Say what you’d like about Tim McCarver (and people have basically said everything), but last May when the Hall of Famer announced that 2013 would be his last season in the Fox broadcast booth, it was clear that whoever replaced him would have some big shoes to fill. Turns out, Fox plans to replace him with two pairs of shoes.

Former Major League All-Star Harold Reynolds and veteran baseball writer and analyst Tom Verducci will join Joe Buck as the new lead broadcast team for Fox, the network announced Monday. The trio debuts on Fox Sports 1 April 5 when the Dodgers host the Giants at Dodgers Stadium.

Fox Sports Executive VP John Entz also announced Kevin Burkhardt will be Fox Sports 1’s pregame studio host alongside a rotating case of analysts including Hall of Famer Frank Thomas, former Dodger Eric Karros, Red Sox World Series champion Gabe Kapler and former Reds pitcher C.J. Nitkowski. The analysts will also contribute to FS1’s new highlight show, MLB Whiparound, along with host Chris Myers.

MLB Whiparound debuts on Opening Day and will air every weeknight at 10 p.m. with the exception of Wednesday nights, when it will air at midnight. Entz was quiet on many of the show’s details but did give a clue to its pacing, saying, “We want to make you feel like you’re watching all the games at once. We want to bring a pace that’s not normally associated with Major League Baseball.”

Fox Sports 1 will broadcast about 40 games this season, including Fox’s first 15 MLB telecasts. In fact, the main Fox network doesn’t carry any baseball until late May and will only air about a dozen games on the main network all year.

Buck, who worked with McCarver for 18 years, and called 16 World Series with him, says he knew within the first few moments of a practice broadcast with Reynolds and Verducci that the threesome had chemistry.

“Literally within five minutes I knew this was going to be the combination, if my opinion had anything to do with it,” Buck said on a conference call with reporters. “Three-man booths aren’t easy, but it works when two [analysts] come at it from different perspectives.”

Reynolds and Verducci certainly took different paths to the Fox booth. Reynolds was a three-time Golden Glove winning infielder with Seattle in the late 80s and early 90s, before retiring in 1994 and becoming a long-running studio analyst on ESPN’s Baseball Tonight in 1996. In 2009, he joined MLB Network, appearing on a host of studio shows and special events such as the All-Star Game, playoffs and World Series.

A year before Reynolds retired, Verducci joined Sports Illustrated after a decade at Newsday. Since 2008, he has been a playoffs reporter for TBS and has also been a mainstay on MLB Network and Fox. Both Reynolds and Verducci plan to continue their work at MLB Network. Verducci said he will also continue writing for SI.

“I’ve worked with a lot of ex-players,” said Buck. “Some of the greatest ever to do it, and for Tom to come at this from being a non-player, to even be considered for this job speaks to how good he is.” A reporter on the call pointed out that, aside from Howard Cosell, Verducci will be the only non-player in the modern era to do color for a World Series broadcast.

“This is not something that I set out to do or expected,” said Verducci. “I didn’t really stop to think about the historical aspect. Just thinking about doing a good job with what’s in front of me right now. I’m just pumped about the opportunity.”

Buck said the ease he feels with his soon-to-be partners compares to how he felt when starting off with McCarver in the mid-90s. The difference is where he’s at in his own career.

“I was scared to death,” Buck says of his first national broadcast with McCarver. “I was 26 when we were put together…Our first game was at Shea Stadium and it was intimidating and to know that he was next to me as this kind of catch-all and security blanket was the greatest feeling a young person in this business on a big stage could have.”

Now, as the omnipresent voice of America’s biggest sporting events, the veteran Buck knows that his new colleagues have to be ready for the criticism that will undoubtedly be leveled their way.

“I don’t think there’s a more criticized or picked apart role in major televised sports than doing the World Series on network television,” Buck says. “I think these guys can handle it.”

“We’re taking it one year a time, but we’re really excited about this,” said Entz, when asked about Fox’s commitment to the new booth. “We hope people will give this a chance before they make a judgement.”

Above image of Harold Reynolds and Tom Verducci courtesy of Fox Sports.

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