But lots of announcers are smart guys with pleasing baritones and a gift for gab and quick recall. None of them are Vin Scully. It is amazing and a little alarming that Scully will be 80 years old in November.
He looks like a much younger man, and seems to have the energy of one. Even as he concedes he may have lost a step from his professional prime. "I think as players slow up as their eye-hand coordination slows up, I think as a play-by-play announcer the mind and the tongue might not always be as sharp as it was," he said.
"So I think I would be less than honest to say I'm as sharp. "I still think I do a reasonably good game." He is keenly aware that sickness or injury could have curtailed his career.
"I'm not really affected by anything that's happened to me except an overwhelming feeling of thanksgiving to God to a.) give me the job at an early age, b.) allow me to keep it so long and to keep my health all these years.
Really, in retrospect that's the bottom line, and I'll never, ever get over that feeling." Scully insists he doesn't feel like a celebrity but concedes he is often treated like one. And you may be pleased to learn he likes you as much as you like him.
"I like (listeners) to think of me as a friend," he said. "One of the nicest residual effects of this job is to have people say to me, 'You know, when I hear your voice I think of summer nights with my dad in the backyard and a barbecue,' or 'I can remember fishing with dad,' or 'I remember mom and dad taking me somewhere and I heard the game,' and it's a nice feeling. I really do love that.
" Fifty years in, the Dodgers without Scully seems almost impossible to imagine. But it has to end someday, as awful as that day will be. He has a contract through 2008 (and earns about $3 million per season) and seems willing to continue beyond then with his reduced (generally, no games east of Colorado) schedule.
He said the 1994 baseball strike, and the enforced idleness, bored and startled him. He began by playing golf, then moved on to having lunch with the guys. "And all of a sudden I was spending an inordinate amount of time in the hardware store .
.. and all of a sudden I thought, 'Oh my gosh, imagine if this was it.
' ...
I don't know if I can handle it." Not that he assumes eternal health. "One of my favorite expressions is, 'If you want to make God smile, tell Him your plans,"' Scully said.
But lots of announcers are smart guys with pleasing baritones and a gift for gab and quick recall.
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