This Week in Baseball - WGN Channel 9 (Complete Broadcast, 7/26/1980) 📺 ⚾

Here's the complete broadcast of an edition of the highlights series This Week in Baseball, aired over WGN Channel 9. The narrator was Mel Allen who was the "Voice of the Yankees" in New York from 1939 to 1964 (and, from 1951, seen over WGN's sister station, WPIX Channel 11.) Mr. Allen also did voiceovers for the sponsor billboards and Volkswagen Quiz.

[NOTE: A few of the library music cues used in the show had to be modified or removed to prevent blocking.]

Includes:

WGN "Last Farewell" ID (voiceover by Len Johnson)

Previews of week's games (with humorous highlights emphasized), followed by opening titles and sponsor billboard for Gillette Trac II

Commercials for:
Gillette Trac II razor (with George S. Irving as man behind the counter)
Miller Beer - "Miller Time" (on fishing boat ride) (voiceover by Gene Barry)
Stroh's Beer
Polyglycoat liquid cleaning compound

Games highlighted in Segment 2 include a Yankees-Royals game (with a camerawoman for WPIX shown for a few seconds; entire audio is silent and George Brett is seen moving his lips at the end); and a Pirates ceremony honoring Willie "Pops" Stargell - and highlights of a game against Dodgers that ended Pirates' 7-game winning streak, followed by Bucs' win in doubleheader nightcap

Volkswagen Quiz (Which rookie of the year in the late '40's is currently a manager?)

Commercials for:
Volkswagen Rabbit (filmed in Belgium)
Creative Mirrors (voiceover by Len Johnson; with "Pam the Creative Mirrors Girl" at the end)
Stroh Light beer
Promo for The Mike Douglas Show (starting August 11th; this was the version produced by Syndicast, after Group W unceremoniously fired him earlier in the year and replaced him with John Davidson)

In Segment 3, spotlight on American League rookie players including Detroit's Kirk Gibson (manager Sparky Anderson speaks) and Rick Peters, Cleveland's Joe Charboneau, Minnesota's Doug Corbett and Rick Sofield, Chicago's Harold Baines, Rich Dotson and Britt Byrnes, Kansas City's Rennie Martin, Toronto's Alfred Griffin and Damaso Garcia (with words from manager Bob Mattick), Boston's Dave Stapleton, and Yankees' Dennis Werth; plus a look at Steve Balboni of Class AA Southern League's National Sounds

Answer to Volkswagen Quiz

Commercials for:
Rolaids Relief Man Award (with Mel Allen)
Gillette Atra razor (with pivot)
Polo at Glendale Heights Polo Club

Segment 4, with looks of play screwups at games of Tigers-Angels, Pirates-Phillies, (?), the Phillie Phanatic doing his thing, Tigers-Mariners, Cubs-Dodgers, Giants-Cardinals, Mets-Braves, Yankees-Twins (audio completely muted until midway through Yanks game; "Guitar Pickin' Man" by Glenn Sutton and Lloyd Green from KPM library heard); and looks at Yankees' Willie Randolph, Texas' Pat Putnam, Atlanta's Bob Horner, Minnesota's Dave Edwards, San Diego's Bon Joshua, California's Don Baylor, Cleveland's Ron Hassey, Yankees' Ron Davis, and Minnesota's Pete McCannon; plus record-breaking from Cincinnati's Johnny Bench, Yankees' Graig Nettles, Boston's Carl Yastrzemski, and Yankees' Reggie Jackson (winner of Gillette Special for week); Steve Busby speak of "Reg"

After Allen's close, audio is muted as ending credits come:

Narrated by: Mel Allen
Technical Supervisor: Joseph L. Reichler
Written by: Mark Durand
Script Editor: Warner Fusselle
Film Editors: Mario Bucich, Tony Tocci, Mike Kostel, Ken McIlwaine
Sound Mixer: Vincent Gizzi
Videotape Editor: Ron Wandler
Production Assistants: John Bacchia, Carl Vandevender, Chris Martens
Production Coordinator: Bill Brown
Associate Producers: Elise Backus, Jack O'Hara
Produced By: Tim Parker
Supervising Producers: Jody Shapiro, Geoff Belinfante
Executive Producer: Larry Parker
Post-Production by Teletronics

Commercials for:
The Shower Saver
Olympia Beer (incomplete; recording ends ten seconds in)

This aired on local Chicago TV on Saturday, July 26th 1980 during the 12:30pm to 1:00pm timeframe.

About The Museum of Classic Chicago Television:

The MCCTv (FuzzyMemoriesTV) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit whose primary mission is the preservation and display of off-air, early home videotape recordings (70s to early 80s, mostly) recorded off of TV (in Chicago or other cities now too); things which would likely be lost if not sought out and preserved digitally. If you have any old 1970s videotapes recorded off of TV please email: [email protected] Even though (mostly) short clips are displayed here, we preserve the entire broadcasts in our archives - the complete programs with breaks (or however much is present on the tape), for historical preservation. For information on how to help in our mission, to donate or lend tapes to be converted to digital, please e-mail [email protected] Thank you for your help!