Miracle NotebooK: The booth is his field of dreams

Like children of the 1980s, Sean Aronson loved his Nintendo.

But Aronson's passion wasn't popping in "RBI Baseball" and playing as his beloved Los Angeles Dodgers.

Aronson left the button-pushing to his friends. Instead, he stood off to the side and, with his hand serving as a microphone, did the one thing he knew even then he always wanted to do: he called the games.

Fifteen years later, he's still at it, except these days the microphone is real and the ballplayers are a little bigger than a couple of blips on a television screen.

Aronson, in his second year as the play-by-play voice of the Fort Myers Miracle, thinks he's a little bit better than he was in one of his friends' living rooms, and no less passionate.

"It's the only thing I ever wanted to do," said Aronson, 27.

And to hear him tell it, Aronson had no choice in the matter. When you grow up in the San Fernando Valley, the sky bleeds Dodger Blue during the summer, and the voice of Hall-of-Fame broadcaster Vin Scully is the cool blanket you fall asleep to.

"You can't stay up late, so you have to listen to the games on the radio," Aronson said. "That's what I did.

I learned the game of baseball from Vin Scully."

Even when he played the game during high school, Aronson would sit at the far end of the dugout while his team batted and broadcast the game to anybody within earshot.

"I knew if I wasn't good enough to play, then this is what I was going to do," said Aronson, who got his start during an internship with a minor league team in Colorado Springs, Colo.

From there, the University of Colorado graduate moved on to a minor league gig in Pennsylvania before moving on to the Miracle before last season.

Like the players he covers, Aronson, too, dreams of making it to the big time.

How big? Well, when you're a Dodger fan, there's only one job that really matters.

"I'd love to cover the Dodgers," Aronson said.

"That would be huge."

Mention to Aronson that it would be kind of difficult to replace Scully, who is in his 55th year calling Dodger games, and Aronson just laughs.

"Hey, it's got to be somebody," he said. "You're going to get at least one year, and if they run you out, you're in the second-biggest market in the country. You could pretty much get a job anywhere you want."

Not that he's in a rush to leave, and in his evolution as an announcer, Aronson thinks he's got "a long, long way to go."

That's why when you pop into his office during a random afternoon, you'll hear him listening to a tape of the previous night's game, figuring out what worked and what didn't.

It can be difficult, but it's never boring. Even in 8-1 games at the end of one of the normal 14-hour days he endures during the cramped Florida State League schedule, when he broadcasts 140 games in around 150 days.

While broadcasting is the best part of Aronson's job, the games are simply the final dash of a day-long sprint around Hammond Stadium. He gets to work at 9 a.m., a good 10 hours before first pitch. There are game notes to write and press releases to put together. It's all a part of his official job as "director of media relations."

There are sales meetings and phone calls to make on top of keeping tabs on a roster that is always in flux.

Aronson won't necessarily hang out with the players after the games, but he makes sure to introduce himself to the new guys and get a quick bio on them he can use during a broadcast, because odds are, the player's parents are listening over the Internet back home.

"I get the greatest joy out of meeting their parents," Aronson said. "When they come I'm usually the first one they want to meet."

Hammond Stadium might not be Dodger Stadium, but it's a start.

"I love what I do," he said.

"The best part of my day is when I put the headset on, doing what I truly love to do."

To listen to the Miracle on the radio at AM-770 or over the Internet, go to www.miraclebaseball.com.

NOTES: The Miracle released pitcher Marcus Moseley last week and added right-hander Pete Fisher to the roster. Fisher, 27, played with the Miracle in 1999 and 2000 before undergoing Tommy John surgery.

Francisco Liriano, who was called up to Class AA New Britain two weeks ago, pitched seven innings of one-run ball in his debut with the Rock Cats.

After creeping back to .500 a week ago, the Miracle have lost five straight despite hitting .306 for the week. The team didn't hit a home run during the losing streak.