By RaptorTalk

Hel-l-l-l-o-o-o-o! The Coach is back!

Despite fears of many fans that Jack Armstrong would not be providing color commentary on Raptor games next season – it looks like Jack will definitely be returning. Steve Simmons reported the news in his Toronto Sun column:

“Good news for basketball fans: Jack Armstrong is close to signing a contract with TSN that will keep him on the air for Raptors games and more.”

                  

With Sportsnet having completely dropped out of the Raptors broadcast picture and TSN picking up more games, it looks like we will now see Jack Armstrong on TSN. Hopefully, this is a sign that TSN will increase their overall hoops coverage and that the Coach will become better known across the country.

Next season, it is expected that Jack Armstrong and Leo Rautins will split the color duties, while Matt Devlin will call all 82 games for television. Jack gets all TSN and RapsTV games, while Leo takes all Score and CBC games.

Last year, the broadcast of Raptors television games were split as follows:

Score - 30 games
TSN - 21 games
RapsTV - 12 games
Sportsnet - 12 games
CBC - 7 games

We certainly hope that Jack Armstrong will still be on the FAN 590. However, his appearances may be limited because he will now be a TSN employee. The FAN gives preference to Rogers and Sportsnet employees and limits appearances from broadcasters from TSN and the SCORE. Last Friday, Swirsky had Dave Randorf from TSN as a guest and its likely that's how Jack will appear on the FAN.

However, there are a limited number of hoops experts in the Toronto media and the FAN can't simply use Eric Smith, Paul Jones and Matt Devlin – so we hope to still hear a lot of Jack on the radio, too!

Jack Armstrong joined the Raptors radio team ten years ago after coaching NCAA ball at Niagara University. A native of Brooklyn, Armstrong lives in Lewiston, NY - a picturesque town which is a just across the Niagara River from Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario.