Cubs' Marquee broadcast gets plenty right but one annoyance still lingers

A rollercoaster year of Chicago Cubs baseball has given Marquee Sports Network a lot of material to work with in 2026. Whether it's the regular duo of Boog Sciambi and Jim Deshaies on the call or Alex Cohen stepping in as a backup, the broadcast booth has routinely risen to some big moments, from the league-leading 13 walk-off wins to spectacular defensive plays by Pete Crow-Armstrong, Dansby Swanson, Nico Hoerner, and more. It's a testament to how far both the team and the announcers have come since Marquee launched, and the quality is reflected in how publications and fans view the television product.

Earlier this year, the Chicago Sun-Times crowned Sciambi atop its power rankings of Chicago sports personalities for what was deemed his best year of work in the booth in 2025. His quality as a broadcaster was well-known when he was hired to take over for Len Kasper in 2021, but he's increasingly grown in esteem locally thanks to his improving chemistry with JD and Taylor McGregor over the years. The occasional odd call where he feels more like a national broadcaster aside, he's mostly been a good fit as the voice of the Northsiders that fans generally gel with.

However, five years into his tenure, there's one criticism that has stuck with most viewers despite it being out of Marquee's control — the ever-changing booth. The network has admittedly improved by leaps and bounds in this regard. Originally, a rotating third voice on the call made the broadcast feel too crowded, and they've since found a permanent back-up in Cohen instead of tapping one of a wide range of voices whenever Sciambi was working with ESPN. Yet, it's still a tad disappointing how often one or both of the main Marquee duo are out of the picture.

That sentiment came up prominently in Awful Announcing's latest round of MLB broadcast rankings. The Cubs remained as the 5th-best television experience with a B grade, but the frequent absences of Boog and JD kept them from potentially soaring even higher. Respondents praised the duo as an "elite pairing," but one note was particularly harsh towards the rest of the announcers that filter through the booth. "There is a high percentage of broadcasts without one or both of them, and things fall off a cliff."

For certain, the constant rotations keep some of the replacements from building up the same rapport with audiences the way the regular voices of the Cubs do. Cohen's the main exception this as Sciambi's backup, hence why he's the only broadcaster outside of the main duo to be singled out for praise. “Jim Deshaies deserves more recognition,” another grader told Awful Announcing. “Informed, entertaining, humorous, experienced. Boog is great, and Cohen deserves his own booth.”

The Cubs aren't likely to shake up the broadcast booth anytime soon

It's hard to imagine the Cubs finding a way around this problem. Sciambi and Deshaies signed multiyear extensions with the team back in 2022 and, as noted, rate out well among viewers. They're a strong enough pair that Marquee would likely have no issues continuing this rotating format to accommodate them both as long as they want to stay with the team. They've already called some classics, like Mike Tauchman's home run robbery of the Cardinals and the recent walk-offs against the White Sox, and are part of the Northsiders' modern identity for fans.

There is a case to be made for Cohen taking over the booth one day, though. As the former announcer of the Iowa Cubs, he has a homegrown connection to the fans and has a feel closer to that of the team's most beloved local broadcasters like Kasper or Pat Hughes. He's also proven he can deliver in the big moments, notably earning praise for his work in the Cubs' series win over Milwaukee back in June and the following series against the Padres. That would solve the problem of juggling play-by-play voices, at least, while still keeping a name installed that people know and enjoy.

Having both Sciambi and Cohen is a good problem for now, though. There will always be some complaints, but Cubs fans generally have it quite good with their viewing experience.

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