Saying goodbye to Nancy Bea Hefley
The Sporting Tribune's Arash Markazi writes about his memories of legendary Dodgers organist Nancy Bea Hefley, who passed away Saturday at 89 years old.
Good morning and welcome to The Morning Column at The Sporting Tribune. It’s the first of our weekday 6@6 series, where you can catch The Morning Column, Arash Markazi’s daily notebook, at 6 a.m., and then watch and listen to The Sporting Tribune Today at 6 p.m. on X. The show, which is hosted by Arash Markazi and Grant Mona, will hit on the top stories of the day and will also air on KIRN 670 AM in Southern California, 98.5 The Bet in Las Vegas and The Hawaii Sports Radio Network 95.1 FM and 760 AM in Hawaii.
LOS ANGELES – Six thoughts for Monday:
1. As great as the opening week was for the Los Angeles Dodgers after they raised their World Series flag, handing out their World Series rings and started the season 5-0, the team sadly announced the passing of long-time organist Nancy Bea Hefley, who was 89 years and played the organ at Dodger Stadium from 1988 to 2015.
Hefley famously played “Master of the House” from “Les Miserables” whenever Orel Hershiser took the mound and “Food, Glorious Food” from “Oliver!” when the scoreboard advertised food specials. There was a special bond between Hefley and Dodgers fans that was forged over a quarter century.
Growing up as Dodgers fan, who fell in love with the team during their magical World Series run in 1988, Hefley was as much a part of the fabric of the Dodgers as Vin Scully and Tommy Lasorda. I got to know Hefley and her husband, Bill, over the years when I started covering the team for Sports Illustrated and ESPN.
By the time Hefley retired in 2015, the Dodgers had all but phased her out. We often joked that you could count the number of times she played the organ in-game on one hand during her final season.
One of my favorite memories of Hefley didn’t take place at Dodger Stadium but at Angel Stadium in Anaheim. When Manny Ramirez joined the Chicago White Sox late in the 2010 season after being waived by the Dodges, Hefley and her husband drove to Anaheim to catch up with Ramirez and another former Dodger who was in Chicago, Juan Pierre, before leaving for their home in Silver Springs, Nevada prior to the opening pitch. She made that 450-mile commute to every Dodgers homestand but I’ll never forget her making that commute just to give a former player a pregame hug.
"When Manny arrived, the team wasn't doing anything and he just brought a spark," she told me after giving Ramirez and Pierre a big hug each in the visitor's dugout. "He brought a spark to the team in the dugout and on the field and made it very exciting."
Hefley made every Dodgers game she performed at exciting and she will be missed.
2. After Roki Sasaki’s nightmarish home debut at Dodger Stadium on Saturday, cameras caught an emotional Sasaki in the Dodgers dugout.
Really tough seeing Rōki Sasaki emotional after his outing.
He’s 23 years old. Stuff is nasty. He’ll be great in MLB.
pic.twitter.com/5Z0tmhXRSx— Ben Verlander (@BenVerlander) March 31, 2025
Sasaki's Dodger Stadium debut ended in the second inning after he issued four walks and got only five outs while throwing 61 pitches to 12 batters. The video of him nearly in tears in the dugout after getting puled by Dodgers manager Dave Roberts went viral online. It was from the Japanese broadcast not from the Spectrum SportsNet LA telecast so it was the first time most fans had seen Sasaki visually rattled. Having just spent a week in Japan covering four Dodgers games, the telecasts in Japan focus on every movement of Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinbu Yamamoto and Sasaki in between pitches. Instead of watching the batter in the batter’s box or the pitcher on the mound, we get closeups of Ohtani, Yamamoto or Sasaki eating sunflower seeds or drinking water.
Not only did I not have an issue with Sasaki’s reaction to getting pulled early, I thought it showed how badly he wants to be great and how much he wants to be a part of this team’s success early. The truth is, he’s just 23 years old, he’s going to get better and the Dodgers are 5-0 this season with the deepest pitching staff in baseball and they don’t need him to be a Cy Young candidate early in his rookie season. I was actually more concerned about Yamamoto after his first start last season when he allowed five runs on four hits and a walk in only one inning of work with two strikeouts against the San Diego Padres. The five runs allowed were the most ever by a Dodgers starter in their major league debut pitching an inning or less. It was a far worse debut and we know how last season ended for Yamamoto and the Dodgers.
3. The UCLA women’s basketball team is headed to the program’s first-ever Final Four after beating LSU on Sunday. As much as basketball fans in Los Angeles would love to see a fourth match-up between USC and UCLA on Friday night in the Final Four in Tampa, USC enters Monday’s Elite Eight game against UConn as a heavy underdog. Without JuJu Watkins, USC enters Monday’s game as a 15-point underdog. It’s the biggest underdog a No. 1 seed has been in the tournament (men’s or women’s) in 25 years. Even without Watkins, USC has covered the spread over Mississippi State and Kansas State and it’s not hard to imagine them keeping the game against UConn, a team they beat earlier this season, within a dozen points.
4. The mantra for the Lakers entering the stretch run this season is “playoffs, not play-in.” It makes sense. Since winning the championship in 2020 (the first season the play-in tournament was introduced), the only times the Lakers have been in the playoffs have been after winning their way in through the play-in tournament as a team seeded between seven through 10. The Lakers don’t want to do that this season. After being as a high as the No. 2 seed they would like to remain in the top six and simply qualify for the playoffs without being in the play-in tournament.
To take that one step further, they would also like to be a top four seed and have home court advantage in the first round of the playoffs. The road to that goal begins tonight at home against the Houston Rockets. The Lakers only have eight games left in the season and will likely need to go 6-2 over that stretch if they want to be a top four team and start the postseason at home.
5. Major League Baseball released a list of the 20 most purchased jerseys since the 2024 World Series and it’s no surprise that the Dodgers dominate the list with six players in the top 16. Ohtani is No. 1 on the list followed by Freddie Freeman at No. 2, Mookie Betts at No. 4, Yoshinobu Yamamoto at No. 10, Clayton Kershaw at No. 11 and Kike Hernandez at No. 16.
6. The Kings will honor longtime play-by-play announcer Nick Nickson during a pre-game ceremony on Tuesday celebrating his hall of fame career before his retirement at the end of this season. Nickson is in his 44th season as the “Voice of the Kings” across radio and television. He has called over 3,800 Kings games.
It will be the end of an era in Los Angeles sports broadcasting after Bob Miller’s retirement in 2017, Ralph Lawler’s retirement in 2019 and, of course, the passing of Chick Hearn and Vin Scully. We were blessed with some of the most iconic voices in sports history.
“It has been an absolute privilege to bring the game to the listeners and viewers from one season to the next,” Nickson said in October after announcing his retirement. “Through it all, I have enjoyed calling every shot, every save, every goal, and two Stanley Cups. To my family and the Kings organization, thank you for your unwavering support and loyalty. To the great fans of Kings Hockey, thank you for your encouragement and kind words over the years. It has always meant the world to me.