Marv Albert is an icon in the New York area, a nationally famous sports announcer who was able to survive a horrible sex scandal in the late Nineties and continue his career. Marv Albert is known for his many catchphrases, from his signature “Yesssssssss!” when a jump shot goes in during a basketball game to his “Serves up a facial!” call when one player dunks the ball on another. Marv Albert is currently the voice of the New Jersey Nets, the NFL on Westwood One Radio for Monday Night Football contests, and the National Basketball Association on the TNT Network. Albert worked at NBC Sports for over twenty years in different capacities, and was the voice of the New York Knicks and Rangers for decades. Marv Albert has been awarded many honors, including five national sports Emmys, three New York Emmys, and has been named New York State Sportscaster of the Year an incredible twenty one times!
Born in Brooklyn, New York in June of 1941 as Marvin Philip Aufrichtig, Albert went to the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University from 1960 through 1963. Marv then graduated from New York University in 1965. Albert was a one-time ballboy for the Knicks, and eventually got a job in their radio broadcasts. He did his first Knicks’ game in 1963 after the regular play-by-play man, Marty Glickman, got hung up in a snowstorm, which led to Albert doing Knicks’ contests for more than thirty seasons. His popularity led the Madison Square Garden network to also hire him for New York Rangers’ games, and he served double duty during the winter announcing both sports on radio and on television. Madison Square Garden gave Albert the heave-ho in 2004 when he rightfully criticized the moribund Knicks on the air, angering management.
Among Marv Albert’s other broadcasting jobs in the New York City area were stints on the radio doing New York Giants’ football games, a thirteen year run as the sports anchor for WNBC-TV out of New York, and his current job as the Nets’ primary announcer on the televised YES Network. Albert was also employed by NBC for more than two decades as the voice of the NBA on their nationally televised broadcasts doing play-by-play. Albert was the announcer during many NBA Finals, and he also did three Super Bowls on radio as well. Albert was so well versed in the major sports that he called NFL games for the network, worked on Major League Baseball pre-game and studio shows, and did some college basketball and boxing as well.
His world almost came crashing down around him in 1997 when he was accused of forcible sodomy. The lurid details, which included reports of his sexual encounters and habits, made Marv Albert the butt of many jokes, and he pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and battery charges and was given a twelve month suspended sentence. NBC fired him shortly after the trial, but hired him back as their play-by-play man for the NBA a couple years later. Albert remained with the network until they lost the rights to NBA telecasts in 2002. Albert has received the prestigious Curt Gowdy Award from the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame for his outstanding contributions to the sport through his announcing.
The vivid picture that Albert paints while behind the microphone, especially for radio listeners, is what sets him apart from all others in his field. He coined so many phrases now taken for granted, classics such as his “Yessssss!” call and “rainbow jumper”, “Kick save and a beauty”, “from downtown”, “rejected!”, and many others. Albert got his trademark “Yesssss!”, from longtime NBA referee Sid Borgia, who would yell’ “Yes. And it counts!” when a player hit a shot while being fouled. Albert used the phrase one night early in his career when Knicks’ guard Dick Barnett hit a bank-shot while being fouled, and it was so well received that he incorporated it into his broadcasts whenever it was appropriate.
Albert fondly remembers calling the 1994 Rangers’ title run and Stanley Cup Championship and announcing the 1992 Olympic Basketball “Dream Team” annihilation of all comers as the two most exciting moments of his broadcasting career. The two greatest athletes he ever saw, he will tell you, were Michael Jordan and Muhammad Ali, but the most emotional time in his career was when the Knicks took the NBA title with their legendary combination of Willis Reed, Walt Frazier, Dave DeBusschere, Bill Bradley, and Barnett. The title stood New York on its collective ear, with Albert’s voice becoming synonymous with the team. Marv Albert shows no signs of slowing down at the age of 64, still working NBA games on TNT with former Bulls’ sharpshooter Steve Kerr. He teams with Mark Jackson to do the Nets on YES, and he covers the Monday Night Football games on the radio for Westwood One with Boomer Esiason. Marv Albert is a one-of-a-kind talent who survived the self-inflected wounds that would have, and have, ended lesser careers, and he deserves to be thought of as perhaps the most versatile sports announcer this side of Curt Gowdy.
