Don Orsillo shared the advice he received from Joe Castiglione
Orsillo said that Joe Castiglione taught him several crucial lessons about working in the broadcast booth.
On Monday, Padres broadcaster Don Orsillo joined the “Baseball Isn’t Boring” podcast and discussed the valuable lessons he learned from Red Sox radio legend Joe Castiglione early on in his career.
Orsillo, who attended Northeastern University, worked as an intern for Castiglione while in college.
Orsillo’s first broadcasting gig at the major league level was with the Red Sox in 2001. He served as the team’s play-by-play announcer for NESN until 2015 when the network opted to move on from him and go forward with Dave O’Brien on play-by-play instead.
In his career Orsillo has also catered to a national audience, working for Fox and TBS for several MLB postseasons. On the podcast, he mentioned that one of the main pieces of advice from Castiglione was knowing the difference between the local and national broadcasts.
Castiglione reminded Orsillo that a local broadcaster will not only spend countless hours around the team, but also in the homes of millions of fans.
“[Castiglione] said local TV is about wearability,” said Orsillo. “I didn’t really understand the term, but you can’t annoy people, because you’re going to annoy people whether you want to or not because you’re on all summer in their living rooms for six months every day for three-and-a-half, sometimes four hours.”
Orsillo also said that he was told to let things be casual and personal between the broadcaster and the viewer.
Castiglione also gave Orsillo some tips on the little details of broadcasting.
“[Castiglione] said, ‘Put a caption underneath the picture, don’t be captain obvious.’ And it was great advice,” Orsillo said.
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com