RIP Bob Uecker (1934–2025)

Former player, Brewer broadcaster, and legendary baseball personality Bob Uecker has died.

One of the great things when Baseball started broadcasting games over the internet many years ago is that I got a chance to hear Uecker broadcast a bunch of games. He was damn funny, an amazing broadcaster and storyteller, and a lifetime .200 hitter (as he sometimes pointed out with his wonderful self-deprecating humor).

You can read more about Uecker at his Wikipedia page.

RIP Vin Scully (1927–2022)

I'm watching the game, and the Dodger broadcasters announced about 20 or so minutes ago that broadcasting legend Vin Scully died today. (Scully's death was announced by the Dodgers in the tweet to which I just linked, along with other simultaneous social-media posts.) Vin was the greatest broadcaster who ever lived. I listened to Vin broadcast literally thousands of games across four decades. Vin was one of the key voices of my childhood (and much of my adulthood). For so long, Vin was not only the voice of the Dodgers, but was also (along with Tommy Lasorda) the pulse of the Dodgers.

Here is Vin's Wikipedia page.

Update: ESPN has now posted an article about Vin Scully's death.

RIP Don Sutton (1945–2021)

We have lost yet another Hall-of-Fame Dodger: pitcher Don Sutton has died.

(Tip of the cap to Gregg Schneider.)

"Wild Thing": Now Pitching for the Rockies

Dodgers broadcaster Joe Davis likes to use the nickname "Wild Thing" for Rockies' relief pitcher Carlos Estévez (for obvious reasons). I love it!

In case you don't remember and don't want to follow a chain of links on Wikipedia, go to this page.

Some Tributes to Vin Scully

Vin Scully is retiring at the end of the 2016 regular season, his 67th year of broadcasting Dodger games. I have listened to Vin all of my life (ever since I can remember), and that covers only a bit more than half of Vin Scully's career. (He's had the longest career of any broadcaster in any professional sport.) Wow! And Vin is the best of all time.

As Vin's career winds down, I have (especially in the last couple of days) seen various tributes on my Facebook feed, so I am going to put some links to some of these here—partly just so that I can have a few of them in one place. I should have compiled a few I saw over the last couple of weeks, and I'll add some of those when I see those links again.

Here is are stories compiled by Jayson Stark.

Here is a video from Baseball Tonight.

Baseball-reference.com has posted a discussion with a statistical trip through Vin Scully's career.

Update (9/23/16): I hadn't caught this before, but Vin has broadcast more than half of the games that the Dodgers have ever played. Wow! (I am listening to the live presentation of the presentation at Dodger stadium honoring Vin Scully.)

Update (9/23/16): Here is a rank-ordered list of the "top 20" Vin Scully calls of all time. As I write this, numbers 1 and 2 haven't yet been listed, but they are not at all surprising: number 2 is the end of Sandy Koufax's perfect game, and number 1 is (obviously) Gibson's home run. The reason I put "top 20" in quotes is that fans were given a list of 20 moments and then voted among the given list of 20. That's a bit cheesy, though some of my favorite moments and a few other obvious ones are among the memorable 20.

Update (9/24/16): Here is an article about the tribute to Scully. Also, I happened to notice that #vinscullyday was trending on Twitter yesterday.

Update (9/26/16, about 1:03 am): The Dodger players have Vin Scully a great tribute during today's game, which we won in the 10th inning on a walk-off homer to win the National League West for the fourth year in a row. I haven't yet gotten my cable tv working in LA, so I listened on the radio, although for most of the game I couldn't hear much because my friends and I were busy building my furniture for my apartment. I'll need to catch some video clips of the game.

Update (10/01/16): Here is an article in the New York Times about the "archive of oddities" that Vin Scully leaves behind.

Update (10/02/16): Vin's final broadcast finished a little while ago. You can see my comments about it in this blog entry, where I also link to a few other goodbyes.

MLB Tonight's Tribute to Vin Scully

This season is the last season that Dodger announcer Vin Scully will be broadcasting Dodger games. MLB Tonight has produced a nice tribute video.

I have been listening to Vin announce baseball games for more than 35 years, and that is barely more than half of his career! Vin's voice has been one of the soundtracks of my life, and I sure as Hell am going to miss it.

When it comes to broadcasters, Vin Scully is the Best of All Time.

(Tip of the hat to Chris Howland.)

Vin Scully Reading a Shopping List

On several baseball broadcasts over the years, I have heard the comment that Vin Scully would sound amazing even if he were reading a shopping list.

Apparently, about four decades ago, somebody recorded Vin doing it. This recording was played on the ESPN broadcast last night, and it does sound amazing. Vin's voice is just so soothing.

Vin Scully is the best announcer ever, and 2016 will be his last year broadcasting baseball. It's been awesome to listen to him broadcast Dodger games for well over three decades.

Krukow and Kuiper

Giants broadcasters and former Major Leaguers Mike Krukow and Duane Kuiper are the second-best broadcasting team in Baseball right now. (The only one better is Vin Scully, who is only the best sports broadcaster ever.) I often make it a point to listen to them, and I have frequently chosen to watch Giants games over other non-Dodgers games in order to listen to them. They are excellent, and here is an interesting article about their friendship and about the significant physical challenges that Mike Krukow is facing because of a rare disease.

Vin Scully to Continue Broadcasting Dodger Games in 2015!!!!

It's become an annual rite during the Major League Baseball season. Vin Scully takes his time to figure out if he'll continue broadcasting Dodger games the next year, and yesterday the Dodgers announced that Vin will continue broadcasting games for them in 2015. Awesome!!!!

(Tip of the cap to whoever posts for 'Vin Scully' and MLB on Facebook.)

Baseball Tonight Dream Team

Well, it looks like Ozzie Guillen is joining the Baseball Tonight crew. Now I'm going to need to find out when Ozzie is on just for comic relief.

Man, it's really too bad that Rob Dibble no longer works for ESPN. (I know, he hasn't worked for them for a decade.)

I want to see a Steiner-Ozzie-Dibble broadcast.

Dodger Broadcasting Changes

I didn't catch this news when it came out, but the Dodgers have dumped Steve ("Psycho") Lyons and Eric Collins from their broadcasting team. Lyons is an atrocious broadcaster, and we employed him for way too long. Nomaaaaaah Garciaparra is joining our broadcasting crew, and we're trying to recruit Orel Hershiser. I would love for Hershiser to return to the Dodgers as a broadcaster.

In other baseball news, the Nationals fleeced the Tigers in acquiring Doug Fister. Really, what were the Tigers thinking? Meanwhile, the Nationals' starting rotation is rock solid.

Tim McCarver Stepping Down After 2013!

Tim McCarver announced today that he is stepping down from the Fox broadcast booth after this season. Yay! Though I wish he had stepped down multiple decades ago...

Pretty Please?

I cannot overstate how much I agree with this article urging Tim McCarver to retire (though I'm sure that McCarver could). I've been ranting about his crappy announcing for more than 2 decades.

And this guy won the Hall of Fame's award for broadcasters...? Groaaaaaan.

Broadcaster Mash-Up

The Orioles and Nationals did something very cool for their interleague series. Namely, the broadcast booth included announcers from both teams. I would like to see more of that in baseball games (as long as Vin Scully gets to continue to announce alone, of course!).

Also, I am watching the Giants game, and injured closer Brian Wilson visited with the Giants broadcasters for a couple of innings. Wilson was highly amusing.

Vin Scully will be back in 2012!

It's a year-to-year thing these days, so it's with great pleasure that I woke this morning to see a Facebook post from the Vin Scully page that he will continue to broadcast Dodger games in 2012. Sweet!

In other Dodger news, Matt Kemp became the second player in franchise history (Raul Mondesi was the first) to have a 30/30 season. (A "30/30 season" means a season in which a player hits at least 30 homeruns and steals at least 30 bases.)

Play Ball!

I am listening to the first Dodgers Spring Training game of the year! We're playing the Giants.

Vin Scully isn't announcing yet --- he doesn't announce much in during Spring Training --- so I am listening to Giants broadcasters Jon Miller and Duane Kuiper, who are (a) excellent and (b) much better than Charlie Steiner (who is announcing for the Dodgers today).

Ernie Harwell wins Vin Scully Award

I didn't even know that there was a Vin Scully Award, but there is one, and Ernie Harwell has won it. This award, which is a lifetime achievement award in sports broadcasting, is richly deserved. (And it's also fitting that it's named after Vin Scully---not that I'm biased or anything...)

Broadcaster Jon Miller joins Hall of Fame

Broadcaster Jon Miller, who is most famous for his play-by-play work on ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball, has won the Ford C. Frick Award and has thereby earned a spot in the broadcaster's wing of baseball's Hall of Fame. About time.

Quote of the Day

Today's quote comes from broadcaster Joe Simpson: "Jim Tracy is close to arguing for the cycle."

Simpson made this comment as Rockies manager Jim Tracy was jogging out to argue with the third base umpire. Earlier in the game, he had jogged out to both first base and second base to argue.

Some words from Vin Scully

Courtesy Rob Neyer's blog, here is a short video blurb from Vin Scully in which he talks about past, present, and future.