Lowell Cohn: Why Ted Robinson ruins 49ers games

Ted Robinson ruins it for me.

NFL training camps are around the corner and I’m excited about the upcoming season. I bet you are, too. NFL football is a blast. Even 49ers football is a blast, except for their radio play-by-play guy, Ted Robinson. He ruins it for me. I bet he ruins it for you, too.

The Niners used to have a world-class radio play-by-play announcer, Joe Starkey. In 2009, Starkey was out and Robinson was in, and I never knew the ins and outs of that in and out. It was a shame.

Starkey has a great voice. Deep from the chest. He rises to the occasion. Meaning he injects verbal drama into the unspoken drama on the field. Think of his call of The Play. One online site called it the greatest call in American sports history. Think of his call for the Bay Area of USA Hockey upsetting Russia in the Olympics. As a describer, Starkey is at the Bill King level.

As a describer, Robinson is not. Strictly second-rate. Start with his voice - his instrument. His basic tool. It is thin and tinny. Sounds like he has stomach cramps. He struggles to emit sound.

He has a so-so dramatic sense, certainly not like Starkey’s. He is forced and labored. Rarely does justice to a great play. I listen to him on my radio in the press box. Listened to Starkey, too. No comparison.

Robinson is better at announcing tennis than football. In tennis the announcer yells less and can whisper. Robinson’s limited voice isn’t a handicap in tennis.

If Robinson’s only sins were his announcing deficiencies I wouldn’t be writing this. He commits other sins - in my opinion.

He is an over-the-top advocate for the 49ers. Starkey never was. Always was detached in the best professional sense. Robinson has scolded local columnists for criticizing the 49ers even when the Niners deserved criticism. Went out of his way to do it.

When a team deserves criticism as the Niners have deserved criticism, a columnist or commentator would be derelict in his/her duty not to acknowledge the truth. Robinson has criticized local columnists for doing their jobs. FYI: He never has criticized me as far as I know. But he has ticked off other opinion writers, good writers. Some columnists - not me - refer to him as The Shill.

Robinson is not part of the 49ers team. Doesn’t have a locker. Or shoulder pads. Or cleats. As the late, great Ron Bergman would have said, he is the lead tonsil. What columnists write - if they are fair and scrupulous - should not affect his relationship to them or his opinion of them. Never did with Starkey. Robinson is the mongrel dog barking at the gate to the mansion.

He needs to stop barking.

He’s barking up the wrong tree.

I want to tell you about Robinson and me. I have known him 36 years, more or less. We both are New Yorkers. In the past, I liked him. Thought he was a gentleman, easy to talk to. Went on his show decades ago on KCBS.

Pleasant experience. He once hosted a talk show on TV with me on the panel. He did a good job and we shook hands afterward, said we enjoyed working together.

The past two seasons, I wrote critical stuff about the Niners. About the weird, sad departure of Jim Harbaugh. About the disastrous hiring of Jim Tomsula - still blows my mind. And about the 49ers’ awful 2015-2016 season. Nothing unusual about any of that. Starkey would have understood.

So, two things happened. After one loss - I forget which - I had attended the postgame interviews and was walking down the hallway toward the press-box elevator with my son Grant who writes Inside the 49ers for the PD. Robinson came walking toward us.

“Hi, Ted,” I said.

He began to say hello - remember, we had been friendly. Then he stopped himself in mid-hello and screwed up his mouth to stop “hello” from escaping his lips. He hurried away. I felt sorry for the guy.

“What was that?” Grant said.

“You got me.”

“Looked like he had lockjaw,” Grant said.

Maybe he did.

Jed York and Trent Baalke don’t suffer lockjaw around me. I get along with them. Not friends. Of course not. But we are polite with each other. We talk to each other. We are professional in our interactions. So, I get along with the owner and general manager, but the tonsil spurns me.

Huh?

Then this happened. We were in Seattle for a 49ers-Seahawks game. Before the game, I walked to the eating area - a buffet table. Robinson was there. He saw me and turned his back on me. I sure thought he did. I took it as condemnation of my work. He couldn’t have been sore at me personally. I wrote nothing bad about him. Never hurled epithets at him in public.

I went over to him. Asked why he turned his back on me. Said we had been friendly. Said I was disappointed in him. He said he hadn’t seen me. Considering I was the only one there, considering I was about three feet away, I was skeptical of his explanation. I walked away. Over and out. For good.

He had no reason to turn his back on me. He had no reason not to talk to me. No problem. I just gave him one.

For more on the world of sports in general and the Bay Area in particular, go to the Cohn Zohn at cohn.blogs.pressdemocrat.com. You can reach Staff Columnist Lowell Cohn at lowell.cohn@pressdemocrat.com.