R.I.P.: Former Detroit Tigers Radio Voice Paul Carey

Paul Carey

Former Detroit Tigers radio voice Paul Carey died Tuesday a month after turning 88 and after a duel with cancer had placed him in hospice care, the Tigers confirmed Tuesday night, according to The Detroit News.

His nearly 50-year career in broadcasting was a rich mix of multi-sport expertise and status a no-frills Mount Pleasant native never quite saw in himself.

Carey joined Ernie Harwell as a play-by-play announcer for the team in 1973 and spent nineteen seasons calling the games until his retirement after the 1991 season. For sixteen of those years calling Tiger baseball on radio, he also handled the engineering for the broadcasts. Paul's last Tigers broadcast was on the closing day of the 1991 baseball season in Baltimore. It was the last game played at Memorial Stadium, and a number of famous former Orioles returned for post-game ceremonies.

Carey also served as a play-by-play announcer for Detroit Pistons' basketball for six seasons (1969–1973, 1975–76 and 1981–82). He did pre- and post-game shows for the Detroit Lions' games in the late 1950s and early 1960s, from Tiger Stadium. In 2012, Carey was named the third recipient of the DSBA's Ernie Harwell Lifetime Contribution Award. The award is named after the Hall of Fame Detroit Tigers announcer. Harwell was the first winner of the award. John Fountain won the second award. The award honors an individual from the broadcast industry who has contributed outstanding time and effort to the betterment of sports broadcasting through a lifetime body of work.

Carey’s shift spanned the middle three innings, with Harwell book-ending the other six. It was a format that became a fixture for Tigers followers and allowed two men with distinctive styles and differences to wed themselves to listeners who appreciated, if not adored, each man’s unique ways.