R.I.P. Scooter

"Holy Cow! It's a hit."

Phil Rizzuto, the beloved yet paradoxically underappreciated color commentator for Yankees broadcasts on WPIX Channel 11 was the sports announcer from my childhood. Much to my regret, I didn't get to go to many Yankees games nor I was particularly good on baseball trivia. As such, I could not be a "superfan."

But I liked Rizzuto.

It seems like Scooter was the only sports announcer on TV at that time who realized that the people at home where watching the screen and that those people had a basic understanding of the rules of baseball. Therefore, he didn't find it necessary to state the obvious, except for comic effect (see above).

At some point, it seems like Scooter realized he was getting paid to show up and be himself and that it wasn't always necessary to talk about the game, or baseball for that matter. Frequently apropos of nothing, one sensed that this completely freaked out the other announcers who seemed totally unable to respond.

Apparently, he'd often leave before the game was over. I understand that. Some of those years were pretty dismal for the Bombers. I like to imagine that one at least one occasion, he decided midsentence that