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Sure, the break from seeing one Met after another fall to the ground in pain has been welcome. But what pleasure can a National League New York fan get watching the Mets' primary in-division rival head inexorably toward a battle with the team's primary in-city rival?

The answer is a simple one: the broadcasting of Dodgers announcer Vin Scully. With Vin at the microphone, the Mets may not be in the playoffs, but the Brooklyn Dodgers certainly are.

In the eighth inning of Sunday night's 11-0 drubbing at the hands of the Phillies, many announcers would have devolved into silly personal stories, tried to fake banter with others in the booth, or simply checked out of the broadcast.

Scully was a joy to listen to in a blowout. He noted the fantastic statistical profile put up by the Phillies in inventive ways -- pointing out, for instance, that Philadelphia had, as a team, hit for the cycle by the second inning, "with a stolen base thrown in for good measure."

But probably the finest way that Scully distinguishes himself as an announcer, if not linguistically, is by finding ways to balance the myriad focuses of the listener within the framework of baseball.

His discussion naturally shifted to Game 4, providing a preview for the matchup most Dodger fans were already thinking about. He spoke of the Game 4 starter, providing unmatched background information for Randy Wolf's time in Philadelphia.

Somehow, Scully always finds facts that no one else does. I've probably written more columns on Ramon Castro than any other baseball writer, spoken to him plenty of times, yet Scully had information about Castro's baseball background I hadn't heard on a broadcast earlier this year.

His broadcast Sunday night was no different, detailing, with delightful twists of the phrase as throwaway lines -- "capacity crowd;" "full of beans;" "Philly bats';" "full of runs;" -- and a brief history even of a small group of fans in left-center field, tying it to a story about Philadelphia's Shibe Park.

But never at the expense of the game. Scully only adds value. And most enjoyably, Scully placed the Game 3 loss itself in larger historical context. He referenced the Brooklyn Dodgers' heartbreaking loss to the Phillies on the final day of the 1950 season -- providing details that allow you to view the game in your mind just as clearly as Scully describes the current game in front of him. Scully himself had the added benefit of being there.

To consider Scully's career breadth is to realize what a large portion of baseball history his time in the sport represents. Put in percentage terms, by calling games since 1950, he's broadcast more than 45 percent of the seasons in which the National League has existed -- the Senior Circuit, don't forget. (Had he been an American League announcer, he'd have broadcast well over half of the campaigns.)

His first year, 1950, preceded Joe DiMaggio's retirement. At that time, Stan Musial's career was less than half over, as was Jackie Robinson's. Casey Stengel had one World Series victory. Keith Hernandez was three years from being born.

Yet with so many of these legends, we are forced to grade them on a curve. We give them credit for time in the game, and adjust our expectations accordingly. We allow for a slowing of the rate of insight, trading that for the chance to hear about times we never experienced.

This is unnecessary with Vin Scully. His delivery is smooth, his ability to focus on the various frameworks that make baseball the preeminent sport never detract from the simplicity of letting people know the score of the game, the game situation, the little physical details and movements of player and manager that make baseball on the radio such an aesthetic pleasure.

Scully never falls into the trap of so many older observers of baseball or any pastime -- he never favors the old over the new simply because the old is more familiar. He also brings the wisdom and perspective to compare, effectively, the new to the old. When Shane Victorino led off first base early in Sunday night's game, Scully picked up a tell on when he'd likely to be stealing and then compared it to a similar tell that Darryl Strawberry betrayed as a member of the Dodgers.

He is always interesting, always brilliant, and the wit comes with the package as well. With Cliff Lee batting and the Phils already well ahead, the typical Scully moment arrived. Somehow, Scully knew that Cliff Lee's favorite food is Spam.

"I mean, really," Scully drolly added, and left it at that.

Less was more. No rant. Just the right amount of humor. As Scully himself could tell you, brevity is the soul of wit.

This summer, Vin Scully pronounced the first discordant note of his career, when he said he would consider retiring after the 2010 season. For the son of a Brooklyn Dodgers fan, the prospect of Scully off the air couldn't be more upsetting. I never got to see Gil Hodges or Duke Snider play, or Jackie Robinson go home-to-third on a triple.

Ebbets Field was apartments decades before I was born. But I can still call my father, as I did on Sunday night, and tell him that Vin Scully was on the air.

Much has changed since 1950. I was listening to Scully in the car, through my telephone's wireless internet connection. But neither Scully's presence, nor his ability to broadcast a baseball game like no one else, has differed since two years before John Kennedy was first elected to the United States Senate.

With a child on the way, I will admit to the borderline-insane practice of taking earbuds, plugging them into the Scully call of the Dodgers' playoff games, and placing one in my ear, the other in my wife's belly button. If I am to play Mozart and Brahms, Lester Young and Clifford Brown for the baby, I want to share Vin Scully, too.

So the baby has to listen to Charlie Steiner and Rick Monday for innings 4-6. Steiner and Monday are fine broadcasters. But after three innings of Scully -- I mean, really.

So turn off the television volume this evening, and tune into MLB Gameday Audio's call of the Dodgers and Phillies. Enjoy Vin Scully while you can, until the day he decides he's called his last game. We have no right to complain when he makes this choice. We've already been lucky to have the best baseball announcer in the game's history grace us for the longest tenure. It would be like getting Sandy Koufax's prime for 60 years.

Top of the ninth inning, and Vin Scully compared himself to a survivor in a science fiction film, wondering aloud if anyone was still listening. He is a legend, without any of the pomposity he's earned the right to have.

Anyone smart enough not to walk out of a great symphony performance still had Scully on.

New York's National League fans, like me, have a rooting interest that, whether they ultimately win or lose, the Los Angeles Dodgers go to the World Series -- and the series goes seven games.