Larry Munson! Larry Munson! Larry Munson!

Posted Sep 20, 2009 by Bob D'Angelo

Updated Sep 20, 2009 at 06:37 PM

He was the radio voice of Georgia Bulldogs football for more than 40 years, an unabashed homer with a marvelous, gravelly voice that oozed red and black.

Larry Munson was never ashamed to urge the Dawgs to “hunker down,” as he did in a November 1982 game against Auburn; or, to plead with Lindsay Scott (“run, Lindsay!”) to complete that improbable 93-yard touchdown catch and run against Florida in November 1980.

Want to rile up an old University of Florida football fan? Shout: “Lindsay Scott! Lindsay Scott! Lindsay Scott!” That was Munson’s frenzied call at the end of the play.

Munson recounts his long career and his favorite calls in “From Herschel to a Hobnail Boot: The Life and Times of Larry Munson” (Triumph Books, $24.95). Assisted by longtime Atlanta sportswriter Tony Barnhart, this book recalls lots of Georgia glory. But it also reveals some facts the reader may not have known about Munson.

For example, while still attending high school, Munson played piano with Frank Sinatra and the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra for one week in Minneapolis. The regular pianist, Milt Raskin, was out with appendicitis.

Second surprise: Munson was a Minnesota native, and worked in Nashville calling minor-league baseball before coming to Athens. Heck, he sounded like a Georgia guy from Hog Mountain, or Ellijay, or even Metter. Or Athens, where he has lived since 1966.

Another overlooked fact: Munson helped broadcast Braves games with Milo Hamilton during the franchise’s first two seasons in Atlanta.

“The best thing I can say about Milo is that he was very difficult to work with,” writes Munson, who also claims that Hamilton got him fired.

“But I still had Georgia,” he writes. “I didn’t know it at the time, but 40 years later I would still have Georgia.”

Munson took over play-by-play for Georgia in 1966 and kept calling games until he retired two games into the 2008 season. This past May, he was inducted into the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Hall of Fame.

Munson’s memories are warm and vivid and his stories are great, but it is the 42-minute bonus CD of his 10 greatest calls that is a treasure. Barnhart sets up each call, and then Munson does the rest.

The book has a transcript of each call, so the reader can relive calls like this: “We just stepped on their face with a hobnail boot and broke their nose. We just crushed their face!”

It’s memorable reading, and sounds even better on CD.