Pat Hughes (baseball)

Virgil Patrick "Pat" Hughes (born May 27, 1955 in Tucson, Arizona) has been the play-by-play voice of the Chicago Cubs, working for WGN radio, since 1996. In all of Hughes' time as a Cubs broadcaster, he has partnered with color commentator Ron Santo, former All-Star third baseman for the Cubs. Together, their broadcasts are known as the Pat and Ron Show to Cubs fans. Prior to joining the Cubs broadcast booth, Hughes spent 12 years calling games for the Milwaukee Brewers, with the legendary broadcaster Bob Uecker. Hughes has also spent the last 17 years as the television play-by-play man for Marquette University basketball.

He is best known for his call of Mark McGwire's 62nd home run in 1998, which broke the single-season home run record, which is the most often-played call of that moment:

On most other instances, his home run call is "That ball's got a chaaaance...GONE!" On longer home runs, Hughes' call often includes the phrase "Get out the tape measure". Another Hughes catchphrase as the first pitch of the game is thrown is "And away we go..."

The Chicago Tribune reported on November 15, 2006 that Hughes has agreed to a multi-year contract extension with the Cubs.

Hughes' broadcasting career includes stints as a broadcaster for the Minnesota Twins baseball team, the Minnesota North Stars hockey team, and minor league baseball teams the Columbus Clippers and San Jose Missions. He has also broadcast college games for Northwestern University, San Jose State University, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, as well as announcing games for ESPN.

Hughes' work has earned him the Illinois Sportscaster of the Year award in 1996, 1999, 2006 and 2007, in addition to three Wisconsin Sportscaster of the Year awards from 1990-92.

Hughes graduated from San Jose State University.

Hughes appeared in an uncredited voiceover role as the Basketball Announcer in the 1997 remake of the Disney film Flubber.

Hughes has recently produced/written and narrated a series on great baseball announcers entitled Baseball Voices. His releases have been short books about former colleagues Bob Uecker, and Harry Caray, as well as Marty Brennaman, Jack Buck, and Harry Kalas. [ [1] ] .

In July 2008, Hughes' voice was featured in a State Farm commercial, calling the end of a walkoff win for the Cubs, in which a ball was hit onto Waveland Avenue and caught by a teenager who then gives the game winning ball to a young Cub fan.

References

* [http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/press_releases/press_release.jsp?ymd=20070129&content_id=1789130&vkey=pr_chc&fext=.jsp&c_id=chc WGN's Pat Hughes named 2006 Illinois Sportscaster of the Year]
* [http://www.wgnradio.com/sports/pataward.htm Pat Hughes Wins "Sportscaster of the Year" Award For Fifth Time]
* [http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/team/broadcasters.jsp?c_id=chc#pat_hughes Bio at Chicago Cubs web site]
* [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1219852/ Pat Hughes entry at the Internet Movie Database]
* [http://www.baseballvoices.com]