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Bill Brown (sportscaster)

broadcaster, born 1947

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMay 17, 2026
Entity authorityQ4908289 ↗
Source-derived summary

Bill Brown (born September 20, 1947) is an American former sportscaster. After spending several years calling play-by-play on Cincinnati Reds broadcasts, Brown worked for the Houston Astros from 1987 to 2016.

Biography

Brown did play-by-play for the Cincinnati Stingers Television Network for the 1975-76 season and the Cincinnati Reds Television Network from 1976 to 1982. He worked four years with Ken Coleman and another four years with Ray Lane. Brown also called Xavier Musketeers and Cincinnati Bearcats basketball and Cincinnati Swords hockey early in his career, and was a senior producer and anchor of the Financial News Network's SCORE programing and sports director of the Sports Time Cable Network. He was sports director of Home Sports Entertainment in Pittsburgh.

Brown became an announcer with the Houston Astros in 1987. With the Astros, Brown was often called "Brownie" by his play-by-play partner Alan Ashby. He often played the straight man to former partner Jim Deshaies' humorous asides. Brown retired on September 28, 2016, after the final Astros home game of the 2016 season and was succeeded by Todd Kalas, He cited his reason to retire due to feeling that his performance on the air was slipping.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Bill Brown (sportscaster)” as broadcaster, born 1947. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1947, 1987, 2016, 1975—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1947-09-20. The account is most persuasive where Bill, Brown and sportscaster can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as broadcaster, born 1947. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4908289. VIAF identifies the subject as 295689948. The Library of Congress control number is n2013001080. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1947, 1987, 2016 and 1975.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Bill Brown (sportscaster)”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Bill Brown (sportscaster) primary sources, Bill Brown (sportscaster) archive and Bill research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Bill Brown (sportscaster)”?
  2. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Bill Brown (sportscaster)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.