Geraldo Carrillo – Moving on Up

July 29, 2020

This definitely has turned out to be a different summer which is also slipping away very quickly. Starting on  Friday we will be wearing masks for indoor activities. My best friend since the sixties has just completed 20 radiation treatments for prostate cancer and we are under a heat wave with very high humidity. Baseball has resumed at the MLB level, at least temporarily, and as fans we should be…

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Meet JP

July 20, 2020

No, not JP Howell whom I expect we all remember well. JP, as in Dodger catcher Joe Pignatano. For some unknown reason, his name popped into my head the other day. Perhaps it is because I am partial to catchers. Older Dodger fans such as myself will remember Joe. He is now one of the oldest living Brooklyn Dodgers at age 90. Joe Pignatano was truly a Brooklyn Dodger. He…

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Bill Haselman

July 13, 2020

Last Friday in a post on LADT our own DodgerBlueMom indicated she hoped a Bill Haselman column could be posted as he is one her favorite AAA managers. It just so happens that I had posted an article on Haselman in Think Blue LA way back on January 18, 2014. What follows is a reprint of that article with a few editorial changes and an update through his time in…

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Zach Fitzpatrick – Dodgers Assistant Director of Amateur Scouting

July 10, 2020

I have to tell you folks that with minor league ball gone belly up my baseball oxygen is basically depleted. I am only on life support with MLB and the goings on. The Dodgers have thus far signed only one undrafted free agent – righty Robbie Peto out of Stetson University. A few signings would definitely provide some more baseball oxygen for me. I have looked at the 60-man roster…

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The Fall of Baseball Cards

July 3, 2020

This is the second part in the two-part article on baseball cards penned back in 2012. I had collected baseball cards as a youngster in the fifties. Unfortunately, I gave my collection to a good friend in 1957 when my family moved from the small town of Lunenburg in Nova Scotia to the city of Edmonton, Alberta. At that point, my life was over – or so I thought, and…

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The Rise of Baseball Cards

July 2, 2020

This is for Bear although he most likely has all of this in his data bank and more. It is a rerun of an article I posted on Think Blue LA back in December  of 2012. At that time I wrote: Yesterday I spent some quality time with myself organizing and cataloging my latest Clayton Kershaw and Matt Kemp baseball cards. Today, I will take my Duke Snider cards out…

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Gavin Stone – from Bear Purple to Dodger Blue

June 15, 2020

Right-hander Gavin Stone was selected by the Dodgers in the fifth and final round of the 2020 First-Year Player Draft. He was the penultimate selection in the draft at No.159 one pick before the 160th and final selection. He was rated the 303rd best-prospect in the draft by Baseball America. He is third-highest Central Arkansas MLB draftee in school history, and highest since 1992. He is the 23rd Bear to…

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Carson Taylor – A Closer Look

June 13, 2020

https://www.mlb.com/video/dodgers-draft-c-taylor-no-130?t=mlb-draft Draft night is always an exciting time because of what might be in the not too distant future. It was especially exciting this year as it came in the midst of a world without baseball. Since there were only five rounds, it was a different kind of draft not leaving teams much room for error and providing a less take-a-chance atmosphere. That would be true for most teams, but…

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Luis Who?

June 3, 2020

A while back I had posted a column on Dan Bankhead, the first African-American pitcher in MLB. I knew the answer to that trivia question. To this one I did not know the answer. Namely, who was the first Puerto Rican player to play at the MLB level with the Dodgers? He was not the first to play MLB coming in second but was the first position player from Puerto…

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Cape Cod Baseball League

May 29, 2020

A long time ago when the earth was young – well maybe not that long ago – I visited the Cape Cod region of Massachusetts. It was almost 45 years ago and it was a whirlwind visit as a day trip from East Bridgewater, a small community about 30 miles south of Boston. My wife and I were visiting relatives in the East Bridgewater area and they took us on…

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