From his blog, Baseball Nerd, Keith Olbermann on how Vin Scully almost became the Yankees’ announcer…According to Olbermann, here is Scully’s story (thanks to Baseball Think Factory for the link):
“When the Yankees let Mel Allen go in 1964, I got a phone call from the man who they had brought in to run their broadcasting operation, Craig Smith,” Vin began. “He had been in charge of the World Series broadcasts forever, so I’d known him about ten years by then. And he asked me if I’d like to come home to New York and become the lead announcer. He offered a very handsome salary, and a long contract.
“Well, I was amazed, as you can imagine. I’d found a wonderful home here in Los Angeles, but remember, this was only seven years after the Dodgers left Brooklyn. I was still a New Yorker through and through. Plus, here was a chance to work again with Red Barber. And recall, too, that this was just before the Yankee dynasty collapsed. As much as Mr. O’Malley had done here and in Brooklyn, the Yankees were still the marquee name in sports. If it had been 1958 or 1959, when I still missed New York so, I would’ve said yes before he hung up the phone.”
“So, I thought long and hard about that one. But I had a young family, and I think we had all just truly adjusted to living here – takes just about seven years, I think – and in the end I turned it down.”
From Mel Allen to Sterling/Kay. Ugh.
I just threw up on myself.
Yeah, I was going to say that it may have spared us some combination of Sterling, Kay, and/or Waldman.
Apart from the ex-players on YES, the NYY broadcasters are pathetic, obnoxious, and offensively stupid.
[2] I wonder what that would have meant for the Scooter? Also, could it have meant no White/Scooter combo?
[3] Or maybe no Bob Gamere and/or Frank Messer and/or Hawk Harrelson? So there was some chaff that could have been separated to make room for Scully.
I think Scooter and Scully might have been great together.
[4] I actually really liked Frank Messer...
[5] He was better than Sterling, Kay, or Waldman, but imo, not in the Scooter, White, or Scully class.
Gamere used to say "high, far, and gone" way before Sterling did. Sterling is the absolute worst. He's like a young child who said something precocious, and because that response was reinforced, they continue to repeat it to the point at which it becomes nauseatingly tedious. Of course, the child eventually grows out of it. Not so with Sterling, who is so sight-challenged at this point that flyballs to mid-CF provoke his HR call.
Sterling, who is so sight-challenged at this point that flyballs to mid-CF provoke his HR call.
It seems Kay is starting to do the same as well...
Did anyone see Maddon forget to put a DH in the lineup in yesterday's game? Sonnanstine batted 3rd for the Rays... Could you imagine what would've happened if that happened here? Heads would've exploded?
[6] I used to really like Sterling up until Kay departed for YES. I thought they were a good team. Sterling also did good work before Kay, especially with Johnstone. In that duo, Sterling was actually the serious professional one of the two, but it really sounded like both were having fun...and it was a fun listen.
[1] Perfect response... having grown up with Vin Scully as the voice of summer, I've been so spoiled I just watch the Yankees on TV with the sound muted. Growing up, we used to just turn on KABC and let his voice waft through the house... and then tolerate Jerry Doggett's clumsiness just because you knew that he would come back on eventually. He even made the Union 76 ads sound good! Just remembering his voice makes me think of the warm Santa Ana breezes, and the smell of chaparral (EVERYONE brought their radios to the stadium, so you heard his voice even there!)
[9] I agree that Sterling and Kay were tolerable together.
Warts and all, I love Sterling. My friends and I are always imitating his overly dramatic baritone in our conversations. FWIW, the Scooter couldn't see a thing for the last 15 years of his career and I loved him too.
Twenty years from now, when they are putting up his plaque in Monument Park right next to Bob Shepard's, all you guys will be saying, "Oh Sterling, he was just a classic."
Bob Gamere: "Fly ball.. Roy White.. on his horse...". Anybody else remember that?
Agreed with, Joel.
Ol' Harry Moskowitz can be a tough listen at times, but he certainly makes it entertaining.
I miss Rizzuto and White! They made each game fun, whether the play was lousy, great, or somewhere in between. Back in the 70's, at the dawn of satellite television, when there was no break away for commercials, those times were priceless.
Besides, if those events did not transpire the way they did, we would have never been blessed with one of the single greatest moments in all of sports, "Scooter's" Hall of Fame Speech.
That's definitely in my all time top ten where the Yankees are concerned!
: )
I think Scooter gets a pass, because he isn't as pompous, as bombastic as Sterling.
The Post has a column today asking Sterling to leave:
http://www.nypost.com/seven/05182009/sports/yankees/baseball_fans_deserve_better_than_sterli_169830.htm
Is that a Gang Starr reference? I love this blog.
"Deep to left" - Bill White
I used to like the way Bill White pronounced "Kurt Bevacqua," and the way that he made "mozzarella" sound as if it was spelled "matzorella," which always cracked Scooter up.