Joe Davis is Fox Sports’ new voice for Major League Baseball

There’s a new regular Joe calling baseball games on Fox.

Joe Davis, a seasoned sportscaster who is known on the West Coast for calling Los Angeles Dodger games and as a Fox Sports regular, will take over as lead play-by-play announcer for coverage of Fox Sports’ Major League Baseball. He succeeds Joe Buck, Fox’s longtime baseball and football announcer who moved to ESPN to work on “Monday Night Football.” Davis will join John Smoltz in the network’s main baseball stand.

“If you had asked me when I was 10 what I wanted to be when I grew up, I would have said ‘Call the World Series’ to you. So when I say this is a dream come true, I really think so,” Davis said in a statement. Davis and Smoltz, along with reporters Tom Verducci and Ken Rosenthal, are expected to call Fox’s coverage of the 2022 MLB All-Star Game, MLB at the Field of Dreams Game and of the MLB postseason, including its 25th Fall Classic. Davis’ first appearance in his new role is scheduled for Saturday, May 28.

The sportscaster’s rise is the latest in a series of high-profile sports announcer maneuvers that have come as networks with big sports contracts poached the talents of their rivals. ESPN lured Buck and Troy Aikman to call NFL games next season, while Amazon lured NBC Sports’ Al Michaels to call its “Thursday Night Football.” Those decisions have left some of the major sports media organizations mounting succession calls for some of the biggest names in sports television. NBC, for example, replaced Michaels with Mike Tircio as one of the lead voices on its “Sunday Night Football.”

Davis is no stranger to Fox viewers. He joined Fox Sports in 2014 as a play-by-play announcer for the network’s coverage of MLB, college football, and college basketball, and replaced Buck twice when football duties took him over. have moved away from post-season baseball coverage. Davis has been on the stand for coverage of Fox Sports’ Division series since 2017.

He will continue his role for local Dodgers telecasts on SportsNet LA, where he took over from Vin Scully in 2017.

Davis has been calling games since he was young. While attending Beloit College in Wisconsin, he performed play-by-play duties for the school’s athletic department, calling men’s and women’s baseball and basketball games on radio and on the air. local television. Just before his senior year, Davis got a job with the Schaumburg Flyers baseball team of the Northern Independent League, serving as the team’s director of media relations and play-by-play voice. He eventually landed a play-by-play voice role for the Montgomery Biscuits, the Double-A affiliate of the Tampa Bay Rays. Davis called the Biscuits games for three seasons.

At 24, Davis jumped into national television, joining ESPN in 2012 as an announcer for baseball, basketball, soccer, hockey and softball games, and lending a helping hand calling games. of MLB for ESPN Radio. In 2013, Davis was assigned to broadcast the Poinsettia Bowl by the network, becoming the youngest person to ever announce a bowling game for ESPN.

“It’s amazing to see Joe’s continued growth over the years to become one of the elite broadcasters in all of sports,” Brad Zager, president of production and operations at Fox Sports, said in a statement. . “As an integral part of our coverage over the past few years, his transition to baseball’s biggest stage is a natural fit and we couldn’t be more thrilled to have him as the new voice of MLB on Fox.”

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