Denny Matthews
| Denny Matthews | |
|---|---|
| Born |
November 14, 1942 Jacksonville, Florida, USA |
| Occupation | Sportscaster |
| Website | www.kansascityroyals.com |
Dennis G. "Denny" Matthews (born November 14, 1942) is an American sportscaster, best known as a play-by-play announcer for Major League Baseball's Kansas City Royals since the team's inception in 1969.
Matthews grew up in Bloomington, Illinois, and attended Illinois Wesleyan University, where he played baseball and football, and belonged to the Sigma Chi Fraternity. He worked for local radio and television stations in Peoria and St. Louis before his hiring by the Royals.
Matthews has broadcast for the Royals since their inception in 1969, when he was the sidekick to Bud Blattner. Blattner retired in 1974, and Matthews has been the Royals' top broadcaster since then. From 1974 to 1998 – a stretch that includes the best seasons in the Royals' history – Matthews was paired with Fred White. In 1999, the two also teamed up to write a book called Play by Play: 25 Years of Royals on Radio, which recounts anecdotes from those seasons. Matthews also called baseball events for the national CBS Radio network in the 1980s.
In 1999, the Royals fired White and replaced him with the younger Ryan Lefebvre. Despite a tremendous age difference, Matthews and Lefebvre integrated their styles well and their dry wit and rapport became popular with Royals fans.
In 2008, Matthews cut back on his broadcast schedule, traveling to fewer road games, turning many of those chores over to Bob Davis and Steve Stewart (who succeeded Lefebvre in the Royals' radio booth while the latter shifted to television). However, Matthews broadcast the first road trip of that season from Detroit and Minnesota while Davis was broadcasting the Kansas Jayhawks' run to the national basketball championship. Matthews handled most of the home schedule and much of the September slate, when Davis turned his attention to broadcasting Jayhawks football games.
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