Media Views: Despite his troubles, Dan McLaughlin has done a lot for St. Louis

One of the region’s most well-recognized citizens — the television voice of the Cardinals, no less — has lost his job because of yet another bad decision tied to his admitted alcoholism.

Dan McLaughlin, who has left Cardinals telecaster Bally Sports Midwest in what on Thursday was termed a mutual decision following his recent third arrest for drunken driving, has no excuses for the latest incident. Some people want to vilify him, which is understandable after the officer who arrested him last week in Creve Coeur said McLaughlin was a “danger to the community” because of his actions.

But there is another side to this man, a guy who has helped generate countless dollars for local charities, who made an impassioned plea to help land a Major League Soccer franchise for the city.

A few months ago, the 20th rendition of his charity golf tournament and auction raised $400,000, according to its website, to help children with disabilities “achieve success in school and beyond.” More than $20 million has been collected in the two decades the event has been held.

He also has helped pull in more than $2 million for the National Children’s Cancer Society and has been active in a program that has brought underprivileged or sick children and their families to a Cardinals game. He has been a big supporter of the Ascension Charity Classic, the St. Louis stop on the PGA Champions Tour that organizers said gave more than $1 million to worthy causes this year.

The list goes beyond these activities.

He was a vocal supporter of the successful effort to being an MLS team and stadium to St. Louis, appearing before a committee of St. Louis alderman urging for the plan for a tax break for the stadium to be approved.

“I’m here because I love this city. I love it,” he said at the meeting. “I want to make this clear: I have zero, no skin, in this game. I have no ownership, no employment opportunities, no financial interests in this team or this stadium. None.

“One of the constant themes I hear is that we as a city do not have enough progress,” he added. “So once I heard about this project and how it works, I thought to myself that I could either sit around and do nothing or as a concerned citizen get up, use my platform, my voice, and help and try and make a difference.”

He knew he could rile some people by becoming involved in a political situation but said it was worth the risk.

“I’m not a politician,” he told the Post-Dispatch then. “I call a 6-4-3 double play for a living. I do have a platform, though, and a voice and I wanted to use it for something that I’m passionate about. To me, this is way more than sports. Our city needs a win.”

The human side

The ramifications of McLaughlin’s latest bad decision are far reaching, a glum story with many angles.

Not only is his well-paying job gone, he is only 48 and should be in the prime of his career. He still has his “Scoops with Danny Mac” business, which includes a website that has sports commentary and podcasts as well as a TV show that has aired on KTVI (Channel 2) at 10:30 p.m. on Sundays. But the station did not carry it last week, and general manager Kurt Krueger said Thursday that the show is “on hiatus” there until a determination is made about its future.

McLaughlin has a family — his wife, Libby, and four children. Of course they are all impacted.

And there are the legal implications, which could lead to jail time.

“As I move forward, I please ask for your patience and your privacy,” he said in a statement issued Thursday when his departure from BSM’s Cardinals broadcast booth was announced. “Thank you. God Bless.”

The rise

McLaughlin was a homegrown success story.

And what a rise it was, from growing up in the Chippewa-Jamieson area of South St. Louis and attending Vianney High School to blossoming into the television voice of the Cardinals and arguably the most prominent sportscaster in the market.

When he was an 18-year-old college student at Lindenwood, he served as a disc jockey on the campus radio station and also would drive to small towns to broadcast high school games, sometimes sleeping in his car between assignments.

He parlayed his work ethic and a Lindenwood connection into an internship at KMOX (1120 AM) in its high-profile sports department. KMOX general manager Robert Hyland, who made the station one of the most successful in the history of radio, had a relationship with the school and McLaughlin certainly made the most of his opportunity.

After working behind the scenes for about a year, he finally was given an on-air assignment — recording sportscasts to air on Saturday mornings that recapped Friday night’s events.

Staffers usually would churn that report out quickly at the end of their Friday night shift. But McLaughlin, then 20, would stay until the wee hours, rewriting and rerecording it.

“I’d sometimes stay there till 5 a.m. trying to get it just right,” he once said. “This was my break, and I wasn’t going to blow it.”

In the late 1990s, he went to another station then returned to KMOX before getting his next big break, in 1998 being offered a position on the pregame show on the Cardinals’ regional cable television network — Fox Sports Net at the time.

That was the first step in his meteoric rise, which quickly rocketed. The following year he was elevated to doing play-by-play of FSN’s Cards road games, replacing the seasoned Bob Ramsey. McLaughlin was 24 and the wonder boy.

“He’s a guy with a big future in this business,” said Jack Donovan, who then was FSN’s general manager and remains in charge of the channel that has evolved into Bally Sports Midwest. “There was no dissatisfaction with Bob, it’s just that we had a young, rising star available. ... If we didn’t get him, somebody else would have.”

McLaughlin also has worked on Blues telecasts, many college basketball games and did some NFL contests. In fact, he was on several recent Blues telecasts in a studio role.

Knowing his place

McLaughlin knew he was fortunate and in the right place at the right time, getting his start when the migration of sports from over-the-air to cable TV was in its heyday — as is sports’ transitioning now from cable to streaming. The cable opportunities seemed boundless then.

“I know I worked hard, but a lot of guys work hard and could do this,” he told the Post-Dispatch in 2002. “I still am completely, utterly shocked I am doing all of this.”

His stature continued to grow, and for the last seven seasons he has been the sole Cardinals TV play-by-play announcer, doing all the locally produced home and road games — about 150 a year.

He has had many dramatic calls and this year might have been his best, what with Yadier Molina and Albert Pujols playing their final season and Paul Goldschmidt’s run to the National League MVP Award setting the stage for many storybook moments.

The season culminated for McLaughlin with him calling the Cards in the playoffs for the first time. Because there is no local TV in the postseason, he previously had been shut out. But local radio rolls on in the playoffs, and the decision was made to add him to that crew for a few regular-season games that were not on BSM plus all the Redbirds’ playoff contests. There were only two of them, but McLaughlin was ecstatic for that opportunity.

“I’m thrilled,” McLaughlin told the Post-Dispatch in October. “... I have had multiple opportunities to leave for national TV work, other organizations, do other sports, but I’ve turned those down. Why? Maybe, one day I’d get a chance to call a Cardinals playoff game. This is my dream come true to do playoff baseball.”

And he never hesitated to say how appreciative he has been for the job.

“It’s been an incredible ride for me personally,” he told the Post-Dispatch in October. “The game has changed, but not my love for the game and this organization. To say, ‘I get to call Cardinals games,’ that’s more important to me than all the national work that’s been offered. It goes beyond the biggest deal I have been offered. I get to call games in my hometown, and do it for the DeWitts. They have been amazing to me, and for the greatest fan base in sports. That’s more important to me than anything else I would have the chance to do.”

‘Living the dream’

Perhaps McLaughlin summed up how much talking on the air about the Cardinals has meant to him in 2020, when discussing a radio show that he was beginning to do on WXOS (101.1 FM), a program that ran for about a year.

“Talking Cardinals baseball is my dream come true,” he said. “I grew up in south St. Louis loving this organization. Ozzie Smith was my idol, and I love it more now than ever. That’s saying a lot for a kid that used to sleep in his baseball uniform all summer. Yes, I’m serious. ... I’m so proud to be from our city.

“... I’m living my dream. This is all I ever wanted to do. In this position, you realize what the Cardinals mean to the elderly, the sick, families, kids, and the pride in our town. It’s huge. So to talk about it means more than anybody would ever know. It’s special to me. I am trying to promote our city and the Cardinals. This is a great place. My connection to baseball is more than a job. It’s a connection to my late father, who’s been gone for quite some time. We bonded over St. Louis sports. We bonded over the Cardinals. That’s why I love the Cardinals.”