what it always<\/a> felt like.<\/p>\nNot like a broadcaster talking at you.<\/p>\n
But like an old friend sitting on the couch talking to you.<\/p>\n
For nearly 40 years \u2014 first on the radio and then on television \u2014 Steele was there through every chapter of Orlando Magic basketball. He described the miracle moments and the miserable ones. He called playoff triumphs, lottery seasons, buzzer-beaters and blown leads with the same steady voice that fans welcomed into their living rooms night after night, year after year, decade after decade.<\/p>\n
National broadcasters become famous.<\/p>\n
Local broadcasters become family.<\/p>\n
Mike Breen has \u201cBang!\u201d Kevin Harlan has his unmistakable excitement. Mike Tirico can make any event sound important. They are among the finest play-by-play broadcasters in the business for good reason.<\/p>\n
But they parachute into your city a handful of times every few seasons.<\/p>\n
The local play-by-play announcer is there for every chapter. He\u2019s there on the random Tuesday night in Charlotte when the team loses by 18. He\u2019s there during tanking seasons when victories are scarce. He\u2019s there when lottery picks become All-Stars, when coaches come and go, when championships remain elusive but hope somehow returns every October.<\/p>\n
He doesn\u2019t just witness a franchise\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
He becomes part of it.<\/p>\n
No one embodied that better than David Steele.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I interviewed with Pat Williams back in 1988, I never dreamed it would play out this way,\u201d Steele said upon announcing his retirement. \u201cNow it is time for me to put the microphone down and spend time with my family. It\u2019s been an honor to represent the Orlando Magic, and I am forever grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s fitting that the Magic inducted Steele into their Hall of Fame seven years ago. He wasn\u2019t simply honored because he called more than 2,200 games.<\/p>\n
He earned that distinction because his voice became part of the franchise\u2019s identity.<\/p>\n
You simply can\u2019t separate Orlando Magic history from David Steele.<\/p>\n
He was there from the franchise\u2019s birth in 1989.<\/p>\n
He narrated the arrival of Shaquille O\u2019Neal.<\/p>\n
He narrated the departure of Shaquille O\u2019Neal.<\/p>\n
He chronicled Penny Hardaway\u2019s brilliance.<\/p>\n
He described Tracy McGrady\u2019s scoring explosions, Dwight Howard\u2019s dominance and today\u2019s young, ascending Magic team.<\/p>\n
He was there for the rebuilds and the rebuilds of the rebuilds.<\/p>\n
He was there through the exhilarating march to the 1995 and 2009 NBA Finals, the devastating playoff exits and the countless seasons when hope was all Magic fans really had.<\/p>\n
The remarkable thing wasn\u2019t simply that he stayed. It was how he did his job.<\/p>\n
Steele understood something many broadcasters never learn. He understood the game isn\u2019t about the broadcaster.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really think television is more of a color announcer\u2019s medium than it is the play-by-play announcer\u2019s,\u201d Steele once explained. \u201cThe fans really don\u2019t rely on the announcer to tell them what\u2019s going on because they can see what\u2019s happening\u2026 I set the tempo and I try to bring out the best in the color announcer.\u201d<\/p>\n
That philosophy defined every broadcast.<\/p>\n
He never forced excitement.\u00a0He never shouted simply because shouting had become fashionable.<\/p>\n
He respected the audience enough to know they could tell the difference between routine and remarkable.<\/p>\n
Which is precisely why his biggest calls still resonate decades later. Nothing illustrates that better than Game 1 of the 1995 Eastern Conference semifinals.<\/p>\n
Michael Jordan had returned from his NBA hiatus.<\/p>\n
The Bulls appeared ready to steal the opener.<\/p>\n
Then came six unforgettable seconds.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnderson tries to steal it from Jordan and Jordan dribbles around him,\u201d Steele told his radio listeners. \u201cThe clock is down to 12 and Anderson stole the ball. Hardaway picks it up, two-on-one, Penny bounce pass to Grant and he dunks it! Six-point-two seconds to go! Nick Anderson stole the ball! Nick Anderson stole the ball from Michael Jordan!\u201d<\/p>\n
Steele wasn\u2019t performing.<\/p>\n
He was reacting.<\/p>\n
The excitement was authentic because the moment demanded it.<\/p>\n
If David Steele raised his voice, you instinctively knew history was unfolding.<\/p>\n
Fellow Magic broadcaster Dante Marchitelli, who now succeeds Steele on television, perhaps explained his mentor\u2019s greatness better than anyone.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody, and I mean this, nobody in the league prepares as much and as well as David Steele,\u201d Marchitelli once said. \u201cIt\u2019s not about him. David Steele is about the game and the players, and if it\u2019s a big moment he lets it breathe. He has a knack and great timing and his preparation and the way it all comes together is what makes it, really, a perfect telecast.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe doesn\u2019t make it about himself, and I think people truly enjoy that.\u201d<\/p>\n
That may be Steele\u2019s greatest legacy.<\/p>\n
In an era when too many broadcasters chase viral moments, catchphrases and social-media clips, Steele quietly pursued something far more difficult.<\/p>\n
Credibility.<\/p>\n
Respect.<\/p>\n
Class.<\/p>\n
He was prepared.<\/p>\n
He was accurate.<\/p>\n
He was humble.<\/p>\n
And because he never tried to manufacture emotion, fans trusted him when genuine emotion\u00a0 arrived.<\/p>\n
Of course, Steele wasn\u2019t above having fun.<\/p>\n
One of the most beloved features of Magic broadcasts became his wonderfully quirky \u201cIs This Anything?\u201d segment, where he\u2019d present some wonderfully obscure statistical oddity before asking broadcast partner Jeff Turner whether it actually mattered. A cheerful \u201cding\u201d meant yes. A buzzer meant no.<\/p>\n
It became one of those inside jokes shared between two friends; between broadcaster and audience; the kind of thing that only develops after decades together.<\/p>\n
Orlando Magic Chairman Dan DeVos couldn\u2019t resist using it one last time.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can\u2019t have a memory of Orlando Magic basketball without David Steele\u2019s voice being a part of it,\u201d DeVos said. \u201cDavid handled everything with professionalism and class, and he will forever be entrenched in this franchise\u2019s history. \u2018Is This Anything?\u2019 We\u2019d say David was EVERYTHING to the Orlando Magic.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was the perfect tribute because it spoke Steele\u2019s language.<\/p>\n
As a kid in East Tennessee, Steele would hide a transistor radio beneath his pillow at night, listening to baseball broadcasts after he was supposed to be asleep. Those unseen announcers sparked a lifelong dream and unknowingly shaped the broadcaster he would become.<\/p>\n
For nearly four decades, somewhere in Central Florida, children were either falling asleep or on the couch with Dad as another familiar voice drifted through the house.<\/p>\n
David Steele\u2019s voice.<\/p>\n
One day they\u2019ll realize those weren\u2019t merely basketball games they were hearing and watching.<\/p>\n
They were memories being made.<\/p>\n
And long after someone else occupies the television chair, generations of Magic fans will still hear Steele\u2019s voice whenever they replay the most compelling moments in franchise history.<\/p>\n
Because some broadcasters simply call the games.<\/p>\n
The truly special ones like David Steele become part of the family.<\/p>\n
Email me at mbianchi@orlandosentinel.com. Hit me up on social media @BianchiWrites and listen to my radio show \u201cGame On\u201d every weekday from 3 to 6 p.m. on FM 96.9, AM 740 and 969TheGame.com\/listen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The news Tuesday that David Steele is retiring after 37 seasons as the voice of the Orlando Magic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":339776,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[139604,5805,139,141,1239,140,139630,41706],"class_list":["post-339775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-david-steele","tag-dwight-howard","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-magic","tag-orlando-news","tag-play-by-play-broadcaster","tag-shaquille-oneal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339775\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/339776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=339775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=339775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}