Kirby Lee/Image of Sport/US PresswireVin Scully and Ross Porter
It’s 2-for-1 day again: Happy birthday to a pair of my all-time favorites.
Tag: Vin Scully (Page 16 of 17)
Kirby Lee/Image of Sport/US PresswireVin Scully and Ross Porter
The Arizona Fall League throws out its first pitch of 2010 today, and Dodger fans might pay it a little more mind than usual. Not only is this Don Mattingly’s first official gig at the helm of a baseball team, the Phoenix Desert Dogs, but there are a couple of key players to watch:
1) The Dodgers’ minor-league hitter of the year, Jerry Sands, will be tested out at third base.
2) The Dodgers’ minor-league mystery of the year, Scott Elbert, will be tested out on the mound.
Other organization members on the Desert Dogs of Phoenix (or is it the Dogs of Phoenix Desert) are Javy Guerra, Jon Link, Justin Miller the Younger, Matt Wallach, Ivan DeJesus, Jr. and Trayvon Robinson. A few of these guys will be competing for major-league jobs in 2011.
Phoenix has its first game against Mesa at 12:35 p.m.
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- Logan White will interview for the Mets’ vacant general manager slot, according to Tony Jackson of ESPNLosAngeles.com. Jackson adds the following about surprising rumors in recent days that the Dodgers were pushing White out the door.
… As recently as 10 days ago, rumors surfaced that White, whose current contract is set to expire at the end of this month, was on the verge of being fired by the Dodgers. White told ESPNLosAngeles.com on Oct. 1 that he was aware of those rumors but hadn’t been told anything official and that he planned to continue working as usual until he was told not to.
“I’m still working,” White said at the time. “I haven’t been told anything [different]. There is a lot of innuendo and rumor out there, and I hate to even address some of those because they are so ridiculous.”
Those rumors appear to have been the result of confusing White with another Southern California amateur-scouting chief. The Los Angeles Angels had fired their scouting director, Eddie Bane, along with three of his scouts, on Sept. 29. Multiple sources said Monday the Dodgers have every intention of re-signing White and keeping him around in his present role if he isn’t hired as a GM by another club. …
- Vin Scully Is My Homeboy passes along these interviews by reporter Maria Serrao with Scully himself.
- Friend of the Dodger Thoughts family Daniel Paul has passed along this link to some Dodger caps his son Harry designed. Click the link and rate the cap.
Former Dodger owner Peter O’Malley, who has publicly been almost completely silent on the current ownership issues with the team, told Bill Shaikin of the Times that he believes the team should have new ownership.
He said he is not interested in returning to ownership but would be willing to smooth the transition for potential new owners on what he called a “short-term” basis.
“For many years, the Dodgers have been one of the most prestigious institutions in our city and throughout professional sports,” O’Malley said. “Sadly, that is not the case today.”
McCourt responded through a statement from his spokesman, Steve Sugerman.
“Frank has made it abundantly clear he is the long-term owner of the Dodgers,” Sugerman said, “and he looks forward to the day when his four boys own and operate the team.” …
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Dodger coach Bob Schaefer had some weirdly noteworthy comments today in an interview with Jim Bowden on XM radio. Mike Scioscia’s Tragic Illness has details.
One of them was a no-comment on Matt Kemp that was followed by a comment that indicates there is no love lost there. Another reportedly had Schaefer saying that Don Mattingly had turned down “managerial positions” to stay in Los Angeles, but I’m wondering if Schaefer really meant or said “managerial interviews.”
Also, it’s one thing for me to say the Dodgers have issues for next season, but it’s a bit unusual for a coach to say the team “will have to pull a rabbit out of the hat” to contend. Presumably, Schaefer has already plotted his own exit from the organization.
Schaefer said he doesn’t think Joe Torre will manage the Dodgers next season, but that he will stay in the game in some capacity. However, Torre told reporters that
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- David Brown has a barrel-of-fun interview with Vin Scully at Yahoo! Sports’ Big League Stew.
- Russ Mitchell is the only Dodger since 1920 to start a game at first, third and the outfield in his first season, according to Eric Stephen of True Blue L.A.
- One of my earliest memories as a baseball fan is reading in Baseball Digest about Rennie Stennett’s 1975 7-for-7 game, in which Pittsburgh shut out Chicago, 22-0. Chris Jaffe recalls the event in The Hardball Times.
- Howard “Howie” Levine, the longtime Grant High School boys basketball coach whom I first met more than 20 years ago as a Daily News sportswriter, has worked as a Dodger Stadium usher for 38 years. On Tuesday, the night that the Dodgers honor their employees of 25 years or more, Levine will sing the National Anthem.
The thing I’ve realized, and this relates to Vin Scully, is that getting older doesn’t necessarily make you feel old. It just makes you have less time left to feel young as young as you always have.
And yes, in some ways I feel old, as I’m sure Scully does. But you know, in some ways I felt old when I was 5. And meanwhile, I continue to marvel at how many ways I feel like a pup.
Vin Scully is a grownup with a lot of kid in him. That 8-year-old that fell in love with sportscasting while camped out underneath his family’s big radio in the 1930s is still with us, and for that I’m thankful.
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Dusty Baker might be holding off on signing his contract extension as manager of the Reds in order to keep himself alive as a candidate to replace Joe Torre with the Dodgers, write The Associated Press and Vincent Bonsignore of the Daily News.
The possibility surprises me because of the acrimonious way Baker left the Dodgers nearly three decades ago, but I guess, after all, that was three decades ago. In fact, Baker told Bonsignore he was interested in the job before Torre got hired, although of course the transition from Grady Little to Torre was practically a simultaneous move.
Baker, who has a reputation for riding his pitchers hard, being in charge of Clayton Kershaw or Zach Lee would inspire some interesting amounts of panic.
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Did you know about Hong-Chih Kuo’s workout regimen? From Ken Gurnick of MLB.com:
His daily therapy regimen is legendary among any who’ve witnessed it, starting at 12:30 p.m. for a 7:10 night game.
“I wish you guys could see what he puts himself through,” said (Dodgers trainer Stan) Conte. “He’s in constant motion until 11 at night — ice, heat, ultrasound, message, stretch, flex, leg work, working all the time just to pitch an inning.”
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Courtesy of Jon SooHoo/LA Dodgers
Andre Ethier stretches during the Bark in the Park promotion prior to Saturday’s Dodger game.
Andre Ethier stretches during the Bark in the Park promotion prior to Saturday’s Dodger game.
- SI.com has a new photo montage of Scully up.
- Talk of Andre Ethier winning the National League Triple Crown has long since faded, but Joey Votto and Albert Pujols still have very good chances, writes Rich Lederer of Baseball Analysts. It’s been 73 years since Joe Medwick won the last NL Triple Crown.
- Bob Timmermann discusses “The L.A. Times vs. Matt Kemp” at L.A. Observed’s Native Intelligence.
- Two interesting posts on the final games of Hall of Fame managers, here and here, come from The Platoon Advantage (via Hardball Talk).
- Big ol’ David Ortiz tripled for the 11th consecutive season Sunday, writes Drew Silva of Hardball Talk. Ortiz is one of three players in the AL to do this, according to Brian McPherson of the Providence Journal.
- Former Dodger Wilson Betemit has revived his career with Kansas City, to the tune of a .984 OPS, though his future remains uncertain, writes Dave Cameron of Fangraphs.
- Maligned All-Star Omar Infante has also been getting the last laugh with a hot streak, writes Aaron Gleeman of Hardball Talk.
- Canines cavorting at Dodger Stadium seems to have gone well, according to Chris Erskine of the Times. Hard to deny after seeing the photo above.
In case you missed it … here it is.
Vin Scully said he will return to the Dodgers in 2011, continuing to broadcast home games and road games against the National League West.
“I’m just honored and humbled to continue my association with the Dodgers, which has been a major part of my life,” Scully said in a statement.
The Dodgers made the official announcement just before 9:30 a.m. today, and Tony Jackson of ESPNLosAngeles.com has more details.
I blame T.J. Simers for making my stomach churn. Like I needed to think more about what it would be like without Vin Scully. But it’s all good, once again.
On Sept. 18, 2006, the Dodgers came back with four consecutive homers in the ninth inning and then one in the 10th to beat San Diego in the legendary 4+1 game.
Tonight, the Dodgers almost matched the feat, hitting four homers in a five-batter stretch (interrupted only by a Manny Ramirez third out in the bottom of the second inning), and then held on to most of their 7-1 lead for an 8-5 victory over Cincinnati. Call it the 4-minus-1 game.
Ryan Theriot and Andre Ethier went deep with two out in the second, and then Jay Gibbons (with a bouncer off the top of the center-field wall) and Matt Kemp (pulling a high and somewhat outside pitch) copy-catted leading off the bottom of the third.
Chad Billingsley cruised for the first five innings, then was pulled after giving up a couple of runs in the sixth. Cincinnati made the game close with two runs off Travis Schlichting in the seventh (inherited runs allowed to score by Hong-Chih Kuo), but the Reds got no closer. The Dodgers added an insurance run in the bottom of the seventh, and Jonathan Broxton retired the side in order in the ninth despite two three-ball counts for the save.
Ramirez went 0 for 3 with two strikeouts in his return, but Gibbons went 2 for 3 with a walk batting cleanup. Ethier, Kemp and Casey Blake each reached base three times.
Tonight’s news was overshadowed by Vin Scully telling T.J. Simers of the Times that he plans to announce his future plans before Sunday’s game. Given that Scully has said he hasn’t wanted a farewell tour, I’m going to go to sleep thinking it’s an announcement he’s coming back, at least to do home games.
US PresswireVin Scully, during last year’s offseason.
I have no insight into whether Vin Scully will retire after this season. My hunch is that he won’t walk away easily. He still sounds filled with so much spirit – more than any of us have, I’m guessing – that I think with whatever schedule adjustments continue to be necessary, he will press on.
But there is always the possibility that these are the final two months of our time with him on the air. And however the Dodgers are playing, I have to find a way to appreciate that time. Even if they are not his final two months, I so want to savor them.
Thirty-six regular-season games remain at home and on the road against National League West opponents.
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“Leave it to the Dodgers, going back all the way to the borough of Brooklyn, to get three hits in the inning and not score a run,” Scully said at the end of the first inning tonight.
Scully doesn’t get upset when the Dodgers play badly, and fans don’t mind. In fact, they appreciate it.
There are things that bother Scully – from people who fail to acknowledge the heroes of D-Day, to the way the post-O’Malley organization discarded Mike Scioscia – but even then, he measures his words carefully and civilly.
The result on the field never bothers him. And fans don’t mind.
I do get upset when the Dodgers play badly, but sometimes I’m told I’m not upset enough, not angry enough. I’ve certainly been told that I’m not angry enough about the ownership situation, even though I’ve expressed my displeasure with it more often than I can count.
No one ever complains that Scully isn’t angry enough. I mean, it sounds silly that someone ever would, right? Maybe it’s because he doesn’t identify himself as a fan. Maybe because I get excited when the Dodgers do well, it’s considered my duty to get angrier when the Dodgers lose.
But Scully was and is an enormous influence on me. He sees every game as part of something bigger. He sees the team as part of a larger team, going all the way back to the borough of Brooklyn. He sees the grand timeline of the Los Angeles Dodgers and baseball, and knows that one bad inning, one bad game, one bad month, one bad season and more, are just part of the journey. He’s able to see all that even as he nears the end of his own journey, however far away that hopefully remains.
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Matt Kemp went 5 for 5 with a double and home run in the Dodgers’ 10-5 loss to San Diego tonight, but his night was marred when he failed to score on that first-inning play Scully described above. James Loney was thrown out trying to reach third base on Casey Blake’s single, the tag coming before Kemp crossed home plate.
When Kemp came up in the eighth inning, Scully discussed the play, not shying away from dealing with it objectively, but also without venom.
Scully certainly wouldn’t say that fans aren’t entitled to be upset about the fortunes of the Dodgers this year, but I do wonder why more fans don’t follow the tone he sets. They worship him, but they don’t emulate him. I don’t judge those fans for it; I just find it interesting.
If the Dodgers don’t salvage the 2010 season, you’re going to see me continue to channel my inner Vinny, as best as I can. I hope to be insightful; I hope to be entertaining. I hope to comment without anger, to find joy amid the sorrow, to see the forest for the trees (and avoid cliches when I can). It’s something I don’t do enough of in my non-Dodger life, but here, in the one place I seem to be able to pull it off most of the time, I mean to sustain it.
In a life replete with doubt and disappointment, go with Vin.
Mark J. Terrill/AP
Rafael Furcal had three hits, three runs and a dazzler at shortstop.
On a night they had 11 hits and drew 10 walks, there were many moments of pleasure for the Dodgers in tonight’s 9-4 victory. For example, the Dodgers took a haymaker in the top of the first inning when Hiroki Kuroda struggled with control and gave up two walks and a home run to the first three batters, but Rafael Furcal got the Dodgers off the mat. It was just a simple single to left, but it started to take the sting out right away.
Furcal also ended the night with an exclamation point, making a full-flung diving stop of Robinson Cano’s grounder up the middle, bouncing to his feet and firing to first in time to end the game.
In between, Manny Ramirez reached base four times, and James Loney drove in four runs.
But when I think of everything that happened tonight, what gave me the most pleasure was Hong-Chih Kuo. With the tying runs on base and one out in the top of the sixth inning, Kuo blew away Derek Jeter on strikes and then got Jorge Posada to fly out. Then in the seventh, Kuo came back and retired Mark Teixeira, Alex Rodriguez and Cano. Five Yankees, 18 pitches, no contest. Kuo showed the nation how great his stuff is, and it felt sweet.
The Dodgers have evened it up with the Yankees, and go for bragging rights Sunday with Clayton Kershaw.
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Message to Fox: There’s a line between an acceptable amount of in-game interviews and an excessive amount. And it’s not a fine line. It’s a line that can be seen from Saturn. You guys crossed it. This is not a latenight talk show – it’s a baseball game.
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From Vin Scully at John Wooden’s public memorial today:
“The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives. The triumph of life is to live hopefully, kindly, cheerful, reverent and to keep the heart unwrinkled. The coach kept his heart unwrinkled. He was truly triumphant.”
Tyler Kepner of the New York Times’ Bats blog has a 1,700-word interview with Vin Scully that’s actually a prelude to a more formal Scully column running Friday. It’s a fun read, with some stories you’ve probably heard before and others, maybe not. Here’s the penultimate paragraph:
… I’ve been thinking recently, the Prince of Wales gave up the British throne to marry an American woman, which immediately disqualified him, and I thought, My God, if he can give up the British throne for his wife, maybe I can give up baseball. It’ll be hard. When I’m going to do it completely, I don’t know. If I had my way, I might be able to dabble and do home games, and maybe come down here. I don’t know, and I don’t know what the boss is going to say. He might say, ‘Well, you know, we really need a guy full time,’ and I’d say, ‘Well, then, you’ve made my settlement a lot easier.’ So we’ll just have to see. I really don’t know.” …
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Tom Hoffarth of the Daily News went to Cooperstown and has a blog post highlighting a bunch of Dodger memorabilia at the Hall of Fame.
John Ely was the surprise stopper at one of the Dodgers’ darkest hours this season, when they were 11-16 and about to be swept at home by Milwaukee. And now, with the Dodger chips down again, Ely has the chance to snap out of his own slump and surprise and delight again.
For Dodger fans, it would be the perfect end to a crazy day that began with breakfast-hour soccer dramatics from South Africa, redoubled with lunchtime Wimbledon wonders from the U.K. and now takes its chances on the latest Stephen Strasburg outing.
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Halos Heaven has a link to a radio interview with Vin Scully.
Phil McCarten/APThe legends
“Scully and Wooden: For the Kids” re-airs on Prime Ticket after tonight’s Dodger postgame show, for the first time since its live presentation. (Of course, some of us never deleted it from our DVRs.) Here’s my writeup the night of the event. If you never saw it, you don’t want to miss it.
Above, Ken Levine passes along a fun promo for Vin Scully’s 1967 Rose Parade co-hosting gig with the bewitching Elizabeth Montgomery. We know Scully’s voice can cut through time and space, but this is ridiculous!
In contrast, while I share the Left Field Pavilion’s disappointment at how many non-Dodger events are included in this MLB Network tribute to Scully, it’s all worth it for the pictures of Scully hitchhiking. Yes, hitchhiking.
- The somewhat press-shy Andre Ethier gave a fairly lengthy interview to Steve Greenberg of SportingNews.com.
- Red-hot Jerry Sands of the Dodgers’ Class A team in Great Lakes is profiled by Hugh Bernreuter of the Saginaw News. Sands hit two homers Saturday to up his season batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage to .443/.500/.967.
- John Lindsey Watch: In Albuquerque’s 6-2 victory over Omaha on Saturday, Lindsey homered and singled in five at-bats, which meant his season batting average and on-base percentage fell to .500 and .548. His slugging percentage did tick up to .821.
- By comparison, Isotopes third baseman Russ Mitchell went 3 for 5 and is up to a .359 OBP and .446 slugging.
- Ivan DeJesus, Jr. had been struggling at Albuqerque, so his 3 for 5 came in handy. His overall 2010 offense still remains down in the .277/.323 dumps.
Mark J. Terrill/AP
Manny’s calf is still mooing.
Russ Ortiz has been designated for assignment by the Dodgers, who have called up righty Jon Link to replace him for the time being. Link has been hit pretty hard at Albuquerque this season – 10 baserunners against 13 outs – so at this point he might just be a different sort of mop-up man until Hong-Chih Kuo is activated.
- Today marks the 60th anniverary of Vin Scully’s Dodger debut.
- Saturday’s 20-inning Mets-Cardinals game was scoreless for the first 18 innings, the longest a game had been scoreless since Rick Dempsey’s 22nd-inning home run gave the Dodgers a 1-0 victory over Montreal in 1989.
- Josh Towers pitched six innings of one-run, seven-baserunner ball for Albuquerque on Saturday, but the Isotopes suffered a 2-0 defeat.
- Jerry Sands had two doubles and a triple in Great Lakes’ 4-2 loss Saturday. The 22-year-old is on-basing .465 and slugging .763 in 10 games this season, with seven extra-base hits in that time.
- Babe Ruth was in a near-fatal car accident in 1938, when he was a Brooklyn Dodgers coach. Blue Heaven passes along photos of Ruth and a description of the wreck.
- Video of Lefty Grove has been posted at Minor League Ball. Grove was held captive in the minors well past the point that he was major-league ready.
- Nice recap of Ubaldo Jimenez’s no-hitter for Colorado – the first in Rockies history – from Troy E. Renck of the Denver Post.
- According to the Dodger press notes, DodgerTalk with Ken Levine and Josh Suchon on KABC AM 710 will be soliciting callers for their best nicknames for Andre Ethier and Matt Kemp. Somebody better stick up for the Bison.
Russ Ortiz came into pitch in the top of the 11th, and Matt Kemp misplayed a ball in center field. You can fill in the rest.
Russell Martin has caught 407 pitches in the past 35 hours. Vin Scully has called 795 of them – slop-free, I might add, unlike the way most of the Dodgers are pitching.
