Managing expectations, Day 23: Second interviews are coming, but who’s in the group? Update.

Kirk Gibson

Former Arizona Diamondbacks manager and 1988 World Series hero Kirk Gibson is no longer a candidate to get a second interview for the Dodgers’ managerial vacancy. (Getty Images)

ESPN.com reported today that the Dodgers will hold second interviews with four managerial candidates from a group including Gabe Kapler, Dave Roberts, Darin Erstad, Bud Black and Kirk Gibson.

Two sources familiar with the process told me that this is not entirely accurate. One source told me that three candidates, not four, will get second interviews, and that one of the three might not be from the group of five ESPN reported. So we’ll see. The Dodgers aren’t confirming a specific number of second-interview candidates yet.

Update (1:07 p.m.): Two more relevant nuggets as the Dodgers whittle down the field:

Update (10 p.m.): Erstad is out, and ESPN has scratched Gibson from the list on its original report.
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Managing expectations, Day 14: Bob Geren and Kirk Gibson, opposite ends of the spectrum. Update.

Kirk Gibson

Kirk Gibson will reportedly interview for the Dodgers’ managerial vacancy. (Getty Images)

Kirk Gibson could have done practically anything with his life after October 15, 1988, and none of it would change how Dodger fans remember him first and foremost. Gibson’s home run off Dennis Eckersley in the 1988 World Series is number one on many lists in these parts.

Ranked somewhere far behind that in Gibson’s L.A. story: he will be counted among those who interviewed to replace Don Mattingly as the Dodgers’ manager, according to multiple reports Wednesday. The Dodgers have also received permission from the New York Mets to interview bench coach Bob Geren.

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Daily Distractions: Vin Scully returns, dissecting the trade, real best songs of the millennium.

Vin Scully

Vin Scully is returning to the Dodgers’ broadcast booth in 2014. (photo by J.P. Hoornstra)

The Dodgers announced this morning that Vin Scully will return in 2014, calling all games in California and Arizona as he’s done the past two seasons. It will be Scully’s 65th season behind the mic, and he’ll talk more about it at 2:45 p.m. today. (Follow along on Twitter and Tout for live updates.)

Scully said in a statement released by the team this morning that, “other than being home with my family, there is no place else I’d rather be” than Dodger Stadium. Few would disagree that Scully still sounds right at home in the booth.

Consider this: When he began broadcasting Brooklyn Dodgers games in 1950, the team had yet to win a World Series. Three years later, at the age of 25, Scully became the youngest person to ever broadcast a World Series game.

The Dodgers would love to give him one more before the year’s over.

Some bullet points for a Remembrance of the Slave Trade Abolition Day:
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