BIL sits down with Mike Breen, the longtime voice of the New York Knicks and the biggest NBA games on ABC/ESPN.
The greatest stories in recent basketball memory have had many different authors. Most of them, however, have had a similar narrator in Mike Breen.
The 64-year-old Breen, known as the bellower of “Bang!” and the top voice of major NBA games for both ABC/ESPN’s hardwood coverage and New York Knicks games locally broadcast on MSG Network, need little introduction to even the most casual of basketball viewers.
The Yonkers native has become the basketball voice of a generation on both a national and local level: he has had a play-by-play role in every televised edition of the NBA Finals since 2006, all while forming one of the top local NBA broadcasting tandems alongside Walt “Clyde” Frazier, a pairing that has sustained Knicks fans through both good times and bad in the last two decades.
With yet another new NBA season fully underway, BIL spoke Breen about his past, present, and future in New York and beyond …
Beyond great fashion, what’s the greatest lesson you’ve learned from Walt “Clyde” Frazier?
MB: I’ve never been asked that question. That’s a great question. There’s one thing: he’s taught me so much about experience as a player, the highs and lows, and even how great players lose confidence. I think that’s one of the things that’s really surprised me. He was the first person to ever tell me that that even great players lose confidence. I couldn’t imagine, growing up, thinking that Clyde Frazier ever didn’t have confidence on a basketball court.
He’s just given me such a great learning experience about life as an NBA player, both when you’re first coming in, when your star, and when you retire, He’s been wonderful about that, about just the experience of special athlete and star athlete. I guess it’s a daily lesson with him. Every game, he teaches you something about either the game or what it was like to be a player. That’s the first time I was ever asked that.
What, in turn, do you think is the best thing Clyde has gotten from you?
MB: You’d have to ask him that I feel like I’ve learned a lot more. I think what he’s learned, and not necessarily just from me, but from the whole crew, is how broadcasting basketball has some similarities to playing basketball, from the standpoint of it’s a team effort for him to succeed on the court as a player.
Clearly, [he and the 1970s Knicks] had phenomenal chemistry and teamwork that led them to win two championships. But it’s the same thing with broadcasting basketball, in that it really is a team effort, not just with the play-by-play and the analyst, but with the producer, and the director, and the camera crew, and the statistician. I think that’s what he’s learned from from me and from our entire crew, is that he’s still part of a team. When the team operates well together, you have success.
How has basketball media changed the most since you entered the business? Do you feel like you’d reach the same level of success if you were starting out today?
MB: I think, first off, when we started broadcasting games, and I started broadcasting games, there was no internet. That’s the biggest change, because you went from, back in the day, when you go into a city to do a game, you would grab the local newspaper and scan it to see if you can get any kind of information. Now, before you go anywhere, before you leave your house, you can read articles and look at statistics on every player on every team for hours. So that’s the biggest change.
The amount of information that’s available to you now is just incredible, to the point where you have to know when to stop researching for the game, because you can go on and on. Back in the day, so much of what you used on the air was [obtained] by talking directly to players, coaches, other broadcasters. That’s how you got the information. But now, it’s all out there for everyone to grab. So that’s the biggest change from when, from when I started.
As for your second question, I’m glad I don’t have to know the answer to that. It is very different. I would say there’s many more opportunities in today’s landscape, but I also think it is different. The way people want their their information sometimes a little bit different, the way it’s broadcast is a little different. The styles of broadcasters have changed, but I’d like to think that I would be able to adjust the different era and do it. But that’s not for me to say. I was very fortunate to come in for the time when I did, because I received an incredible amount of help from so many people, and that hasn’t changed either. There’s always people who are currently in the business who are willing to help the people that are coming up.
When it comes to the current Knicks, how would you compared this team, 10 games in, to last year’s group or even as far back as the last Eastern champion groups from 1994 and 1999?
MB: From ’94 to now is night-and-day. The game is played differently, is officiated differently, is coached differently. This year’s team is even different from last year, because you have a coach whose style is much different. Mike Brown wants a lot more ball movement. He wants a lot more pace. He wants more passes for possession. He just wants to have the pace and the ball and player movement increase, and that’s a big difference from last year’s team.
Back in the 90s, those teams, the game was much more physical defensively. You could do a lot more physical play. Like, back in the day, you’d commit a hard foul and all it would be, it’d be two free throws. Today, they look at it to see if it’s a flagrant or a flagrant two. And, obviously the biggest change from from those teams back then and now is the 3-pointer. [It’s about] the volume, not only the volume from teams, but every player. Now it becomes, whether you’re a center, whether you’re a point guard, being able to shoot the three is now it’s almost a must in players.
Who would be on your Knicks Mount Rushmore?
MB: It’s almost impossible to narrow it down, in terms of great players. Patrick Ewing and Clyde, I think, are up there. Bernard King was one of the great scorers in the history of the NBA, with the Knicks as well. I think just from the standpoint of leadership and great play, Willis Reed is up there. I do think Jalen Brunson, the way he’s been playing, is going to be in the conversation as one of the great Knicks of all-time. Mount Rushmore was only four, but there were just a lot of great players, but those are probably the ones that deserve to be at the top of the list.
You’ve spoken about the changing world of NBA media, and you’ve backed the continued presence of regional sports networks like MSG. With the NBA taking on a larger national presence on Amazon and NBC, what changes, if any, have you seen RSNs make over the past year?
MB: Some of the changes are not for the better for the RSNs. I think we have to be careful not to lose the RSNs because, for fans, that’s your connection to the team. Usually the local announcers, whether it’s TV or radio, they become part of the family. That’s the way I felt growing up, listening to Marv Albert, when he was with, whether it was Cal Ramsey that he was working with or John Andariese, it just felt like that you knew them so well and they were part of your family. I feel the same way about my favorite baseball teams.
It’s something that I think is a staple to becoming a fan of a team, and we can’t lose that. With all the new national media rights to different broadcast outlets, the emphasis on the regional sports networks, that seems to be less and less. For example, this year, there are no playoff games that will be on regional networks for the first time, and I think that’s a mistake. Yes, I understand that the national outlets, including the one I work for, they pay a lot of money and they want that exclusivity. But I don’t think having a little side for the original broadcasters just to do some of the important games, I don’t think that there’s that much of a factor ratings-wise to impact them. So I wish they would reconsider that, but I don’t think that’s ever going to happen.
I just think that we can’t lose sight of the fact that the regional networks are important to the fans, and I hope that they don’t keep becoming less of a less and less of a presence for the basketball fans, because I think that’s a big part of why the younger generation develops that true passion for their team, when they’re watching the home broadcast.
We’ve seen so many legends of the mike move on in recent years, particularly in New York (i.e. Sam Rosen, John Sterling). How much long do you see yourself on the mike and when will you know it’s the right time to walk away?
MB: Well, I still love it. I still love the game. I still love the preparation for the broadcast. I still love being part of a broadcast team. So as long as that’s still a part of me, the love, the passion, [I’ll stay] for as long as I can.
I haven’t set any time. It’s simple to try and say I’m going to stop here or stop there. I mean, you just don’t know what’s ahead. But as long as they’ll have me. If I start losing the desire to prepare for the games, because the preparation is the most important part, and I think if I start losing that desire, or if I feel like I’m not doing it at a high level, those things might come into play to make me decide.
But, right now, I just love the game as much as ever. When they’re about to throw the ball up to start a game, I’m so excited sitting there and it’s still a privilege and an honor to do so. Hopefully, I’ll have a bunch more years to go.
Is there anyone with whom you haven’t called a game with that you would like to?
MB: Another one I’ve never been asked. Let me put it this way, there’s not one in particular right now because there’s so many interesting basketball people. But, last year, being able to do Hubie Brown’s final game, that was really important to me, because of what he meant to my career and to what he meant to so many basketball fans around the world. So that’s something that I was glad I was able to do.
I’ve had so many great partners that you don’t think along those lines. There’s a lot of partners I wish I could still do games with, like one more game with Doug Collins, or do one more game with Jeff [Van Gundy] and Mark [Jackson]. You have such, great memories. I did a lot of games with PJ Carlesimo, and I always loved doing games with him. Ann Myers, that’s another person I love to work with. Andy, John Andariese, who’s passed on, Bill Walton, who’s passed on, Snapper Jones, who I used to love to work with, he’s passed on.
So that would be more of my thought, boy, if I could do one more game with with some of those people that I’ve done in the past, that’s something that would be fun.
In your career, you’ve had to succeed some of the legends of the broadcasting game, such as Marv Albert, Al Michaels, John Andariese, and more. How did you respond to that, and what’s the best thing you can tell the next generation no doubt seeking it’s own Mike Breen moment?
MB: You can’t think of it. When you follow somebody who was a legend, like Marv, like Al, you can’t think of it that you’re coming into to follow them because they’re two of the greatest that have ever done this. Speaking about Mount Rushmore, they’re two of the ones, in my opinion, are up on that one.
You just have to be your own broadcaster. There are things you can learn from them in terms of how they approach a game. I took so much from how Marv approached the game and how he called the game, and I do it with my own style, with my own twists and turns on it, or wherever you want to put it. But if you start thinking, I’m coming in to replace the legend like that, then you’re just not going to work.
What you have to do is, you have to come and be yourself and win over the viewers on your own and not try and win them over right away. I think that’s one of the things I would tell somebody: don’t feel like you have to make this great statement the first night. It takes time to win over the viewers who will take time to trust you and enjoy what you’re doing. So that’s what I would say: don’t try to put them over right away, and don’t try and replace them. Just try to be your own broadcaster and show them through preparation, through passion, and through joy.
There are three things I’d like to convey when I do a game, and that’s what I would tell young broadcasters: number one, you have to be prepared. The people listening to you have to think, okay, this guy’s prepared. He knows what he’s talking about. Number two, you have to have a true love of the game. If they hear that you’re enjoying the game, if they can feel that you love basketball, then that’s what you really want to do. You want the viewer to say, man, you can tell he loves basketball. And the third one is to let the viewer know that you enjoy working with the people you’re with, and that you’re having a fun time together. So those three things, preparation, joy, and teamwork. If you can accomplish those things, I think I feel good about that, if I can accomplish those things on a broadcast.
Geoff Magliocchetti is on X @GeoffJMags
