Talk:Bob Kelley

1953 Milwaukee Braves announcer?

An update was made recently to Bob Kelley's page, adding him to the Milwaukee Braves broadcasters category. I questioned that information, since I probably listened to nearly all of Bob's radio appearances from the time of his arrival in L. A. with the Rams in 1946, well into the late '50's. That includes both baseball and football play-by-play, as well as his nightly shows on KMPC. At no time was he missing from his post at KMPC for any length of time, nor did he mention leaving to work for other teams.

His name does indeed appear in the List of Atlanta Braves broadcasters article as a play-by-play announcer for the Braves during 1953, their inaugural season in Milwaukee. However, I question whether this is correct. His page at Los Angeles Radio People lists him as announcer for the Los Angels of the Pacific Coast League "from 1948 to 1957."

So what is the truth? One of the following:

His appearance in the list of Braves broadcasters is completely erroneous.
There was some other Bob Kelley, or Bob Kelly, who broadcast their 1953 games.
"My" Bob Kelley made a very brief appearance as a Braves announcer, perhaps filling in for one of their regular play-by-play men.

I have no idea which of the above possibilities might be true, so I'll leave Bob's categories alone for now. Perhaps somebody who was a Braves fan in those days can help me solve this mystery. DutchmanInDisguise (talk) 00:38, 9 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A follow-up

Last month, I deleted the "Milwaukee Braves broadcasters" category from Bob Kelley's article. Ashbeckjonathan responded, correctly, that the category shouldn't have been deleted since he was indeed on the list of Atlanta Braves broadcasters (which included people who had broadcast Braves games in Boston and Milwaukee). However, I questioned whether the Bob Kelley I used to listen to in the Forties and Fifties in Los Angeles should have been on that list in the first place. I've followed up on that question and here's what I found:

During the 1953 Milwaukee Braves season, there was indeed a Bob Kelly (not Kelley) who was a Braves broadcaster. He wasn't around during the 1952 Boston Braves season or the 1954 Milwaukee Braves season. According to a tribute to another Braves announcer, Blaine Walsh, in a September 12, 1985, article in the Milwaukee Journal, Walsh's voice lives in memory, by Bob Wolf:

"Walsh Joined Gillespie on the Braves broadcasts under unusual circumstances.

"When the Braves moved to Milwaukee from Boston for the 1953 season, WEMP and WTMJ were awarded joint rights to the radio broadcasts. Gillespie was an automatic choice as WEMP's man, having broadcast the games of the minor-league Brewers in 1951 and 1952, and WTMJ named Bob Kelly to work with him.

"Unfortunately for Kelly, it was standard procedure in those days to give a telegraphic broadcast of another major-league game whenever the Braves didn't play. Kelly had never done this before, and when he got stuck with a high-scoring game that dragged on for what seemed like forever, he fell hopelessly behind. Shortly afterward, he was replaced by Walsh, who had come in from WJPG in Green Bay the previous year..."

The SABR biography of Roy McMillan mentions a Bob Kelly as a "Phillies broadcaster", and I thought this might be the same person as the 1953 Braves announcer, but a search of the Phillies season Wikipedia articles during McMillan's playing days turned up only a Gene Kelly. The List of Philadelphia Phillies broadcasters also includes a Gene Kelly from 1950 to 1959.

So my conclusions are:

There really was a Bob Kelly broadcasting Milwaukee Braves games during 1953, but we know next to nothing about who he was.
He shouldn't be confused with the Bob Kelley who was a sportscaster in Cleveland and Los Angeles for many years.
Nor should he be confused with the Gene Kelly who announced Philadelphia Phillies games in the Fifties.

I am therefore making the following edits today:

Changing the name of a "former announcer" in the list of Atlanta Braves broadcasters to Bob Kelly.
Deleting the "Milwaukee Braves broadcasters" category from Bob Kelley's article.

Your comments are welcome! DutchmanInDisguise (talk) 17:06, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

More Bob Kelleys

I later made the following additional changes:

In the list of Philadelphia Eagles players, changed the name of the 1955-1956 lineman from Bob Kelley to Bob Kelley (football player).
In the template mentioned below, changed the name of an 800m champion from Bob Kelley to Bob Kelley (athlete).

I'm surprised there aren't even more men with such a common name running around causing us confusion. DutchmanInDisguise (talk) 03:00, 18 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What links here?

Here's another mystery: When you click on What links here in the column to the left of Bob Kelley's article, a fairly lengthy list of articles appears. However, if you'll then click on the names of those articles, a lot of them contain no mention whatsoever of the guy who once announced Rams and Angels games. For instance, I visited the first four pages listed – James Lightbody, Mel Sheppard, John Woodruff and Mal Whitfield – without being able to find any mention of a Kelley. Is it some kind of coincidence that all four articles are about track athletes? Can somebody solve this mystery? DutchmanInDisguise (talk) 00:38, 9 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Mystery solved!

Here's what I learned when I investigated the many bogus names in Kelley's What links here list:

There was a Bob Kelley among the athletes listed in Template:Footer US NC 800m Men as "US National Championship winners in Men's 800m". He was apparently the 800m champ for 1944-1945. I know absolutely nothing about this athlete, except that he pretty definitely was not the man who was broadcasting Cleveland Rams games at that time.
There were many athletes named in this template. By virtue of appearing in the template, each one is said to be linked to all others named.
I changed the 1944-1945 champion's entry to "Bob Kelley (athlete)" and thought that would solve the problem and make all the bogus links disappear from the real Bob Kelley's What links here list.
It didn't. Then, when I edited Mal Whitfield's article, making what I hoped were some innocuous changes, after I saved the revised article, I returned to Kelley's article, clicked on What links here once again, and voilà, Mal's name didn't appear.
I concluded that the bogus names will only go away after each article which uses the 800m champions' template is edited. I believe this is a bug.
Then I remembered that I had been involved in a similar situation while working on Cornelis Melyn's article four years ago. It also involved a template, and I see that my comments then also included the impression that this kind of thing was a bug. Oh well.

DutchmanInDisguise (talk) 05:11, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Another follow-up and another mystery

When I returned to Bob's What links here this morning to tackle these problems with a clearer head, I discovered that all the bogus names had disappeared! Even though his article and the template hadn't been changed since I last edited them, something magical had happened. Perhaps there's some regular process which reorganizes data bases and automagically takes care of things like this which have been changed in the past 24 hours or so? It's all beyond me! DutchmanInDisguise (talk) 14:37, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bob Kelley

I don't know why that Bob Kelley's name was on List of Atlanta Braves broadcasters but he was the 1961 broadcaster for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim tough and called California Angels for the Pacific Coast League and the Los Angeles Rams of the National Football League since the franchise relocated from Cleveland. It confuses me with the Bob Kelly instead of KELLEY. That's silly. Ashbeckjonathan 21:30, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I have a found a reference, http://atlanta.braves.mlb.com/atl/history/broadcasters.jsp, than even has Bob Kelley's name on there. Ashbeckjonathan 02:47, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

But that's not this Bob Kelley. DutchmanInDisguise (talk) 04:03, 8 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

But it has his name on it. Ashbeckjonathan 18:13, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

Bob Kelley continued

Maybe if that reference had Bob Kelley's name, perhaps, it must be a different Bob Kelley or Kelly. WisconsinBoyClevelandRocks228844 (talk) 15:10, 27 July 2013 (UTC) '[reply]