Swirsky is back where he belongs

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: COMMENTARY BY BOB VERDI : Swirsky is back where he belongs : Bulls' new radio voice happy to come home : Bob Verdi | Sunday Column : Chuck Swirsky never has a bad day, not even the day after the Bulls were annihilated in Portland 116-74. The game was not as close as the score indicated, but their radio voice was rife with passion and energy, even though the vanquished visitors appeared to lack either or both. : "To someone turning on our broadcast, even for two minutes, I owe that person the two best minutes possible, good news or not," Swirsky said. : "The Swirsk" is new to some listeners, yet familiar to those who remember his first trip through Chicago that spanned 15 years. It started with a four-hour talk show on WCFL and ended on WGN, when popular morning host Bob Collins fielded one more phone call extending best wishes. Gov. Jim Edgar was on the line, declaring a Chuck Swirsky Day in Illinois. : "I was stunned," he recalled. "It was tough leaving the world's best sports city, but it was a move I had to make." : By 12, Swirsky had his career planned. He would do play-by-play in the NBA. When he left here in 1994, it was for University of Michigan basketball, a high-profile assignment that also included being sports director of WJR, 50,000 watts in Detroit. Three years later, a pro went pro. Swirsky didn't know Canada, and Toronto didn't know him, but an American at the Raptors' microphone was an instant hit. : "I was blessed," Swirsky said. "My first season there, 1998-99, although a lockout year, Vince Carter was a rookie." : Toronto, a cosmopolitan city wild about hockey, got hooked on hoops because of Carter and through The Swirsk. You know you're big when you go from radio to TV even though you left your hair back in the States. You know you're big when you do three hours every afternoon on the top sports station, even on game nights. You know you're big when the Raptors stage a Chuck Swirsky Bobblehead Night. You know you're big when one sentence becomes a legacy. : "I got a letter up there from a fan who couldn't leave our telecasts even to make a sandwich," Swirsky said. "He asked me to announce when a game was won so he could go to the kitchen and make a salami and cheese. Next night, Raptors are up by a bunch in the last couple of minutes, so I said, 'Get out the salami and cheese.' Before I know it, they're making salami and cheese T-shirts and posters." : Swirsky thought he would be in Toronto forever. Then the Bulls called him last spring. He took a hefty cut in pay, but wife Judy and their three children couldn't resist. To complete the circle, Swirsky now broadcasts with analyst Bill Wennington—"a Canadian, I love him"—on WMVP, 1000 on your dial, where WCFL resided upon Swirsky's arrival in 1979. : "I met a lot of great people in Chicago," Swirsky said. "The icons at WGN, Jack Brickhouse and Vince Lloyd and Lou Boudreau. Tony La Russa, who started as White Sox manager the same year I started. Stan Mikita. Keith Magnuson. I was in Toronto when he died in an auto accident up there. I was crushed. : "And now I'm a rookie with the Bulls and here's Derrick Rose. Like Carter, another special talent." : Swirsky is not from the high and mighty media school. He's a fan with great pipes, solid values and no mean streak. His perpetual ebullience, coupled with the flashy style of another local favorite, Chet Coppock, begat the hilarious Chet Chitchat character developed by Bruce Wolf. That's fine by Swirsk. After all, there was a time when he served as Bulls public address announcer in virtual privacy. : "One night at the Stadium, there's nobody there," Swirsky recalled. "So David Greenwood comes over and tells me, 'Why don't you do yourself a favor and introduce the fans instead of the players?' " : : (Chicago Tribune)

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