Baseball will never be the same without Scully

Vin Scully is so great that even people who hate his team love him.

“He’s the standard no one will ever reach,” said local sportscaster Scott Robbs, who loathes the Dodgers as much as he adores the Giants. “There’s the rivalry, but Scully never comes across as a homer.”

Team allegiance also doesn’t matter in this regard: When Scully’s 67 years as voice of the Dodgers ends next week, baseball will never be the same. He’s the last significant active figure left from the game’s golden age. Scully wasn’t a player, but he was one of the Boys of Summer.

It’s easy to forget he also called Super Bowls and The Masters. I could enjoy listening to Scully announce cribbage. He’d have interesting background stories about all the players, just in case it became a blowout.

That was when he was at his best … mid-August, both teams out of the race, 11-2, top of the seventh.

“A good broadcaster always keeps your attention, no matter the situation,” Robbs said. “He always had a memory for every occasion, and you always wanted to hear more.”

I try to avoid buying anything I know a celebrity is paid to endorse. I’ll buy the competition’s product — not the one that a world-class athlete or some other entertainer tells me will help me be like him.

Nike and Gatorade won’t go out of business because of my one-man boycott. But I sleep better when patronizing companies that put their resources into the actual product, not some famous pitch person’s pocket.

There’s just one exception to this (well, just one of which I’m fully aware … hey, I know how advertising works on the subconscious).

I buy Farmer John products because a very long time ago Scully in his wonderful voice said I should, on a commercial. OK, I admit it, I also buy them because I like how they taste and they’re often on sale at Don Quijote.

Still, if I lived at the North Pole and Scully told me to buy ice cubes I’d immediately slap on my galoshes and head for the nearest ice cube store.

Four years ago, the confluence of Shane Victorino and Brandon League playing for the Dodgers and the University of Hawaii football team at USC during the same week found me in a very long line to buy a very overpriced, but famous Farmer John product. Hey, you can’t go to Chavez Ravine and not eat a Dodger Dog, can you? I’m pretty sure there’s a law against that.

I was there in a working capacity a couple of days prior, and it happened to be Vin Scully Bobblehead Day. Scully was to throw out the ceremonial first pitch. How does an 84-year-old man do that? If you’re Scully, your 16 grandchildren assemble on the third-base line, you toss the ball to the closest one and they pass it down the line until it gets to the catcher.

It’s one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen on a baseball field.

Some student journalists asked me about career highlights and regrets the other day. I got one of each at Dodger Stadium that evening: working a game in the same press box as Vin Scully, but being so close and not figuring out a way to meet someone who is the best ever at what he does.

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. His blog is at Hawaiiwarriorworld. com/quick-reads.