As an 8-year-old, former Orioles catcher and broadcaster Rick Dempsey would sneak a radio into his room when it was time for bed. He had to hide it under his sheets so his parents wouldn’t be able to hear it.
He risked the trouble he would get in to listen to Vin Scully call Dodgers games. Dempsey, who grew up in Southern California, remembers Scully’s voice and the excitement he had for games as he called contests that featured legends like Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale. Dempsey went on to play for the Dodgers from 1988-1990, winning the World Series in ’88.
“[Scully] was so inspirational to me,” Dempsey said on Glenn Clark Radio Aug. 3. “He just brought so much excitement and so much life just by calling a strikeout, calling a base hit, by calling a home run … just brought so much color and so much excitement to the fans.”
Scully, who died recently at the age of 94, broadcasted Dodgers games for radio and TV for 67 seasons from 1950-2016.
Scully’s career intersected with some of baseball’s most historical moments. He began working with the team when it was still in Brooklyn, detailing the final years of the career of Jackie Robinson. He oversaw the franchise’s move to Los Angeles in 1958, a move that spearheaded MLB’s intent to expand to the West Coast. And he was there for the Dodgers’ first six World Series wins.
“Duration certainly has a lot to do with it,” former Orioles broadcaster Gary Thorne said on Glenn Clark Radio Aug. 3. “When you’ve done 67 years with a team, you’re going to get noticed and you’re going to become known. … The whole story of the move of baseball to the West Coast, of Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier, all was part of Vinny’s career. Issues that were national in scope, beyond just baseball, became part of what Vin talked about.”
Thorne, who considered Scully a mentor like many other broadcasters did, first met Scully when Thorne broadcasted Mets games. At spring training, Scully simply walked up to Thorne to shake his hand and introduce himself. That Scully never assumed people knew who he was impressed Thorne who, like many, idolized him.
To Thorne, Scully’s connection with Dodgers fans is what made him the best. In his early years as a broadcaster in the 1950s, the only medium that fans could follow games through live was radio. Naturally, the thousands of fans who listened daily grew to love Scully.
“If you lived in Brooklyn, you could hear Dodger baseball all day and all night walking on the sidewalk because everybody had a radio,” Thorne said. “You’d hear the game as you walked along and heard it off different stoops and porches. Those people who came into the business at that time, they were kings. They were it. They were the connection between the fans and the team. … They became part of your life.”
Coupled with the time period in which Scully came along was his renowned storytelling ability. Throughout the course of a game, baseball broadcasters have lots of dead time to fill. Nobody knew how to take advantage of those empty minutes better than Scully.
“I don’t think there was anyone who was a better storyteller as a broadcaster in sports than Vin Scully,” Thorne said. “He knew how to make it interesting and personal. … He was telling stories about what he did, how he was involved with this player or this team or this time period and it became a history lesson. The stories became a history lesson about baseball. … You felt like you were sitting in the chair next to him and he was your best friend and he was telling you stories about what had gone in the game now and then as well as doing the broadcast, and that’s an art.”
“Vinny was God’s gift to baseball,” Dempsey said. “He just brought so much color and he [passed on] so much excitement about baseball that anyone who loved the game would want to listen.”
For more from Dempsey, listen to the full interview here:
For more from Thorne, listen to the full interview here:
Photo Credit: Courtesy of the Los Angeles Dodgers