I’m not sure exactly what year it was, maybe 2012 or 2013, but I know it was late February, it was a weekday and there had been a slight dusting of overnight snow.

It was about 10 a.m. and I was sweeping my driveway when my phone rang. I looked at the number and said, “Uh oh.” The guy on the other end had called for a reason. It wasn’t for small talk. I went inside and called back.

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Vince Bagli, Baltimore broadcasting legend, picked up.

Before I could ask him what was up, he immediately cut me off.

“Are you OK?”

“Yeah, Vince, I’m fine. Why?”

“Well, I haven’t seen your byline in two weeks, I was afraid they let you go.”

I laughed. And I was genuinely moved.

Back in those days, when I was an Orioles writer for the Baltimore Sun, we seemingly wrote every day. But, during spring training, I would split time with columnist Peter Schmuck. He’d work the first three weeks of spring and I would work the final three. And, during the period I wasn’t in Florida, I’d take time off to prepare for the upcoming, eight-month slog.

Bagli, who was in his 80s then, read the Sun — and our bylines — daily. And when he stopped seeing my name for more than a week he was afraid I had been laid off or had taken a buyout, as many of my Sun colleagues already had done.

I assured him it was all good. That I was still employed. Unless he knew something I didn’t, which was possible since he was “The Dean of Baltimore Sports.”

He said, “No,” and we laughed together.

That’s the first thing I thought about Wednesday morning when I learned that Vince Bagli had died at age 93 on Tuesday evening.

The day that one of the most beloved broadcasters in Baltimore history called to check in on me.

He did it the following February, too, just making sure it was my scheduled time off again.

That was Vince. He had accomplished so much in this town — including being a voice of the Baltimore Colts, sports director at WBAL-TV from 1964 to 1995 and, initially, a sportswriter for the old Baltimore News-American. But he never placed himself ahead of anyone. He was there to pave the way for the next generation. Especially if you were passionate about your craft.

Bagli did that back in 1969 for a local kid who was working in the paint department at Montgomery Ward and was trying to break into the broadcasting business. The 20-something wannabe interviewed for the weekend sports job at WBAL — while Bagli handled weekdays as the director — and he didn’t get it. But Bagli told the young man there was an open door for him to come back and learn the ropes whenever he wanted. That guy spent the next few months working for free at WBAL before Bagli pushed to get him on the payroll at the station. That kicked off a 50-year career in local sports broadcasting for Tom Davis.

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“I didn’t get the job (initially), but Vince said, ‘Look, if you want to come around and hang around and learn the business a little bit, I’ll be glad to let you in.’ And he took an interest in me,” said Davis, who has been a fixture on Orioles broadcasts for decades with Home Team Sports and MASN. “From the fall of 1969, I worked for free until February of ’70, when I was hired for what would be a glorified copy boy but is known as an intern now. A couple years later, I wound up getting the job I didn’t get (in 1969), all because Vince went in and pushed for them to hire me.”

When local TV news was king, Bagli was Channel 11’s Everyman who just happened to find himself in the spotlight. He loved sports and he loved the job, but he mainly just loved people.

“After he did the early evening sports (report), he’d go home to his family,” Davis said. “He had six kids, and he wanted to make sure he saw all of them, had dinner with them. And then he would go back to the station at 9:30 or 10 o’clock for the 11 o’clock sports. Family was so important to him. All the time.”

Bagli gradually became family to everyone in Baltimore because he was so genuine. So real.

When the Baltimore Colts skipped town for Indianapolis that awful night in 1984, Bagli was deeply affected. He had been a Colts broadcaster; he had been a fan. So, when he delivered the news the next day, he didn’t do it as a polished pro broadcaster. He did it as a pissed-off Baltimorean.

I wrote in a blog entry about local broadcasting in 2011 that Bagli’s memorable countenance that day in 1984 was, “like Baltimore’s angry, grieving uncle, explaining to the rest of the family about the untimely death of a loved one.”

He called me to thank me for the piece and to tell me he liked that depiction. He was mad and hurt because his city was mad and hurt.

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“In the broadcasting business, there’s a lot of equipment, there’s a lot of technology, there’s a lot of hurdles, there’s a lot of people, and Vince could just cut through all of that stuff and make it feel like he was sitting at your kitchen table talking to you about sports one-on-one,” said Gerry Sandusky, WBAL’s current sports director who was mentored by Bagli for his first eight years at the station.

“It wasn’t always the most polished. It was never the most produced. It never had the most bells and whistles. But he knew who he was, he knew what his approach was, and he was comfortable in that style. And he took this big, behemoth machine called television and he made it this very intimate, personal way of communicating. It was truly his gift.”

Bagli also didn’t worry too much about broadcasting protocol. I clearly remember watching one Sunday night when he was attempting to announce NFL scores and they were scrolling more quickly than he could read them. Finally, he stopped, waved his hand at the camera and said, “Ah, they’re going too fast. You can read ’em yourself.”

“Vince didn’t mind breaking the fourth wall,” Sandusky said with a chuckle.

WBAL had a longtime floor director named Herb Willoughby, who one day was trying to signal Bagli about a change in the sports segment while Bagli was on the air. It was distracting, and Bagli didn’t know what message Willoughby was attempting to communicate.

“Vince is on camera, he’s talking to the viewer, and he looks at the camera and holds up his index finger and says, ‘Excuse me, just wait one second.’ And then he leans to the left, looks around the camera and says, ‘Herb, what are you trying to tell me?'” Sandusky recalled. “Only Vince could pull that off. If anybody else did that, it would seem like the wings were coming off the plane. But with Vince it was all just so comfortable that it all worked.”

Sandusky was the guy who took over for Bagli. But he’s careful about how that is worded.

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“I did not replace him. I do the job, but nobody replaces Vince Bagli. I was always very clear about that,” Sandusky said. “The things you love about Baltimore are the things you loved about Vince. … To me, he was as much a part of the fabric of this town as William Donald Schaefer, crabs, the Inner Harbor. If you’re gonna have a Mount Rushmore of all things Baltimore, you’ve got to put Vince Bagli on that.”

For years after Bagli retired, he would come to Sunday afternoon Orioles games and mingle with the media in the press lounge. I would always make it a point to chat with him for a few minutes, no matter how busy I may have thought I was.

One day, in 2015, I saw Vince in the lounge and he said, “You’re just the guy I was looking for. Can you do something for me?”

It was like the Godfather asking for a favor. I didn’t even know what he needed, but the answer was, enthusiastically, “Sure.”

He then reached into a bag at his feet, took something out and presented it to me. It was a copy of my book on Orioles history that was published that year. He said, “Would you mind signing this for me?”

That, honestly, was one of the highlights of my career. I have no idea what I wrote. I hope it was poignant and not hackneyed.

Regardless, I remember gliding down the back stairs at Camden Yards, going to my seat in the press box and turning to my Sun colleague, Kevin Cowherd, and telling him, “I just had the coolest moment for a Balmer boy.”

I recounted the story, and Cowherd nodded and said, simply, “Vince is the best.”

He was.

And he left behind so many people that would attest to that. Many who never met him but welcomed him into their homes nightly for 30-some years.

Bagli would end every broadcast with a signature line: “Good night, everybody. It’s been a pleasure.”

The same, Vince. The same.

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From all your friends, colleagues, protégés, viewers, extended family.

A pleasure.

(Photo: Courtesy of the Baltimore Orioles)

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