Over a span of two decades, Joe Buck has been despised by the masses.
But don’t assume his attitude toward the Yankees is resentful.
The long-time FOX play-by-play voice for Major League Baseball and the National Football League expressed his thoughts on the Yankees on Howard Stern’s satellite radio show Monday.
“It’s crazy,” Buck told Stern. “Yankees fans believe that I don’t like the Yankees, which if you know anything about television and ratings and success … If there’s one team, Red Sox two, Cubs … you want these teams in the postseason. You’re going to get bigger ratings. Where do you want to be in the postseason?”
Stern also asked Buck about his involvement in a pregame injury that Alex Rodriguez suffered at Yankee Stadium during warmups in August 2010. The incident resulted in Rodriguez missing the game, although New York still managed to beat the Red Sox to maintain a 1.5 game lead over Tampa Bay for first place in the AL East.
“Unbelievable,” Buck said. “I’m with my sister’s son, Jack. I walk out of the dugout, and Alex, who’s become a good friend of mine, is standing there at third base while they’re taking batting practice. And he looks over to me and goes, ‘Hey, Joe.’ I said, ‘Hey Alex.’ And I keep walking.
“He says, ‘Hey Joe, and he’s starting to say, ‘Is that your boy?’ And Lance Berkman, who was playing for the Yankees at the time, hits a rocket. It crunches him right under his knee. He goes running out one-legged into center field. He’s rolling around in the grass in center field grabbing his leg.
“I’m standing down there and I’m like, ‘Oh my God, I hope nobody saw me talking to him.’ And eventually one of the players said, ‘I know how he got hurt. He was talking to that Fox guy, Buck.’
“Then the horde of media guys turn on me. They said, ‘What happened?’ I said, I just walked out on the field. He turned his head to say hi, and he got whacked.’
“It was the back cover of the Daily News. It said, ‘What the Buck?’ All I did was exist and I got (publicly ridiculed) for that.”
But Buck’s used to the criticism, and realizes Yankees fans have yet to warm up to him.
“They hate me,” he said.
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