Longtime Hawai'i sportscaster Jim Leahey was a senior at Saint Louis School when he began working with Harry Kalas, the legendary Philadelphia Phillies announcer who died yesterday before the Phillies game in Washington. He was 73.

"I got to work on his crew ... spotted for him," said Leahey, 66, now the voice of University of Hawai'i sports. "He was the first announcer for the (Hawaii) Islanders (in 1961) when they came here and also did high school games.

"He was a wonderful man. He had this thing about describing games and he had a great voice. I learned a lot from him and he said he learned a lot from my father (sportscaster Chuck) ... about doing your homework and getting the local names right.

"I remember when my father died, he wrote a long letter to my mom on how my dad helped him."

LOST 'OUR VOICE'

Kalas' baritone delivery and signature "Outta here!" home run calls provided the soundtrack to Philadelphia baseball for 39 years. He died after collapsing in the broadcast booth before the Phillies' game against the Washington Nationals. Philadelphia won, 9-8.

"We lost our voice today," Phillies president David Montgomery said. "He has loved our game and made just a tremendous contribution to our sport and certainly to our organization."

When the Phillies won their second World Series title last fall, Kalas was in the booth for the last out of the clincher. He then joined the on-field celebration, grabbing a microphone to sing Frank Sinatra's "High Hopes."

Kalas was the 2002 recipient of the Baseball Hall of Fame's Ford C. Frick Award for his contributions to the game.

Kalas also was a signature figure to a whole generation of football fans.

Joining NFL Films as a narrator in 1975, he did the voiceover for "Inside the NFL" from 1977 through 2008.

PEERS REMINISCE

Leahey said his odd jobs while working with Kalas was "to be ready with the coffee and the sodas. And when the game was on I would spot for him. I would stand and watch him."

Leahey said he observed how Kalas described a play and "how he felt the game. Feeling the game is the most important thing an announcer does."

Don Robbs, 72, radio voice of UH baseball, was the public address announcer for Islanders games in 1964, a year before Kalas would leave.

"Those were golden years for Islander baseball, when on game nights whenever you went you heard that voice. And that voice was as recognizable to us as it was to the fans in Philadelphia," Robbs said.

"He was a class act, the ultimate pro. I can't image the grief the people of Philadelphia are feeling because I know they loved him."

BIG BREAK HERE

Kalas whose dream was to be a baseball play-by-play announcer, was stationed at Schofield Barracks in 1961 when he got his break.

The Sacramento minor-league baseball franchise moved to Honolulu, becoming the Hawaii Islanders, and Kalas applied for the announcer's job.

"I submitted a tape that I had of an Iowa-Minnesota Big Ten game," Kalas told The Advertiser in a story written by the late Ferd Borsch in December 1999. "They (the Islanders) liked it and I was hired. But there was one problem. The season started in April and I was not due to get out until mid-summer."

But Kalas applied for and received an early release from the Army.

"I was hired by Patt Patterson at KGU. Hawai'i became a great opportunity for me," Kalas said in the article.

After four years as the voice of the Islanders, Kalas left to join the Houston Astros broadcast team from 1965-70 before joining the Phillies in 1971.

"He was the first real guy who had the calling so to speak," Leahey said. "He was a big-timer."

Kalas would be followed in Hawai'i by two others who would find their calling: Hank Greenwald and Al Michaels.

Kalas is survived by wife Eileen and three sons.