Mike Lange had homework to do Monday night.
For a few nights, in fact.
Having been on hiatus as a precaution because of the pandemic, Lange listened to his temporary replacement, Josh Getzoff, aptly handle the duties as the play-by-play radio broadcaster for the Penguins’ first 49 games of the season.
But with Getzoff’s wife, Maddie, giving birth to a son, Gunnar, on Monday, Lange’s respite has come to an end for Game 50, a home contest against the Boston Bruins on Tuesday.
Lange will step back into the booth on PPG Paints Arena’s media level, which bears his name.
His return was planned, even if Gunnar Getzoff’s arrival date was uncertain.
As a result, Lange has been doing his detailed prep work for games — much of which takes place the night prior — for a few days without knowing for which game he would be returning.
“I’ve been doing it for every game depending on when the baby came,” Lange chuckled. “So this has been a lot of work!”
For now, Lange’s return is a one-night affair. But the possibility of resuming something of a normal schedule is a possibility. Tuesday’s game is a test run of sorts for Lange.
In addition to simply avoiding the hazards associated with covid-19, Lange, 73, recently underwent an unspecified surgical procedure that has affected his walking.
“I had a surgery in January that would have normally been pretty routine, but I did develop some complications,” Lange said by telephone. “I had to go back in, and that kind of put me behind the eight ball. Had a little bit of a recovery time. Still doing that, it affected the legs. That’s kind of where I am. I’m still building back up strength, and I’m going to give it a shot tonight and see how we’re doing and see if we can make it work for everybody.”
Work is a term easily applied to Lange.
His preparation for games is a meticulous task that typically involves him rewriting many of the game notes — stacks of paper filled with statistics — supplied by NHL teams onto a yellow legal pad with a Pilot Precise V5 pen.
The best notes are then parsed down to a single sheet of paper and taped on the glass barrier to Lange’s left in the broadcast booth for quick referral.
It’s a routine Lange largely has repeated for each game he has done for the past 40-plus seasons.
So that mention of how many power-play goals Sidney Crosby has scored in April or an anecdote about Tristan Jarry’s peewee team? Those don’t pop up in Lange’s broadcast by coincidence.
“When I go through all the notes and I pick spots that I want … when you go back a second time, it reminds you a little more of what you saw,” Lange said. “I’ve had nights when I’ve never gone to the note page, and I’ve had nights when I’ve had to go there 10, 12 times. You never know but you want to be kind of ready. And if you’ve got something that’s a little different and a situation comes up, it sounds pretty good when you can relay the note that you have.”
The past four months have not been easy for Lange. But the decision to temporarily step away from calling hockey was.
“It’s something we all miss,” Lange said. “It’s what we all do for a living. I’d be stupid to say that I don’t miss it. But I also know I didn’t want to get covid-19. I guarantee not at my age and the situation. So you’ve got to make a choice, and my choice is to try and be as healthy as I can. I’m going to give it a go tonight and see how we feel and hopefully do some more games.”
The possibility of Lange doing more games this season is very open-ended. So is his future beyond this season.
“I’ve been on a one-year deal really for the last 10 years, if not more,” Lange said. “It will be the same thing. I’ll go through it all, and if I decided that it’s not viable to keep going on (any) basis, I would make that decision and say, ‘OK, that’s it. I had a great many years here.’ But I have to do that at end of the (season). That’s my time to reflect on everything. I’ll do that again at the end of this (season).
“I’ll be interested to see how I feel after this game, and hopefully, it’s going to be all right. But it’s demanding. It takes a lot. And my legs have been affected. So it makes it a little tougher. But I’ll get through it. I just have to get to the rehab place and get into that and get my legs going again. But this is the early stages of it and see where it goes from here. But I’ll make that decision at the end of the (season) when it’s all done.”
Seth Rorabaugh is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Seth by email at srorabaugh@triblive.com or via Twitter .
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April 28, 2021 at 03:42AM
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Mike Lange to make temporary return to Penguins broadcast - TribLIVE
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