‘Heeee’s got the bucket!’: G-Man Gary Gerould to call 3,000th Sacramento Kings game Sunday
Gary Gerould’s first Kings game was in the fall of 1985. He never saw it coming, then seized the opportunity and never let it go.
His radio play-by-play detail and excitement was palpable then, the man who goes by “G-Man” recalled, because Sacramento finally landed a piece of the big time: An NBA team in the state capital.
On Sunday, with the Kings playing in Oklahoma City, Gerould will call his 3,000th Kings game on the radio, a regional treasure that keeps on giving.
“I’m semi-excited about this,” Gerould said. “OK, I’m really excited. It’s just so cool. I feel so fortunate to still be doing this. I signed game balls for my 1,000th and 2000th game, and here I am in my 38th year, still loving it, and I get to do my 3,000th. Pretty cool.”
Also cool is how Gerould landed the gig in the first place. He was a veteran sports media figure long before the Kings arrived from Kansas City, but he hadn’t done any basketball play-by-play in 15 years. Still, he had the backing of then-Kings front-office man Greg Van Dusen, who died Tuesday at the age of 72.
Van Dusen urged then-Kings general manager Joe Axelson to give a listen. But listen to what? Gerould had no tapes. So he was tasked to do a mock broadcast of a Kansas City game in Los Angeles and then Oakland at the end of the 1984-85 season. It was a primitive, bare-bones adventure. He had no headphones, no television monitors, no stats, no live audience. It was a tape and a prayer.
Gerould for those games was joined by his son Bobby, then a 17-year old Kennedy High School student, who provided statistics and tidbits. They pulled it off, and they laughed on the way back home to Sacramento, wondering if it would pan out.
Axelson listened to those tapes as he drove from Kansas City to Sacramento to meet with Sacramento officials. He liked what he heard. Gerould got the gig, beating out a field of some 100 candidates for the job, including others who were already calling NBA action in some form. The Kings wanted a local guy to call the games, a familiar face. He’s become the familiar voice, and he’s remained a fixed star, plowing through more lean seasons than playoff ones, but still describing the action.
Gerould said he is still as enthusiastic, as prepared and as grateful as he was in the 1980s, and that included perhaps the most exhausting game he’s called in some time, if ever. The Kings on Friday night beat the Los Angeles Clippers 176-175 in double overtime, the second highest-scoring game in NBA history. Gerould called the action as if it was a page-turning drama, laced with a few of his trademark, “Oh, my!” mentions.
Gerould hopes to be calling playoff action come April, the first time since 2006. He said he’s impressed with how first-year coach Mike Brown has injected new life into the franchise and how the players have responded.
“It’s the first time since the Rick Adelman days that you’re legitimately good enough to win every game, and that’s so big,” Gerould said. “It’s big for everybody involved. There’s no guarantee that the playoff drought is over, but we’ve got a shot. We have a great shot.”
This story was originally published February 25, 2023 at 12:45 PM.