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Vin Scully is undoubtedly the best baseball broadcaster alive today, and he will be severely missed by Dodgers fans after he retires at the conclusion of this season.
Along with Scully’s silky smooth voice and ability to find the perfect words at the perfect moment, he is also a master storyteller. In recent years, Scully has told us about the time Madison Bumgarner saved a baby rabbit, the time Jonny Gomes got attacked by a wolf, and gave a fitting tribute the late-great Yogi Berra.
During the Saturday afternoon matchup between the Dodgers and Padres, Scully was at it again, this time giving us a lesson about the history of the beard for nearly five straight minutes.
The 88-year-old broadcaster apparently decided to do his research about facial hair after watching so many players with glorious manes like Los Angeles’ Justin Turner and San Diego’s Derek Norris. Here is a partial transcript of Professor Scully taking us all to school, with some brief pauses to, you know, actually call the action.
Way back to the dawn of humanity beards evolved, number one, because ladies liked them — and number two, it was the idea of frightening off adversaries and wild animals. In fact, it was so serious, if you look it up, that there’s a divine mandate for beards in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. There became a time when Greek dramatists mined the popular prejudice against clean-shaved men. Back then, clean-shaven men were looked at as being, effeminate. And then along came Alexander The Great, and that’s another story. Alexander The Great was not only great but he also thought he was the greatest looking man in the world, Oh, absolutely. Alexander The Great said there is no reason to cover up my beautiful face with a beard, and so all of the sudden, it started to disappear.
It goes on for another few minutes, as the Padres extended the inning just long enough for Scully to bring it all the way back around to Abraham Lincoln. Vin Scully is the absolute greatest.
