Oy Vey

It seems the Dodgers are in the process of making a move that's almost as tragic as getting rid of Dodger Dogs would have been. According to TJ Simers in Sunday's Times,

You wanted more hits, and so the Dodgers have responded the best way they know how.

In the biggest blockbuster move to date under the new ownership of the Boston Parking Lot Attendant [Simers' nickname for Dodger owner Frank McCourt, who made his millions on parking lots in Boston], the team will no longer allow organist Nancy Bea Hefley to play anything other than a pregame ditty, the national anthem and "Take Me Out to the Ballgame."

In place of the traditional sounds of the organ during the game, a disc jockey will now play CD hits.

This is the kind of thing that would usually get me to write some angry and nostalgic post about how fucking stupid this is. But Les Carpenter, a columnist for the Seattle Times, did my job for me. His whole article is here. Some good pieces:

For 17 years as the organist at Dodger Stadium, Nancy Bea Hefley has lulled babies to sleep, moved fathers to sing with their sons and tempted mothers to dance in the aisles simply by tapping her fingers.

Yet on this night, as on so many nights these days, she sits ...

And does nothing.

Her kind is dying now. A game that thrived through the last century on the ballpark organ jingle has decided in the new millennium that the melody of baseball is no longer good enough. In order to properly enjoy a $32 box seat and $4 hot dog, today's fan apparently needs the stadium speakers pulsing to the steady thump of any one of about 20 songs that can be found on CDs with names like "Jock Jams" or "Rock 'n Jock."

Not that you can't tell if you're in Cleveland, Tampa or Lincoln, Neb., or at a football game, a hockey game or a soccer match. Everywhere you go it's the same 20 songs; the only thing that changes is the order in which they're played.

And the Nancy Bea Hefleys of baseball are left to their knitting.

...soon the day will probably come when no one will have an organ and there will be no more Nancy Bea Hefleys left in the game.

"People come to me and say 'I wish you would play more,' " Hefley says. "I play what I'm told to play, that's life, go with the flow. Change is not always good, but change is coming anyway."

And another piece of everything that was once good about baseball is chipped away.

I don't know her, but Carpenter's piece confirms Nancy Bea's place as one of my favorite people. I hope the Dodgers reconsider. If out-of-town writers are talking about how much they'll miss her music, then she's something special, right?

Comments

[JFOR]

Ha ha, Milton Bradley is a psycho