'Gibby, meet Freddie' revisited: Joe Davis on broadcasting and calling an epic World Series

Fox Sports

2 days ago

Joe Davis isn't sure if it will ever fully sink in that his voice, much like Vin Scully's on Kirk Gibson's iconic blast, will forever be the soundtrack to one of the biggest moments in World Series history.
Even seven months later, it still does not feel real.
"I'm still the kid from Potterville, Michigan, who dreamt of doing this," the MLB on FOX broadcaster said earlier this week.
But the more time that passes, the more Davis recognizes the magnitude of what transpired in Los Angeles on the evening of Oct. 25, 2024, when Freddie Freeman — 36 years after Gibson made the impossible happen — wrote a new chapter in Dodgers lore with his Game 1 walk-off grand slam.
When people see Davis now, Freeman's hit and his call — "Gibby, meet Freddie" — are what they want to talk about.
The same way that Freeman grew up dreaming of coming through in a moment like that, Davis grew up dreaming of narrating it.
"The more distance I get from it, the greater appreciation I have for where the moment — and forget what I said or the call or anything — just where the moment stands in baseball history," Davis said. "It was impossible to fully appreciate that in the immediate aftermath, but the more distance I get from it, the more mind-blowing it is that I got to be in the chair for that moment. I'm, more and more, appreciating what that moment was."
With the Dodgers and Yankees reuniting this weekend for the first time since the Fall Classic, and with FOX Sports celebrating its 30th season of MLB coverage this year, Davis discussed the call, the aftermath, Gibson's reaction, how he critiques and learns from his broadcasts, why a picture in his office reminds him that every night could be the one people talk about forever and much more.
(Note: Some questions and answers may be edited for brevity and clarity.)
Has it hit you yet that the same way we associate Vin's call on the Gibson homer, your voice and your call now will forever be linked to one of the biggest moments in World Series history?
JD: "I don't know if it ever will. I swear, man. And I think that that's a good thing. That's kind of how I want it. I never want, and I talk to my kids about this all the time, too, let's never take for granted how cool it is to have the things we have and to do the things we do. I think that's a great example of that, where I can kind of practice what I preach to my kids. I'm still the kid from Potterville, Michigan, who dreamt of doing this.
"In the same way Freddie stepped into the box and might not have thought to himself, 'This is the moment I've prepared my whole life for,' but you ask him now, yeah, that's the moment every baseball player dreams of having. I even said that right before he stepped in, on the broadcast, in the same way that that was the moment that he grew up dreaming of, as he stepped into the box, that's the moment I grew up dreaming of, too. So I don't lose that perspective. Because of that, it's hard to really wrap my mind around logically where that moment stands and what it means to be tied to that moment. I don't allow any of it to feel real. It's too crazy, too preposterous, for me to really allow it to feel real, even with the distance that we have."
You mentioned using this moment kind of as a life lesson for your kids. As they get older, do they have an understanding for how big that moment was and an appreciation for what their dad got to do?
JD: "Well they have the T-shirt, the 'Gibby, meet Freddie' T-shirt. Charlotte turns 9 in a couple weeks. Blake is 6, and Theo turns 4 on July 1. I think they see me get recognized a little bit more, and still it's often followed by the question, 'You know him?' More and more, they're like, 'Wait, no, they know you, don't they, Dad?' So, I think they see a little bit more of that. My daughter, she's always been mature for her age, so even when I got the World Series job in the first place, she seemed to have an appreciation — she was in like kindergarten at this point — she seemed to grasp what it meant to daddy to live his life dream. My son, the 6-year-old, is baseball obsessed. So, he gets what a big deal it is that I get to do the World Series. He gets it from that perspective. But I always tell them, too, 'Hey guys, this stuff's cool, but I'm just your dad. This is something I do, but this is not who I am. This stuff is amazing, we're so lucky that we have it, but I'm just your goofy daddy, right?' And the other thing is, they get it with their friends at school, 'I saw your dad on TV," and Blake's Little League teammates and things like that. But it's possible to embrace it and love it and realize how fortunate we are while at the same time be like, 'It's no big deal.' That's what we try to do."
Everyone remembers the "Gibby, meet Freddie" part. I don't know if everyone caught the "she is gone" nod to Vin before it as well. It seemed like a pretty perfect call, but as someone who I'm sure is a perfectionist with this sort of thing, and now with months to reflect, is there anything you would have done differently?
JD: "It's a great question. I stayed up, not through the night but lost a little sleep laying there asking myself that question —and this got blown out of proportion a little bit I think in the immediate aftermath when I did an interview talking about this — going back and critiquing it in my head. I'm always going to do that. That didn't mean I went back and was like, 'You stink, that wasn't good.' I just, I'm always going back trying to think about how maybe it could have been a little bit better. In the immediate aftermath, the one thing I had thought to myself was I know on Vin's call of the Gibby home run, his line that everybody talks about — 'In a year that has been so improbable' — that came after Gibby had rounded the bases. It was just, 'She is gone," and then a long layoff while he rounded the bases and even began the celebration at home, and then came Vin's line. So I thought to myself for a bit, went back and rewatched it, rewatched it, rewatched it, should 'Gibby, meet Freddie' have waited? Did I talk over the crowd? Did I talk over the moment? But that's just how I always am on my calls, whether it's that or something that happens this time of year. I go back and have fun looking at it that way, kind of picking it apart. I think what I decided is that having it right there, having the 'Gibby meet Freddie' line follow the 'She is gone,' it probably worked that way. Not that it wouldn't have worked otherwise."
So, do you go back often then to listen and learn from your calls? Or, with so many games in a baseball season, do you prefer to kind of put it away afterward?
JD: "Every night I watch the highlights, just to calibrate where I'm at energy level on them. I may, just to see, 'OK, I felt like I was really getting to the level I needed to be on Ohtani's home run today.' So, let's play the highlight while I still have that feeling fresh and let's see if it matched up. Let's see if the way I felt making that call translated, and if I was maybe a little flat or over the top, I take the memory of that feeling and try to apply it the next day. So I do the highlights each day, and I try to — once every week to 10 days — go back and do a deeper critique of myself and go back and listen to several innings of a game and take notes down, and I'll bring that piece of paper with those notes on what I want to work on, what I want to focus on and have that sit right in front of me for the next week up until I do the next critique."
Freddie talked about this right after it happened. You have this big moment, but you need to win three more games or no one's going to care anymore. For you, you have this big moment, you mention you're laying in bed thinking about it, how do you unwind after something like that? And how odd is it to then immediately have to turn the page to another game?
JD: "Yeah, so it was unique because it came in L.A., which is where I live. And I went back to my house, whereas usually in this business we're going back to the hotel. I went back to my house, and in my office there's one piece of artwork, and it is a picture of the moment Kirk Gibson leaves the on-deck circle to head up for his game-winning home run in '88. And you can see in the backdrop the umpire reaching into his shirt to pull out the line-up card and make the change, and the bigger backdrop is just the wall of people at Dodger Stadium. I've had it in my office as long as I've had my office, because it represents everything I love about the job. The next moment could be the moment. Big crowd in the background, thinking about the noise they make. So, I love that picture, and it's always been there.
But to come back home and walk into my office, thinking like, 'Wow what just happened?' I hadn't thought about it on the drive home, what I was going to see when I sat down in my home office. But I sat down and looked up and was like, 'Oh man, that's right. Holy cow, that just happened again… I was there when it happened.' I didn't sleep great that night just because of the energy of having done that game. And then to your point, I'm up early the next day, 'OK, let's get ready for Game 2. This is amazing, but now let's go get ready for Game 2, and what's going to happen tonight?' But that's the core of what I love about this job, getting ready for the next game not knowing what you're going to see, knowing tonight could be the night you talk about forever each time."
Do you know what Gibson thought about the call? Or what's the coolest feedback you've gotten since that moment?
JD: "Oh, man, people have been so nice. Texted with Freddie that night, just the kind of guy he is, he probably had 9,000 text messages but he thought to text me. I talked to [Gibby on] Opening Day when he was there, and I actually had a couple people who had talked to him to do stories on the connection who had talked to him who then reached out to me and said, 'Hey, you should know, Gibby really thought your call was cool.' That's up there as far as the most special things I heard coming out of that, the fact that Gibby appreciated the call and took some enjoyment out of it. That was really neat."
What are the difficulties that come with calling a World Series when you've been the broadcaster all year for one of the teams involved?
JD: "The hardest part is kind of unlearning, or at least rewiring, everything I know about the team I cover every day. Because the way of presenting that team is totally different when you get to the national audience, especially in the postseason and the World Series, than it would be covering a regular season game. So reframing in my mind how I know that information and present that information takes time. Yeah, it's not a fun thing that everybody thinks you hate their team, but it's part of the territory. Then it gets amplified when one of the teams you cover on an everyday basis. So, I think that part of it, it stinks, but it's as big of a deal as you allow it to become, and I think the only way I know how to handle it is sort of bury my head in the sand on it. I know no matter who the teams are, it comes with the territory that half the audience is going to think you don't like their team and half the audience is going to think you don't like their team, and that's OK, right? These are the biggest games, where emotions are heightened. And it's what makes sports great, that people care that much. And, you know what, fine, if that's the tax you gotta pay to do this gig, I'm totally fine with it."
I've gone too long without congratulating you on winning a sports Emmy for your play-by-play work. Now I've got to ask, winning an Emmy or having that World Series moment, what's the bigger accomplishment?
JD: "Ooo, I don't know. I don't know if I win that Emmy if that moment doesn't happen. That's something in this business, specific to play-by-play announcing, there's a certain amount of luck in it in that the moment has to happen in front of you. I can't create that moment. I just have to be the lucky son of a gun that's sitting there when it happens to happen. Like we said earlier, what is going to go down as one of the great moments in sports history, I just happened to be the guy lucky enough to be sitting there."
Lastly, I know calling a World Series was a dream of yours. You've obviously accomplished that. Is there anything left now on the Joe Davis bucket list?
JD: "I'm doing everything I dreamt of doing and more. For me, it's just been some soul searching for how to keep pushing and growing within what I'm doing. For so much of my life, it's been these big dreams and striving to get there. Now that I've gotten to where I've always dreamt of going, how do I, within the confines of those jobs, bring people joy? How do I make each night something that people look forward to tuning into? Baseball's such a wonderful thing because it's every day, and it's something people can count on. I just spend a lot of time thinking about how I can, in my role, look at that as a responsibility to make people smile and bring them some joy, bring them a distraction if they need it, give them something to look forward to. Whatever little role I can play in their lives like that, I think that's a pretty special gift that my job has in it for me. That's something that, no matter how long I do this, I can keep leaning into and can give meaning to this job. So, no, there is nothing else I want to do. I just want to keep doing what I'm doing right now and be the best I can be at it."
Experience the excitement of the Los Angeles Dodgers' unforgettable 2024 postseason journey. From their intense showdown with the San Diego Padres in the NLDS, to their clash with the New York Mets in the NLCS, and culminating in their epic World Series battle against the New York Yankees, the Dodgers' run is etched in history as one of the most legendary in MLB playoff lore.
Rowan Kavner is an MLB writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the L.A. Dodgers, LA Clippers and Dallas Cowboys. An LSU grad, Rowan was born in California, grew up in Texas, then moved back to the West Coast in 2014. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner .
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