August Burns Red's JB Brubaker Loves the Phillies

Posted on Aug 10th 2009 10:00AM by Amy Sciarretto Comments

When the reigning World Series Champions, the Philadelphia Phillies, were going through a bit of a slump this past June, August Burns Red guitarist J.B. Brubaker missed it. Not because he is a fair-weather fan who turned his back on the team, but because he was on tour in Europe.

"When I was driving home from the airport, the first thing I did was put the game on the radio so I could follow the Phils again," Brubaker told Noisecreep. Brubaker also missed the team's thrilling World Series run last October, because he was – once again – touring across the pond. "I was sitting in my bunk at 4 AM, riding to the next show, texting with my brother on my Blackberry messenger with my brother-in-law." he recalled.

Brubaker's love for the baseball team is legendary. "It is the most important thing to me," the guitarist said. "I'm way more enthusiastic about it than I should be. This may sound terrible, but I didn't cry when my grandmother died last year, but I cried when [Phillies play-by-play announcer] Harry Kalas died. It was hard for me to keep it together. When I found out, I was at band practice and I had to go run errands and didn't want anyone to see me crying." Now that's passion!

In the weeks leading up to Brubaker's birthday this past on May 13, his sister sent messages to the Phillies front office in hopes of getting Kalas to record a birthday message for him! One day, she got an email containing an MP3 with Kalas reading the pre-written message. It was three days before the announcer's untimely death. "I have it saved on three different hard drives so nothing can ever happen to it. It was the coolest thing I ever got," Brubaker said.

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