Maybe all this talk of superior AI chatbots is getting to Apple’s voice assistant. Siri interrupted a radio broadcast Saturday during a double-header matchup between the Boston Red Sox and the Tampa Bay Rays.
The voice assistant had a pretty good reason. The announcer said Siri’s name. But he was talking about Rays outfielder Jose Siri coming up to bat.
And Siri’s response was apparently unintelligible. Typical swing and a miss.
Siri pipes up in the booth during Major League Baseball radio broadcast
It happened during the second game of the doubleheader on Saturday, won by the Rays after the Red Sox took the first game, Boston.com reported.
“So first and second, still only one out, for Jose Siri,” said Red Sox radio announcer Joe Castiglione.
Listeners were then treated to a muffled response from Castiglione’s iPhone followed by laughter in the booth. And it’s not like Castiglione said “Hey, Siri,” the trigger phrase that might be shortened to just “Siri” soon. When that happens, maybe we’ll hear Siri interrupting people more often, like piping up when someone is merely making a joke at the voice assistant’s expense.
Here’s how Boston.com described the exchange that followed Siri’s interruption in the booth :
“Wait a minute, did you hear that?” Will Flemming, who was Castiglione’s broadcast partner on Saturday, asked.
“I don’t know where that came from,” Castiglione initially said, confused about what happened.
“It was Siri! It was Siri,” Castiglione said with a laugh. “It came through on the iPhone. Siri’s at the plate. I’m not asking you, Siri. Not this Siri, that Siri.”
Reaction on Twitter
Joe Castiglione accidentally sets off iPhone Siri after announcing Jose Siri stepping to the plate pic.twitter.com/Ft0tmxIYNn
— WEEI Red Sox Network (@SoxBooth) June 4, 2023
Twitter reaction to the situation praised Castiglione. He’s been calling Red Sox games since 1983, by the way — long before smartphones existed, much less talked back to you during MLB broadcasts.
“This is great. Joe Castig is the best,” tweeted Boston Globe Red Sox reporter Pete Abraham.
And Flemming added this tweet: “An all-time moment. Who has a better laugh than Joe?”
Too bad we don’t know what Siri actually said. Perhaps we don’t want to know. But maybe future Siri could handle the call, if Apple catches up and goes ahead in the AI game.
