Gary Koch and Roger Maltbie are signing off for the last time from NBC on Sunday at the PNC Championship in Orlando, ending two distinguished careers as broadcasters.
“If I have to go out, I can’t think of anyone I’d rather go out with than Roger,” said Koch, a six-time winner on the PGA Tour who joined NBC in 1997.
Maltbie, who won five times on Tour and joined NBC in 1992, has agreed to do several tournaments for Golf Channel in 2023.
“I wake up one day and say, ‘Why would I do that?’ ’” Maltbie told pgatour.com. “And the next day I wake up and say, ‘I still really like doing this. It’s fun.’ So I’m going to do a few.”
Koch, 70, turned down a similar offer.
“After being in the majors for 26 years, I don’t have much desire to work in the minors,” Koch told Golf Digest, referring to being relegated to lesser events. “I can only think it has to do with money. I really don’t know what the justification is. I was told that they wanted to refresh the team and that they were looking at 10-15 years down the road, but then they hired two 60-something guys [Brad Faxon and Curt Byrum], so it’s kind of confusing.”
After Saturday’s opening round of the PNC, NBC paid tribute to Koch and Maltbie, which included a video of several of their best calls – including Koch’s famous ‘Better than most’ call of Tiger draining a bomb at the 17th at TPC Sawgrass in the Players – and top players sharing what the announcers meant to them. It meant a great deal to them, too.
“It’s been a long, wonderful ride,” said Maltbie, 71. “Neither one of us want it to end, but that decision was made, and so be it. It’ll be a sad afternoon when it’s all done.”
Here’s what the likes of Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, Lee Trevino and others had to say about Koch and Maltbie, who will be missed.
Thank you, Roger Maltbie and Gary Koch.
Names from around the game paid tribute to these Golf Channel icons who are broadcasting their last event at the @PNCchampionship this weekend. pic.twitter.com/fkbktjCeLq
— Golf Channel (@GolfChannel) December 17, 2022
