Funny story about Dodgertalk from back in the day.Originally Posted by Sanlmar
Ross Porter, who did Dodgers play-by-play from 1977 through 2004, also did the Dodgertalk call-in show in the '90s and early '00s.
He had a very simple style. He'd let the callers just rant like lunatics, and every so often would interject "Mmm hmm". After a few "Mmm hmms", Ross would say something like, "Well, you raised a lot of good points there, and you may very well be correct. Thank you for calling Dodgertalk."
The caller would hang up satisfied, believing that Porter just validated their unhinged fan thoughts. In reality, Porter just pretended to listen, and quietly moved on to the next person.
Around the same time, a buddy of mine told me he and his wife were considering separating. He said her biggest complaint about him was that he didn't listen to her. He told me that she would just rant on and on about mundane bullshit, and he couldn't even pretend to be interested, thus causing massive strain in the marriage.
I told him about Ross Porter, and advised him to do the same thing when his wife talked to him. He called me up a few weeks later and told me that it worked, and that she believed he was a changed man who was trying really hard to listen to her. "I have no idea what she's even saying to me half the time, but she thinks I do," he confided.
Whenever anyone is talking to me and I have to pretend to be interested, I always think of Ross Porter.
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