Doris Burke will make NBA broadcasting history this year, but can we get her on the TV call next year?
Doris Burke is a trailblazer in many respects. As the most prominent female NBA broadcaster on television, she has overcome years of prejudiced viewers with outdated mindsets — namely, men threatened by women who are knowledgeable about sports. And make no mistake about it: Burke has forgotten more about basketball than most of these sexist listeners will ever know.
So none of what follows is meant to underscore the prominence of the news the Associated Press reported Wednesday morning, as Burke is set to become the first woman to serve as a game analyst on a network TV or radio broadcast for the conference finals and NBA Finals.
The catch, unfortunately, is that her call with ESPN will solely pertain to the “radio broadcast” portion of that sentence, not the “network TV” part. While Burke making history by calling conference finals and Finals games on ESPN Radio is great … who, here in 2020, the year of our Lord, honestly listens to the radio call for the Finals rather than just watching the TV broadcast?
Doris Burke is making history, but stopping here would be criminal
Again, this is not meant to downplay such a milestone for female broadcasters everywhere, and if anyone deserved to earn this kind of recognition, it’s Doris Burke. But it’s also embarrassing it’s taken us this long to get to this point for a radio call, let alone a TV broadcast, and that should be the next step for one of the best color commentators in the game today.
Burke has been a part of ESPN’s NBA coverage since 2003. She’s served as a full-time game analyst since 2017 and joined the network’s crew for Finals broadcasts as a sideline reporter back in 2009. She’s more than paid her dues, becoming the gold standard for basketball commentary regardless of gender.
For everyone who’s not still trapped in the “wOmEN dOn’T KnOw sPOrTs” mindset that belongs in the ’50s, Burke brings all the traits you’d want from a broadcaster to an exciting sport like basketball. She’s enthusiastic, her love for the league and its players shines through her commentary, and she picks up on the finer details of the game to the point that viewers tuning in will learn something new every time, whether they’re casual fans or NBA diehards.
As ESPN continues to shove its curmudgeonly, constantly negative “Dream Team” of Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy down viewers’ throats, it’s worth questioning why it’s taken us this long for Burke to reach this milestone … and how much longer we’ll have to wait for her to reach the next one by becoming the first woman to call an NBA Finals game on TV.
Hopefully it’ll only be one more year.