The Sunday Memory Drawer - The Young Sports Announcer

This is a great vintage shot of the legendary Vin Scully.  85 years young and planning to be the voice of the Los Angeles Dodgers next season.  That would be his 65th year with the club.

This is the guy that taught baseball to Southern California when the Dodgers moved there in 1958.  The city would have been lost without Vin.

As for me 3000 miles away, I didn't know who he was.  Oh, sure, I probably knew he worked for the Dodgers.  But the only time I actually saw the guy was whenever he would host a TV game show.

Nope, my radio and TV links to baseball were the Mets broadcast crew.  Lindsey Nelson, Ralph Kiner, and Bob Murphy.

I probably spent more time listening to them than I did my own parents.  They were my connection to an obsession.  The Mets.  And, as I lived my young life, I often emulated them.  I wanted to be an announcer for this team.  How cool would that be?  Traveling with the team.  Seeing games every day for nothing.  No, actually getting paid to watch games.  At Shea Stadium where I wanted to move my bed.

When you're a kid and all baseball all the time, you start to sound like your team's announcers.   In my Yankee-centric neighborhood which was also mostly Italian, it was a natural to idolize Phil Rizzuto and his "Holy Cow."  Of course, I was a loner when it came to my guys in the broadcast booth.  So I had to repeat their speech patterns in my own way.

In those crazy baseball games I played all by myself in the backyard. 

In our yard, there was a brick staircase into my grandmother's kitchen.  We called it "the stoop."  The bricks served as my backstop against which I would throw my rubberball for strikes.  In my little world, there was much more to this all than the game I was concocting in my mind.  Nope, I needed all the pomp and circumstance that I would see at Shea Stadium.

First, in my best ten-year-old public address announcer's voice, I would announce the line-ups.  First, the opposition, then the Mets.  This would be following by my singing of "Meet the Mets."  It took me ten minutes to get through all this nonsense.

Once the game began, I'd throw my pitches.  One after another.  If I missed the brick stoop, I'd hit the house.  Quickly, a kitchen curtain would part and Grandma would peek outside.

All the while, there is my expert play-by-play.  Switching over from Lindsey Nelson's voice to Bob Murphy's traditional call for a "happy recap."

"Galen Cisco on the mound with two strikes to Willie Mays.  Ball one."

Another hit to the house.

"Ball two."

One right into my grandmother's rose garden.

"Ball three."

The self-involvement was so intense that I was exhausted quite quickly.  No game lasted more than two innings.  I couldn't talk anymore.  Or, sometimes, my game was cancelled due to...Grandma.  She had enough of my endless play-by-play rambling.  The kitchen window would open.

"Shaddap already."

Not a fan of any baseball announcer.

While pursuing traditional career paths throughout high school, I still fantasized a bit about being a baseball announcer.  I would often take a tape recorder into the living room when a Met game was on.  I turn down the sound and offer my own play-by-play.  I would yammer on incessantly.  After three innings or so, one of my parents was done.

"Shaddap already."

I couldn't win.

In high school, I became friends with another kid who had similar aspirations but was really working at his talent.  Obviously, nobody had told him to shut up.  He'd do pretend play-by-play for hockey games and was quite proficient at it.  He'd ultimately make a decent career out of it all.  But, back in those still-learning days, he wanted to go to the college where sports announcers, including Vin Scully, were born.

Fordham University and its WFUV-FM.  

It wasn't the only reason I opted to enroll there.  But the college radio station was an attraction, no doubt about it.  Of course, I followed my friend into those hallowed halls as a freshman.  And was startled to find there was a lot of me around.  Would-be sports announcers from all over the metropolitan area.   And, crap, they were all better at it than I was.

As inferior as I felt, most of them became good friends of mine.  

And I joined the WFUV Sports Department, which did the radio broadcasts for all the Fordham team games.  But, as I looked around and listened to them all, I knew I was sunk.  

I had left all my good work in the backyard with Grandma's stoop.

There was a lot involved in doing game broadcasts and not all of it was on the air.  Kids produced.  Kids handled half time interviews.  And, when there were Fordham football games, kids did the spotting.  That was my very first assignment.

What the hell is a spotter?

Well, you watch the plays as they unfold and then point to a roster sheet and let the announcer know who made the run and who made the tackle.

I was horrible at it.  The wrong guy always had the ball and was ultimately tackled by another wrong guy.  

I already had one foot out the press box door.  The good news is that I must have had a fun personality because the sports guys/my friends kept me around for comic relief.

In an interesting sidelight, hanging around the Fordham/WFUV broadcast booth did provide me with an amusing brush with greatness.  It was the Saturday that the late and famed Yankee public address announcer Bob Sheppard's path crossed directly with mine. 
 
Along with his duties at the Stadium for Yankee and Giant football games, Bob Sheppard was apparently a renowned speech professor. And one of his gigs was at St. John's University. This then morphed into Sheppard doing the PA at that school's football games. Okay, we're not talking the Big Ten here, folks. But, there he was. A booming voice covering every inch of a pretty chintzy football field.

Well, as luck would have it, Fordham was playing St. John's one crisp October Saturday afternoon. Perhaps 150 people were in attendance. Part of that throng was the WFUV-FM broadcast crew covering the game for Fordham. As I mentioned  earlier, my good humor always allowed to go along for the ride.  With a rather spotty career as a spotter, my entire purpose at this football game was to stand quietly and out-of-the-way in the back of the tiny press box. 

In the booth next to us sat Bob Sheppard calling the results of each football play.

Now, there was a kid by the name of Steve on the Fordham Ram football team with a very long and convoluted Polish last name. The good news is that this running back didn't get into the game very often. But, when he did, our WFUV announcers got his last name dead-on. Why? Because I was an insider. 

Steve and I had been in French together the year before and were even study partners, so we were "class friends." More importantly, it made me a complete and thorough expert in the pronunciation of his last name which I dutifully shared with my broadcast cohorts. Hell, I had to bring something to the party.

Around the fourth quarter that day, my language lesson buddy gets into the game at last. And even carries the ball for a couple of yards. Forward motion that is immediately reported over the loudspeaker by Mr. Sheppard.

"FORD-HAM FOUR YARD RUN BY STEVE........(totally butchered pronunciation of last name)."

Don't ask me why I did this. Perhaps I felt that I was the official spokesperson for this kid. But, that screw-up of his last name didn't sit well with me. I needed to step in. I yelled into Sheppard's booth the correct pronunciation. What the hell was I doing?

There was a ten second pause of eternal proportions. And then...

"COR-REC-TION. FORD-HAM FOUR YARD RUN BY STEVE...(totally correct pronunication of last name.)"

So there. 

If nothing else, my childhood work emulating Lindsey, Ralph, and Bob almost always involved the correct way to say the players' names.

Meanwhile, back at the microphone, I wasn't.  I was getting ready to call it a play-by-play career.  But, it was springtime and Fordham baseball season was upon us.   There were lots and lots of games to broadcast and the WFUV Sports Department worked hard to cover them all.  There were plenty of announcer spots open.  

I was picked to do the middle three innings of one game.

Audible scream.

I did my homework for this game as if my life depended upon it.  This was going to be the very earliest fulfillment of a bucket list item.  I studied the players and the stats.  I was going to be ready.

As I slid behind the play-by-play mike in the fourth inning, I thought about this momentous day in my life.  I was speechless.

Literally.

Mouth open.  No words came out.  And, in another attack of flop sweat, I suddenly discovered that I couldn't tell the difference between a fast ball and a curve ball.

It was the longest hour of my life.  As I finished up my stint, I believe you could hear the faint sound of applause all across the Bronx.

Yep, I was done.  At that very moment, I made the play-by-play call for myself.

"Well, maybe I should be a writer."

Years and years later, I got to be the charity participant for two straight years on post-game "Dodger Talk" when it was on KABC.  My first year's participation was so-so, but, by the next season, I was able to command a whole fifteen minute segment with the able assistance of the then-"Dodger Talk" guys Joe Block and Josh Suchon.  I made a contribution to the show and even sounded coherent.  

I also got to meet fellow WFUV-er Vin Scully and, of course, we talked about what we had in common. Later on, I was wandering around the press box during the seventh inning stretch when Vin walks around for his own limbering.  He saw me again and remembered my name.

"Hiya, Len."

Two hours later and I was still on the top of his mind.  But, then again, that's how you stay in one job for 65 years.  As for me, I moved on to other hopes and aspirations.

The one hold-over from my career as a sports announcer.  I still remember how to pronounce Fordham running back Steve's last name.

Dinner last night:  Pepperoni and sausage pizza at Victorio's in North Hollywood.