White Sox broadcast call of Clayton Kershaw’s historic K met the moment perfectly

Clayton Kershaw recorded strikeout No. 3,000 on Wednesday night, and he did it in fittingly grand style, freezing Chicago White Sox infielder Vinny Capra on a backdoor slider in what was likely his final batter of the night. It's a moment that was instantly etched in Los Angeles Dodgers history, the organization that drafted him as a lanky teenager way back in 2006 and watched him blossom into one of the greatest pitchers the sport has ever seen.

Watching him join one of the sport's most exclusive clubs, in front of a sold-out crowd at Chavez Ravine, was a special full-circle moment — one that deserved a special call to match. But ironically enough, it was the White Sox booth, and play-by-play man John Schriffen, who met the magnitude of the moment, and communicated it in a way that even the most die-hard Dodger fan would be proud of.

"Open up the velvet rope and let him in," Schriffen began. "Clayton Kershaw is now the 20th member of the 3,000-strikeout club — a list so exclusive we may never see a moment like this again." It was colorful, it was emotive and, above all, it was succinct, followed by an extended silence that allowed viewers at home to soak in the sights and sounds at Dodger Stadium.

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White Sox call captured the magnitude of Clayton Kershaw's 3,000th strikeout

This sort of situation can often be a sticky one for road broadcast crews. They're fans of the opposing team, and they're calling the game for an audience that by and large doesn't want to see whatever's about to happen. You'd be forgiven for not really knowing how best to play it.

Which is why Schriffen's call is so impressive. He understood that, while his audience might not be Dodgers fans, they're certainly baseball fans, and this was a moment that anyone who loves the game should be able to appreciate it. The 3,000-strikeout club is, indeed, one of the most exclusive in the history of the sport, and Kershaw is now one of just four lefties to have joined it. The fact that he did it at home, on his final at-bat of the night, just adds to what was already a flashbulb moment in MLB history, one that we'll be talking about for generations to come.

If you closed your eyes, you'd have been unable to tell what team he was employed by. In this sort of situation, that's about the best thing you can say for an announcer, and it's likely that, when we watch this highlight back in the future, Schriffen's voice is the one we'll hear.