After opening the show by breaking down Mike Francesa’s 2019 alleged hot mic fart, Boston sports radio host Fred Toucher addressed his chronic raspy voice again, reminding listeners that he’s not dying.
The good news: Fred Toucher’s raspy voice is not life-threatening, meaning he can continue analyzing hot mic farts for years to come. The bad news: Fred Toucher’s raspy voice was used against him in contract negotiations, and if that goes south, he might need to find another outlet to break down hot mic farts.
Toucher lost his voice in early February, and the 98.5 The Sports Hub morning host has struggled to find answers on how to fix it. But after Barrett Sports Media and Awful Announcing wrote about his missing voice this week, Toucher went on-air Thursday morning believing some of the coverage may be overblown, while taking solace in the fact that he’s not dying.
“No one has been like ‘You’re screwed’. No one has been like ‘Oh my god, dude, you’re like this forever’,” Toucher told his Boston sports radio co-host Rich Shertenlieb. “However, I will say that if you’re ever negotiating a contract and have anything going on remotely sketchy, they will use that against you…Is it freaky for me? Yeah, a little bit. This is what I do for a living, and it’s a little freaky.”
It’s nice that Toucher is able to downplay the issue and joke about it on the radio, but for a person who makes a living out of speaking into a microphone, mysteriously losing their voice is kind of a big deal.
“Awful Announcing has an article. They’re very nice, they’re not being d*cks, but they’re essentially obituaries for my career. They make the point that, like, Mad Dog is on the air, so it’s not like you need some silky-smooth voice to be on the radio,” Toucher said, reiterating what was indeed a great point. “My only fear is that I will lose my voice like last week. But I don’t think that’s going to happen again.”
“I’m not nearly as worried about as some other people are,” Toucher added. “But it was used in our agent’s conversation with management. ‘What if he can never talk again.’ I’m like if ‘I have a raspy voice, you’re not going to re-sign me?’ OK. Good luck.”
It’s hard to imagine this was anything more than a desperate attempt by The Sports Hub’s parent company, Beasley, to gain some leverage in their negotiations with Toucher. Even they must know bringing up Toucher’s raspy voice, which has been an issue for six weeks while his ratings track record spans decades, is a sleazy effort at saving some money.
Toucher is one of the most successful local radio hosts in the country with the ratings to back it up. While there might be some uncertainty regarding when his voice will come back, there shouldn’t be any uncertainty about his future with The Sports Hub.
