Posnanski: Last call for Vin Scully
From SABR member Joe Posnanski at JoePosnanski.com on September 22, 2016:
There are two outs now, bottom of the ninth here under a full moon at Dodger Stadium. The bases are still loaded, and the Dodgers still trail by a run. And, well now, it looks like Lasorda is calling back Steve Garvey. This is a surprise. The Dodgers are going to send up a pinch-hitter to face Warren Spahn. And it looks like, yes, it’s going to be Vincent Edward Scully. Well, they say strange things happen on nights when there is a full moon, and this is certainly strange.
Vin Scully, well, there’s certainly no need to tell you much about him. He has been with the Dodgers since they were in Brooklyn a few million years ago. Everything about him is familiar, even in this most unfamiliar of positions. Two outs. Bases loaded. And the Dodgers trail by a run.
Spahn winds up and delivers. Screwball just outside for a ball. Scully bats left-handed, of course, and there is a theory that left-handed batters have a better chance against the Spahn screwball because the ball breaks toward them instead of breaking away. But you know what the French biologist Jean Rostand said about theories. He said, “Theories pass. The frog remains.” And the Spahn screwball is the frog.
Scully steps out of the box to consider the moment. What must be going through his mind? He was born in the Bronx back in 1927 or as he likes to say, shortly after the discovery of fire. He has seen this situation countless times. But he knows too that this will be the last time. What must he be feeling?
Read the full article here: http://joeposnanski.com/last-call/
Originally published: September 22, 2016. Last Updated: September 22, 2016.