In 2016, Joe Davis gained a lot of prominence when the Dodgers appointed him as their road game play-by-play announcer and apparent successor to Vin Scully. Since then, Davis has forged his own career, taking care never to make personal comparisons to Scully, the greatest baseball play-by-play man in history.
Scully’s 67 years with the Dodgers began in Brooklyn in 1950 and ended in Los Angeles with the 2016 season. No broadcaster has spent that long with a single sports team — a record certified by the Guinness Book of World Records.
Like Scully in his early years with the Dodgers, Davis has begun to accept his share of national broadcast assignments over the years as well. Most prominently, Davis is Fox Sports’ lead baseball play-by-play commentator opposite analyst John Smoltz for the All-Star Game and World Series, having succeeded Joe Buck in 2022.
Davis’ other duties include calling NFL games for Fox Sports, as well as college basketball and football. The national assignments currently limit his schedule to 90 regular-season Dodger broadcasts a year.
Against this backdrop, would Davis’ national duties ever lead him to give up the Dodgers’ lead play-by-play chair altogether?
Not a chance, Davis said in a new interview with Awful Announcing.
“I don’t see it going anywhere assuming that they’ll continue to have me,” Davis told Brandon Contes. “This is my ninth year. It’s flown by. We love Los Angeles. My wife loves it here. There have been situations where potential opportunities to go back to the Midwest, where we’re both from, and every time that comes up she’s made it – ‘no, we’re not leaving here, the weather’s too nice out.’ It’s too great. This is kind of home now. We have three kids who are in the school year.”
Davis’ roots lie in the midwest. He was born in Michigan. He attended college in Wisconsin. He grew up a Cubs fan. Notably, the Detroit Tigers’ play-by-play seat recently came open. In Nov. 2023, the job ultimately went to former Chicago White Sox play-by-play man Jason Benetti.
The Tigers never presented Davis with a formal offer, he told Awful Announcing.
Although it might not be ideal for Dodger fans who wish to hear Davis’ voice on more than 90 SportsNet LA broadcasts each year, the current arrangement works well for the 36-year-old announcer.
“The Dodgers, Fox, and my bosses there have been great to me,” Davis told Contes. “They all know each other. So I’ve been so lucky that they’ve worked nicely and allowed me to coordinate the schedule. As the Fox role increased a little bit I was able to pull back on the number of Dodger games. If I couldn’t do that then maybe it’s be a different story.”
