Over the last eight seasons, no team has won as many games as Dave Robert’s Dodgers. 753. His teams have won seven division titles, three NL pennants, and a World Series. Lasorda and Alston, probably the two most celebrated managers in Dodger history, never came close to that kind of success. Different eras, of course. Lasorda’s teams won two World Series, seven years apart. His 1977 and 1978 teams went…
On September 29th, 1976, Walter Alston, who had been the Dodgers manager since 1954, stepped down and retired. He was replaced by third base coach, Thomas Charles Lasorda. Tommy had been a part of the Dodger organization on and off since 1949 when the Dodgers drafted him from his original, and favorite team, the Philadelphia Phillies. He had quite a career at AAA, but never reached those heights in the…
Two men in the long history of the Dodgers managed for 20 seasons or more. Walter Alston, and Tom Lasorda. Manny Mota and Jim Gilliam had careers of more than ten years with LA and then coached for several more years. Vin Scully was the voice of the Dodgers for 67 years. Most teams do not come close to having someone save an announcer here and there around that long….
In the NBA, they change coaches more than some of you change your underwear. The other day, someone asked me, “Do you wear boxers or briefs?” I said, “Depends…” It also might depend on when you ask about Dave Roberts’s shelf life. This is Doc’s 8th year as the Dodger Manager, with 661 wins and 388 losses. That’s a .630 winning percentage. Among any manager in baseball history with at…
Gamer. that single word fits Bill Buckner like a glove. In all the years he played, the guy played at full speed all the time. He played hard, and he wanted to win. He was ostracized for years over an error made in a World Series loss. He endured it all and never complained, and he returned to the scene of the so-called crime and was welcomed as a hero….
… and that, my friends, is a good thing! Expectations were sky-high for the Los Angeles Dodgers last season, as everyone in baseball believed they were a powerhouse! Yes, they did win 111 games, but a lot (and I mean A LOT) went wrong. I won’t list every little thing, but consider these things as going VERY WRONG: Justin Turner, the heart and soul of the team, really regressed to…
William Ellis Russell was born Oct 21, 1948, in Pittsburgh, Kansas. He would spend his entire career as a Dodger. Eighteen years, 2,181 games, four pennant winners, and one World Series Championship. He took over as manager in 1996 after Lasorda had his heart attack. Russell is second to only Zack Wheat on the list of games played as a Dodger. He was drafted in the 9th round of the…
After a lot of seriousness in the playoff chase maybe it’s time for a little levity, and you can easily do that by bringing up former Dodger skipper Tommy Lasorda. With the Phillies in the World Series, I was thinking back at the rivalries the Dodgers had with that ballclub. We faced them in the playoffs in ’77, ’78, ’83, ’08 and ’09. There is history between us. There were…
Orel Leonard Hershiser. Tommy called him “Bulldog.” Born in Buffalo, N.Y., on September 16, 1958. His name is etched in Dodger history alongside many of their greatest pitchers. Most of that praise comes from one magical season when the stars aligned, and he was the best pitcher in the game. His performance in the regular season, the playoffs, and World Series carried the Dodgers to their fifth title in Los…
We are going to take a look back at all the former owners of the Dodgers. Not in depth, but just a glimpse at the evolvement of the team. Most of them, you know at least something about; others, not so much. Ferdinand Abell and Charles Byrne were the two main owners that formed the 1883 team that would one day become the Dodgers. Abell was a casino owner, putting…