More photos » by PAUL WARNER - ASSOCIATED PRESS

Ernie Harwell called games for the Dodgers in 1948 and 1949.

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I managed to catch Studio 42 with Bob Costas tonight, as Ernie Harwell was interviewed.  Harwell, the long time announcer for the Detroit Tigers, has incurable cancer, and doctors have given him mere months to live.  His interview with Costas is a must see, and was very compelling and engaging hour.

Hearing anyone who has been around baseball for more than six decades is always a treat, but this interview with Harwell was especially rewarding.  The man once got Babe Ruth's autograph, played cards with Jackie Robinson, and interviewed fellow Georgian "Tyrus Raymond Cobb," as Harwell referred to him.  The 91-year old Harwell even recited from memory his "This is Baseball," from his Hall of Fame induction speech from over 28 years ago.

In 1948, Harwell was broadcasting games for the minor league Atlanta Crackers.  Meanwhile, legendary Dodger announcer Red Barber was hospitalized with a bleeding ulcer and the club needed another announcer to fill in.  Branch Rickey wanted to hire Harwell, but he was under contract with the Crackers, so in exchange for Harwell the Dodgers sent minor league catcher Cliff Dapper to the Crackers, making Harwell the first and only broadcaster ever to be traded for a player.  It should be noted that Dapper has the highest batting average (.471) among Dodgers with 12 or more career plate appearances.  Harwell announced games for the Dodgers through the 1949 season.

Among the many highlights of the interview:

• Harwell recalled a story of an exhibition series between the Dodgers and the Atlanta Crackers, before which the Ku Klux Klan threatened to shoot Jackie Robinson if he took the field.  It was said that Gene Hermanski quipped that all the Dodger players wear number 42, so the gunmen wouldn't know whom to shoot.
  
• One of Harwell's famous called third strike calls: "He's out for excessive window shopping.  He looked at one too many."
• Harwell recalling the old time broadcasting tradition of recreations, which meant announcers weren't at the game, but would call the game based on telegraph reports, embellishing and sometimes making up facts to fill the time.
• There were an astonishing five radio calls of Bobby Thomson's home run, "The Shot Heard 'Round The World," but Harwell was the lone television announcer.  Sadly, there are no tapes of that 1951 NBC broadcast.
• Here is a clip from the interview, of Harwell remembering Jackie Robinson
• Here is a clip of Harwell reciting from memory his HOF speech

As a Dodger fan, I have been spoiled by having Vin Scully announce games for my favorite team for my entire life.  I am understandably biased when I state that Scully is the greatest baseball announcer of all time.  However, Harwell belongs in the discussion as well.  Before the advent of the MLB Extra Innings package, I never had much opportunity to hear Harwell, but my introduction to him came as he called some playoff games for ESPN Radio roughly a decade ago.  His conversational style, enthusiasm, and friendly nature really stood out to me at the time, and I made it a point to listen to Harwell as often as possible through the years. 

I'm glad I had the opportunity to listen to Harwell broadcast games, and I'm glad I had the chance to watch this interview.  Harwell was a great announcer, and he will be missed.

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More photos » by Mark J. Terrill - AP

7 months ago: Los Angeles Dodgers Hall of Fame announcer Vin Scully makes an announcement to the crowd during opening day ceremonies prior the their baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Monday, April 13, 2009, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill)

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Bill Plaschke of the LA Times brings us the news that Dodgers' announcer Vin Scully will likely retire after next season:

Scully, 81, said if he continues to feel well he will work past his landmark year and retire after the 2010 season.

"God willing, I will probably come back for one more year," Scully said in a phone interview. "At this moment, my health is excellent, and I'm leaning toward one more year."

And then retire?

"Yes, that makes sense," he said.

Scully has been a part of every Dodger fan's life, perhaps the man more associated with the franchise than any other.  Scully's pending retirement has been something all Dodger fans have had in the back of their mind for some time.  After all, this is his 60th season behind the microphone.  However, knowing the "when" of Scully's retirement is a positive thing.

This gives the Dodgers and their many fans the chance to honor Scully, to let him bask in the ovations he so richly deserves.  The man is so humble that he probably won't want to make a big deal out of his retirement.  But it is a big deal, to all of us who used to hold radios to our ears when we were supposed to be sleeping, to all of us who have had an extra family member in Vin Scully.

I have had the great pleasure to cover the Dodgers this season from the press box.  The Vin Scully Press Box.  No thrill has been bigger than being able to be near Vin.  Hearing the deep timbre of his voice in close range sends chills down my spine.  I have passed him in the dining room a few times, and each time he acts as though its his pleasure to see me.

I hope I can be there to give Vin his proper send-off next season.  I'm certain there will be tears in my eyes, but they will be tears of joy.  For all the joy Mr. Scully has brought into my life all these years.  But, why wait until next year?  Show Vin your support now.  Write him a letter; tell him what he has meant to you.  Cherish every remaining moment you will have with a broadcasting legend. 

After all, as Vin likes to say, "if you want to make God smile, tell him your plans."

Do you have a favorite Vin Scully moment?  Please let us know in the comments below.

With the Dodgers set to play the Mets for a three game series beginning Tuesday, it is appropriate to review Darryl Strawberry's autobiography, "Straw: Finding My Way" (HarperCollins, 2009).

I hated Darryl Strawberry for years, because he threw away such a promising career, but more importantly, was a tremendous bust with the Dodgers.  Over the years, those feelings have waned, and this book has done what I would have thought impossible 15 years ago:  it made me a fan of Darryl Strawberry again.

I was ecstatic when Strawberry signed with the Dodgers before the 1991 season.  They were acquiring one of the best players in baseball, a player with seven straight All-Star appearances, and a sure fire Hall of Famer.  He had 252 home runs in his first eight seasons, which at the time was the seventh best start in MLB history, just one behind Hank Aaron.  He was a local boy coming home, with a big-time, $20.25 million, five-year contract, and I was prepared for nothing but a success story.

Strawberry didn't disappoint in 1991, putting up a scorching second half in the heat of a pennant race with Atlanta, one eventually won by the Braves.  After that initial season with the Dodgers, however, years of hard living finally caught up with Strawberry.  Over the next two years, he appeared in only 75 games while battling injuries, crack cocaine, and alcoholism, and hit a meek .199/.300/.355, an 83 OPS+.  He was released by the Dodgers in s 1994, with almost two years remaining on the contract.  As Strawberry noted:

The media were really on my case by then.  They wondered if my back was as bad as I was making out.  Maybe I was just malingering and pulling a scam on the Dodgers.  They wondered if the Dodgers had bought a pig in a poke.  They hinted that the team was considering canceling my contract.  I hated them for it, but looking back, who could blame them?

All through '92, '93, I was one bitter, foul soul.  Full of rage and hate, incredibly frustrated, and forced to be idle.  Terrible combination.  I coped the way I always did, slipping deeper and deeper into the alcoholism and drug addiction.  Looking for the next party, the next one-night stand, anything to distract me from myself and my self-inflicted problems.

Throughout the book, Strawberry is open and honest about his transgressions, and he does not shy away from them.  He talks about how he grew up with a father who never loved him, and as a result Strawberry never really loved himself.   He openly talks about once hitting his pregnant girlfriend, among other mistakes, and makes no excuses.

Baseball always came easy to Strawberry, but as he noted:

My problem was I was still trying to figure out the manhood thing on my own.  Because playing baseball doesn't teach you how to be a man.  Baseball isn't life.  It's a game.  Whenever I hear baseball compared to life I have to scratch my head.  Baseball is easy compared life.  There are clear rules and regulations and stats.  It has obvious winners and losers.  The paths and lines are all straight and well-marked.  Life isn't like that at all.  Life is chaos and confusion.  It's much harder to figure out. 

He's no hero, but what I like about this book is that Strawberry doesn't claim to be.  The story of his life is still compelling, and is a cautionary tale for many who read it.  Strawberry truly did hit rock bottom, and lived to tell about it.  He seems genuinely happy these days to be living in his own skin, and in the end isn't that what everybody wants?

Photo courtesy of Amazon.com.

"Manny Being Manny," an Original Song by Gory Bateson (via nictruj)

Manny's coming back!!!!!

100 Things Dodgers Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die, written by Jon Weisman, is a wonderful book that no Dodger fan should be without.  Not only is the book chock full of facts, anecdotes, tidbits, and trivia about Dodger history -- both Brooklyn and Los Angeles -- but the wonderful writing of Weisman gives this book a broad appeal, to hardcore and casual fans alike.

Weisman has written about the Dodgers for almost seven years on Dodger Thoughts, and has set a high standard of writing his readers -- myself included -- come to expect.  This book did not disappoint.  His writing is clever, witty, humorous, and is written in such a comfortable, conversational tone that the reader feels invited, if not compelled, to read further.

Phil Gurnee called Weisman a poet, and at times he was.  While Phil was moved by the chapter on Kirk Gibson's homer, and rightfully so, here are a few of my favorite parts of the book:

• Dodger history is so full of moments, narrowing them down to only 100 seems near impossible.  Weisman worked around this with the occasional sidebar, including a very informative one analyzing Tommy Lasorda's decision to pitch to Jack Clark in Game 6 of the 1985 NLCS
• About the Mike Piazza trade in 1998, Weisman eloquently wrote: "It wasn't that the Dodgers were robbed of talent.  Sheffield was a tremendous hitter.  It was that the Dodgers were robbed of half of a great novel.  They got the War without the Peace."
• I particularly enjoyed the chapters on Don Newcombe, Peter O'Malley, and the now outdated Wes Parker Cycle
• I laughed out loud when, writing about Dodger Dogs, Weisman noted, "Dodger Dogs are controversial, and not for Upton Sinclair The Jungle reasons."

I really can't say enough about this book.  I have a pretty good grasp of Dodger history, but this book not only taught me new things but also expanded upon subjects I thought I knew all about.  Even though I have read the book once, the 100 chapters make this a perfect reference book to refer to and reread over and over again.

Weisman mentioned that there isn't a definitive book about Don Newcome, and that if he didn't write it someone should.  Well, if Weisman can write a book about Newcombe half as good as "100 Things," I'll be the first in line to buy it.

I would like to add a 101st item for Dodger fans to do before they die:  buy this book.

She is crashing down from the sky; mass times acceleration, a shooting star at mission completion. She is in our heads, she is in our astonishment, she is in our incredulous joy, she has broken into our ever-loving, un appeasable souls, and exploded.

She is ...

Gone!!!

Eric Stephen will be doing the definitive True Blue review of Jon Weisman's book 100 Things Dodgers Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die but I asked him to let me write a snippet about this part of the book because I was so moved by his words.

In Chapter Two Jon writes about Vin Scully and how he's a artist with the ability to paint a game. Instead of me trying to dully describe what Jon says about Vinny how about I give you his own words.

...his voice is a cozy quilt on  a cold morning, a cool breeze on a blistering day; that he's more then someone you listen to, that he's someone you feel.

It was chapter five that sealed the deal for me. The quote at the top of the page is just a part of of several paragraphs that left me mesmerized as Jon describes Gibby's home run in a whole new way. When I finished that chapter before I put the book down to be completed on another day. I wanted to savor his words, so I read chapter five aloud to my wife, and while doing so could feel my voice breaking with the emotion of the beauty of his description of what is arguably the greatest Dodger moment in our memories.

I've finished the book but chapter five alone is worth the book. The title suggests a fluff book  but it is anything but a fluff book. In someone else's hands this book might have been much less then what it is. In Jon's capable hands he will enlighten and entertain you about the team you love.  Anybody who calls themselves a Dodger fan should be ordering this book not only for themselves but for any and all of their Dodger friends and family. The paperback is the perfect companion to read between innings while watching the game on TV or even at the ballpark.

Last night we went to the premiere of Blutopia amid high hopes for an entertaining evening. The production company put on a nice gala at the Pacific Design Center with Dodger players Matt Kemp, Andre Ethier, and Clayton Kershaw in attendance. As we learned later after watching the movie many of the people at the premiere were fans who were highlighted in the movie. Quite an eclectic group of fans, they were interesting but were they interesting enough to carry a movie?

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