch and listen on your computer or smart TV through the popular streaming service Roku.
Anywhere you can get a cell signal you can follow WVU baseball games, which means you might learn something you didn't expect to learn.
In the process, these two are also going to keep you highly entertained as well.
Recently, I learned how to deal with a woodpecker at 4 a.m. if one should ever invade my HVAC system. I've also gotten tips on hunting, fishing, car insurance, movies, rock and roll, geography, investments … you name it.
Oh, and by the way, I've also learned a lot about the great game of baseball, too.
The Dan Zangrilli-Ernie Galusky pairing for Mountaineer Sports Network from IMG broadcasts is about as unlikely as Snoop Dog-Martha Stewart, Dan a lifelong Yinzer from Pittsburgh who grew up in Dormont before trekking 1.8 miles away to Brookline, and Ernie, a red-blooded American and lifelong resident of Preston County who probably owns more camouflage than Stan Ridgway.
About the only thing these two guys have in common is a love of baseball - which makes them a real modern-day radio odd couple.
"I'm supposed to be the city guy from Pittsburgh, but yet I'm the one who owns a 1985 Ford F-150 truck," Zangrilli says. "Well, ask Ernie what type of truck he drives … a Toyota!"
Zangrilli is now in his second year calling West Virginia University baseball and women's basketball games. You may also be familiar with his work previewing WVU football games with Jed Drenning and Dale Wolfley on the popular Mountaineer Tailgate Show, or the weekly podcast he does for WVUsports.com.
You might also be aware that he once worked for the Pittsburgh Pirates Radio Network as studio host of the Pirates' Pregame Show on 93.7 The Fan. He did that for six years, working nearly 170 games in one season in 2013 alongside former studio analyst Kevin Orie.
"Except for maybe a wedding or my parents' anniversary, I did all of them that year," Zangrilli says proudly.
Dan's been on the air since the week of 9/11 when he was just a sophomore at Keystone Oaks High. He had to ride the bus to the first game he ever called (high school football) because he did not yet possess a driver's license at the time.
"It was Keystone Oaks-West Mifflin," he recalled. "It was on the Internet and a station in Carnegie that no longer exists. I can't even remember the call letters anymore."
Zangrilli continued broadcasting games when he attended Clarion University, doing New York-Penn League games in State College, Pennsylvania, for two years during the summertime until he graduated.
From there, he moved up to Double-A Altoona where he worked for three years until 2010, mostly by himself but occasionally with former Pirates reliever Stan Belinda - yes, that Stan Belinda who couldn't get the final out of game seven of the 1992 NLCS against the Atlanta Braves - or former Pirates coach Rich Donnelly and former hockey play-by-play man Paul Steigerwald.
During the six years he did the wrap-around coverage for the Pirates, Dan was consistently praised for doing his homework, his insightful interviews and his strong baseball knowledge, especially analytics.
Galusky will be the first to admit that he has a hard time spelling analytics, let alone speaking about it eloquently. His baseball background includes four years as a college player at Davis & Elkins, one year as an assistant coach at D&E and three more years as an assistant coach at West Virginia.
Ernie coached the Morgantown Post 2 American Legion team to three state championships and four national regional berths, developing two players (Jedd Gyorko and Josh Judy) good enough to make the big leagues before calling it a career in 2011.
Galusky has also been running the baseball program at Pro Performance Center since 2004, coordinating one of the most successful travel teams in the region now comprised of more than 120 players ages seven through 13.
In the meantime, he began analyzing WVU baseball games on the local radio station in 2008 and continued working Mountaineer games when IMG secured the broadcasting rights in 2013.
Like Dan, Ernie has outstanding baseball knowledge with an uncanny knack of explaining situations in a way that makes it understandable to the common fan. He will let you know when things aren't going well for the Mountaineers, too, yet he realizes that he's dealing with college players and not professionals.
He's even honest when evaluating the play of his nephew, current WVU shortstop Jimmy Galusky.
"Ernie is as good as anybody I've ever worked with," Zangrilli says. "You either get somebody with a strong background in baseball and little knowledge of the radio side of things or vice versa.
"He has both."
Which means when things get a little slow, which can sometimes happen in baseball, that's when they can pivot to other entertaining topics, such as last Saturday when Dan had his early-morning encounter with Mr. Woodpecker.
The very next day, Ernie said he had the same thing happen at his house except the woodpecker he dealt with went to town on his siding, meaning Saturday's conversation spilled over into Sunday with the two taking us along for the ride.
Did Ernie really get a visit from Mr. Woodpecker? Dan admits he isn't 100 percent certain but concedes Ernie's story did sound reasonably convincing.
"He said he is going to text me a picture so we'll see," Zangrilli noted.
For the last two years Dan has been trying to get Ernie on Twitter, sometimes soliciting the listeners to help. Recently, he asked everyone to message the IMG account to tell them from where they were listening.
The responses he got were overwhelming.
"We had like 60 come in 30 seconds after I did it," Zangrilli marveled. "We even had somebody listening on their phone in the air!"
These days, the broadcasts are not just confined to your car or your home transistor radio. They are now available on your smart phones or mobile devices through IMG's TuneIn app, or you can watch and listen on your computer or smart TV through the popular streaming service Roku.
Anywhere you can get a cell signal you can follow WVU baseball games, which means you might learn something you didn't expect to learn.
In the process, these two are also going to keep you highly entertained as well.
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