Sometimes, a person can symbolize a city and a team without ever having taken the field to play. For L.A., that was Vin Scully, the longtime announcer for baseball's Dodgers.
Now, the Boys in Blue are returning to the World Series, and the time seems right to share stories about a man who believed in his team, his city, and his Catholic faith.
Vin Scully and the Los Angeles Dodgers
In 2020, during the strange days of the COVID-19 pandemic -- when riots erupted across Los Angeles -- the Dodgers bested the Tampa Bay Rays in the World Series, in front of sparse crowds at a stadium in Arlington, Texas.
It was the first time the team hit the Fall Classic without the legendary Scully, who called games for the team for 67 seasons.
But Scully, who retired at 88 in 2016, was on hand with words of sage advice for the team's loyal fans.
Now, it's 2025, and the Dodgers are returning to the World Series as the defending champion, playing Game 1 on Friday, Oct. 24, at the home field of the Toronto Blue Jays.
Unfortunately, Scully won't be there except in spirit, as he passed away in 2022, at the age of 94. Born in the Bronx, he began with the Brooklyn Dodgers, then followed the team to Los Angeles in 1958, where he became a fixture in the city.
Remembering Scully, a Friend of FTP
He was also a good friend of Family Theater Productions and of Father Willy Raymond, C.S.C. Father Willy, as he was generally known, was equally beloved in Hollywood while he was FTP's National Director, a post he held until 2014, when he went on to become president of our parent organization, Holy Cross Family Ministries.
FTP's current National Director, Father David Guffey, C.S.C., was on hand when Scully came to our studios in 2011 to shoot a special episode of the Faith Bowl series.
In a 2022 blog post commemorating Scully's passing, Father Guffey recalled:
We asked Vin to give a message about youth and sports. I offered to write something, or to put something he wrote on the teleprompter. He smiled and said, “I think I got this.”
A few minutes later, he gave a beautiful reflection, without pause or hesitation. One take. It was poetry.
Click here to watch the whole thing, but here's that excerpt:
Hearing More Tales of Vin Scully From a Man Who Worked With Him
Most months during the year, FTP has a live Prayer and Pasta event at our offices on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood, where we invite guests in to talk to our local entertainment community.
In October, we invited Gary Miereanu, a veteran journalist, publicist, and communications executive, who worked as vice president of communications for the Dodgers from 2004-2006.
He shared some recollections of Scully, saying, "He was a dear. Nobody ever calls me kid anymore aside from Vinny."
Then he told this story:
One of the great moments of this life was anytime Vinny asks you for anything or you got to do anything with Vinny. There was a funny moment during the trade deadline. The week leading up to trade deadline is mayhem. I carried two phones, and they would both be going off virtually 24/7. It was everybody calling you trying to check on a rumor, trying to check on that.
The general manager needed me in his office. We were strategizing how we were going to announce the trade or signing, whatever it was -- Two days before the Paul lo Duca trade.
I was just getting deluged. I went into my office. Now I've got both my cell phones ringing and my office phone ringing. There was this one moment where everything stopped, and I took a breath.
The phone rang and I grabbed it, and I went, "This is Gary." I hear, "Gary Miereanu, my young friend, how are you today?"
It was Vinny calling in. My brain short-circuited for a second. All I could think of was, "Vinny's saying my name on the radio."
It was that kind of moment. I was like, "Um, um." He's like, "Gar, kid, you OK?" I was like, "Vinny, sorry, man, everything's so crazed right now. I answered, and you saying my name, it felt like I was a kid again listening to you on the radio."
He said in classic Vinny style, right back to me, "Gar, we're all kids in this game."
And another story, this time connected to how Scully prepared for games:
He would get to the ballpark at 2:00 or 2:30 and do all his studying leading up. He would keep a binder on... Any Dodger fans here or ball fans? He'd keep a binder on each team.
We'd give him the press notes every day. But he would keep a little binder on every team, and he would make his own little notes. He'd read all of it, and he'd make his own notes. A lot of those stories he told were complete. They came right out of him.
Anyway, the binders. I was in his box when he was calling the game. We ended the game, and I went up and talked with him about something was happening next day, and he took the binder.
We were done with that series, and we weren't going to play the Diamondbacks the rest of the year. He took the binder, and he dropped in the trash can.
He turned his back, and I reached in to get the binder. I was like, "Are you kidding me?" I collect everything.
I went to grab it and he went, "Ah-ah-ah." I went, "Vinny, this is..." "No. I start fresh every year, and I don't want those things out there. Leave it there."
And a Remembrance From Another FTP Staffer
FTP's own producer-at-large, Father Vince Kuna, C.S.C. -- a chaplain both for the Dodgers and for visiting NFL teams -- also shared a memory:
The only time I went blank on a homily was my first Dodgers Mass in 2014. I had no idea Vin Scully served as lector for the two readings and the psalm at Sunday Mass.
After I proclaimed the Gospel, I went blank on my homily, because what I heard proclaimed earlier was like hearing the voice of God.
Luckily, I always type out my entire Sunday homily, and so, I preached it near verbatim, one of the few Sundays I’ve ever done that, because I almost always internalize my text and preach off the ambo.
It was a simultaneously humbling and inspiring moment. Rest in peace, Vin.
Saint Vin Scully?
Could Vin Scully ever become a saint? After all, our current pope is an American and a baseball fan (of the Chicago White Sox, not the L.A. Dodgers, but even so ...).
Recently, Dodger fan Tom Hoffarth wondered just that, in a piece for Angelus, the news website of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. In April 2024, he wrote a book called Perfect Eloquence: An Appreciation of Vin Scully.
In the post, he recalled:
Sports writer Ray Ratto once said of Scully: “He was the poet laureate we, even those who hate poetry, all needed but maybe didn’t earn. He was God’s own larynx.”
According to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, saints are those in heaven “officially canonized or not, who lived heroically virtuous lives, offered their life for others, or were martyred for the faith, and who are worthy of imitation.”
Candidates first become “venerable,” recognized by the pope as “having lived a heroically virtuous life.”
Reading that, I couldn’t help but wonder: Would Scully’s cause have a better chance with someone like Pope Leo XIV, a devoted Chicago White Sox fan who likely heard Scully call games during his national broadcasting network days?
Not to get ahead of ourselves or anything …
Image: Alamy/Credit Image: © Prensa Internacional via ZUMA Wire
Kate O’Hare, a longtime entertainment journalist, is Social Media Content Manager and Blog Editor at Family Theater Productions.
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