He was family, but I never met him
Requiescat in pace, Vin Scully
I never knew Vin Scully, but at times, I felt like he was part of my family.
Every important baseball moment for many of my early years had either Scully, Al Michaels, Harry Caray, or the WTBS team bringing it to me. I spent more time with those guys than I did much of my kinfolk.
Scully passed away earlier this week at the age of 94.
Joe Buck had similar sentiments on a podcast I heard the other day. He reminisced back on his own Scully memories. Buck is the son of a broadcasting legend, Jack Buck, and has had a high-profile career himself, calling every World Series this century for Fox Sports.
Talking about the announcing greats, Buck said:
“These people become part of families. I saw it with my dad. People cut their lawn and listen to the Cardinals game…”
A good play-by-play man is part of the fabric of our baseball lives. A lot of fan bases are fortunate to have a man in the booth that joins their life every night.
Vin Scully of the Dodgers and was the best there ever was. He was the national voice of baseball for many years as well.
When I subscribed to MLB.tv for the first time, over a decade ago, I would put Dodger games on in the background at night because I now had the ability to listen to a Vin Scully broadcast…whenever I wanted.
A real pleasure to listen. I hadn’t heard much Scully since I was a child as he stopped doing national broadcasts in 1989.
Scully on-demand was unbelievable. And I pretty much hated the Dodgers, but I knew a lot of their history having read several books as a child. One that comes to mind is Duke Snider’s The Duke of Flatbush.
Snider had been a fan of Jackie Robinson’s as a child growing up in Los Angeles and ultimately became teammates and friends with his hero.
Scully was also friends with Robinson, famously racing the 1949 National League MVP on ice skates.
Scully would spin tales like this and others, sprinkled throughout his broadcasts.
I knew the Dodgers team after a few years. I bought a Dodgers lid, but still couldn’t consider myself a “fan.”
Nevertheless, one year, I had the fortune to see a couple playoff games at Dodger Stadium.
A young Yasiel Puig was my favorite player in those days.
Earlier that season, Scully named Puig “The Wild Horse.”
But it was the national stage where Scully shined. All-Star Games, the playoffs, and of course, the World Series every other year.
His iconic call of Kirk Gibson’s home run in Game 1 of the 1988 Fall Classic will go down in history as one of the best.
Jack Buck’s radio call of the same event is also one of the best of all-time, by the way.
Scully:
Buck:
The combatants—Gibson and Eckersley—reminiscing:
Yet, the genius in this following clip is remarkable in so many ways. It may not be Scully at his finest, but he is darn good.
The 1986 World Series.
First, we must give credit to the best baseball video game in history. R.B.I. Baseball.
If you argue with me about this judgment, you have the strong potential to be banned from all my platforms.
Secondly, as the kids say, IYKYK…this is not a clip from the original Nintendo cartridge game play. Years ago, I too found a way to make my own teams and players and play on my PC. It was one of the best months of my life until I realized that I couldn’t play any of my friends who wanted to play because I only had one controller that somewhat imitated the original NES.
Same game, but some genius figured out a way to change up the roster and lineups.
But to get the game play to pair with Scully’s play-by-play is so unbelievably beautiful.
To a baseball fan of a certain age, this is Beethoven’s Fifth in action.
I grew up a Red Sox fan and was absolutely crushed by the ending of this game and of Game 7.
Favorite Red Sox of all-time, the Great Troy O’Leary, natch, had his 54th birthday yesterday, August 4th. Serendipity?
Take your time…may have to save this email, but if you are at all a fan of R.B.I. Baseball, the clip is glorious.
RIP, Vin.
What I have for you today most certainly won’t be for all of our readers, but as a once and future baseball coach, I’ve found this product to be a game-changer as far as training goes.
I am going to get into a little bit of “inside baseball.”
At a coaches clinic a few years ago, I saw the great Jerry Weinstein give a presentation on a throwing program for catchers. Catching is Jerry’s specialty.
He had a training product he sourced in Japan that was similar to a baseball, but had the sides cut off. Plastic or rubber. It was bright yellow with red seams. I tried finding one for a long time, but no luck.
Some coaches had been experimenting for a few years with the same idea in mind by throwing hockey pucks.
Hockey pucks are made for ice hockey after all, and …
Why use something that is not a baseball to learn how to throw better?
To get a better grip and release on the ball.
The CleanFuego is a much better alternative to the puck.
The flat-sided baseball helps “work out subtle changes in real-time,” according to CleanFuego.
Mike McGuiness, founder of CleanFuego worked with his brother, Dodgers pitching coach Connor McGuiness to develop the product that is now commonplace amongst the big leagues and high-level professional and amateur programs.
I was an early adapter of the CleanFuego product. Much better than that Japanese thing Coach Weinstein was talking about—a Google-buster too…he had no idea where to get it, just that it existed and he had one.
When the Joe Kelly video went viral, I found the product I’d been looking for!
In the subsequent years, I’ve even bought CleanFuegos as gifts for young ballplayers.
This tool helps all manner of ballplayers to throw the ball better but we really have seen terrific results for pitchers who “learn the proper feel and release of fastballs, curveballs, change-ups, and sliders.”
If you’re a coach or parent (or grandparent even) at the amateur level, your young ballplayers will be a step ahead of the competition by training with the CleanFuego.
Probably want to be 13 or older … playing on the “big diamond.”
Make sure to use discount code
OLEARY10
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Brian O’Leary