Like any good baseball radio announcer, Enrique Oliu has a passion for the sport and a gift for making listeners feel as if they're at the stadium.
The color analyst for Spanish broadcasts of Tampa Bay Devil Rays' home games never has seen anything he describes, though.
Oliu has been blind since birth.
"I don't think it's all that big of a deal. To me, the big deal is I'm doing this so somebody can come behind me or doing something to make them say, `I don't have a handicap.' That's all this is," Oliu said. "I'm just following my dream, like anyone else."
A self-described "stat freak" with an encyclopedic memory, Oliu, 42, grew up in Nicaragua listening to baseball and soccer on the radio. His interest in broadcasting blossomed after he moved to the US to attend the Florida School for the Blind and Deaf when he was 10. There were no schools for the blind in Nicaragua.
One of his teachers was an assistant football coach and fan of Kentucky basketball. Oliu listened to tapes of Wildcats games after school and scanned the radio dial at night in search of baseball and other sports.
"The passion for baseball grew from sitting with my dad in Nicaragua, where baseball is still king," Oliu said. "Dad played sports and always treated me like a sighted kid. If I wanted to ride a horse or wanted to do this or do that, I could always do that."
Oliu is in his fifth season of working Devil Rays games and made his debut describing pro football in 2002 after getting a call three days before the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' season opener.
The one-time public address announcer for college baseball games got his big break in 1989 when he did three innings of color for the minor league Jacksonville Expos. He also worked as an analyst for the St. Petersburg Pelicans before realizing his goal of calling major league games.
According to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, Oliu is the second blind announcer to call a game in the majors. Nine years ago, minor league announcer Don Wardlow was invited by the Florida Marlins to do three innings of a game against the Chicago Cubs.
Oliu prepares for Devil Rays assignments by having several sports sections read to him and by studying media guides, magazines and other publications with help from his wife, Debbie, a Devil Rays receptionist.
"If I'm going to do something, I'm really going to dissect it and break it down," said Oliu, who also has a regular job as an interpreter and client liaison worker with the Hillsborough County public defender's office in Tampa.
"The computer people at work kind of run away from me because if I grab them, I'll start asking them why you have to push certain buttons or why are the keystrokes configured this way. I don't just like to push a button. I like to know why."
Oliu's wife helps him during games, sitting behind him and describing what is happening on the field. Relying on his knowledge of baseball and familiarity with the players and the ballpark, Oliu interacts with play-by-play man Eulides Nunez.
"She has to spot, then you create," Oliu said. "You know where everybody is, and you take a chance. I try to stay ahead. Sometimes there's a little ground ball to second base, you jump on it, and then the fans will tell you the story."
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