A Los Angeles Dodgers come the Major League Baseball team based inside Los Angeles, California. It is in the American Section of the National League. A team originated within Brooklyn before moving to Los Angeles for the 1958 season.

Team Nickname

Before the declaration of an official team nickname within 1933, sportswriters & fans applied a total of nicknames to the club. Early list involved a Brooks, a Atlantics (when an earliest Brooklyn Atlantics club), and a Bridegrooms (when many players married before a 1888 year). Whenever a streetcar lines were set up around Brooklyn, writers began calling a city & a team per somewhat dislogistic term Trolley Dodgers, which became shortened to Dodgers. Under manager Ned Hanlon (1899-1905), a team became called the Superbas, fallowing the popular (though unrelated) gymnastic company at that period known as "Hanlon's Superbas". Under manager Wilbert Robinson (1914-1931), a team was referred to as the Robins, though newspapers utilized Robins & Dodgers interchangeably, typically in the equivalent punt sum-up. There are no nickname was acknowledged in team uniforms until 1933, whilst a word Dodgers eventually appeared. Before that, it got sported either a word "Brooklyn" or even the conventionalised letter "B".

Rivalry with the Giants

A historic & heated contention between a Dodgers & a Giants is more than a century old, with begun whenever each clubs played inside Up to date York City (a Dodgers around Brooklyn and the Giants within Manhattan). Whilst each franchises moved to California in 1958, a competition wwhen well transplanted by using the two, as the cities of Los Angeles and San Francisco have long been competition around economic, ethnical, & political arenas throughout a history of the State of California.

Vin Scully

Vin Scully has served as a play-by-play announcer for the Dodgers for 55 years, the yearn tenure of any broadcaster by having one club inside agent sports history. Around 1976, he wwhen selected by Dodgers fans as a Virtually all Memorable Personality (on the field or even remove) in the team's history.

Franchise history

Early Brooklyn History

A Brooklyn club that would be a Dodgers was 1st formed within 1883, & joined a American Association the following month. A "Bridegrooms" won a AA pennant within 1889. Upon switch to the National League in 1890, a franchise became the sole a single inside MLB history to winside pennants inside different leagues in sequentially years. Eight years passed prior to any additional profits followed. Many Hall of Fame players were sold to Brooklyn by the soon-to-become-defunct Baltimore Orioles, along with their manager, Ned Hanlon. This catapulted Brooklyn to instant contention, & "Hanlon's Superbas" fulfil their title, winning pennants within 1899 and 1900.

Around 1902, Hanlon expressed his want to purchase the controlling interest in the team & move it (back, profits) to Baltimore. His project was blocked by the womb-to-tomb club employee, Charles Ebbets, who put himself heavy within debt to choose a team & keep it in the borough. Ebbets' ambition did non prevent at with a team. He desired to replenish a tatterdemalion Wa Park sustaining a freshly ballpark, & over again invested heavy to finance the construction of Ebbets Field, which would become a Dodgers' zero in 1913.

"Uncle Robbie" and the "Daffiness Boys"

Manager Wilbert Robinson, a second previous Oriole, popularly called "Uncle Robbie", restored a Brooklyn team to reputability, sustaining a "Robins" winning pennants around 1916 and 1920 and contending perennially for several seasons. Upon assuming a title of president, yet, Robinson's ability to focus on a field declined, & the teams of the late 1920s became known as a "Daffiness Boys" for their distracted, error-ridden style of play. Outfielder Babe Herman was the leader two around hitting & around zaniness. Fallowing his removal when club president, Robinson returned to managing, & a club's performance rebounded somewhat.

It was in the period of this era that Willard Mullin, a noted sports cartoonist, fixed a Brooklyn team sustaining the loveable nickname of "Dem Bums". Fallowing hearing his cab driver ask "So how did those bums do today?" Mullin decided to sketch an exaggerated version of noted circus clown Emmett Kelly to represent the Dodgers inside his good deal-praised cartoons in the New York World-Telegram. Two a image & the nickname caught in, such and then that numerous a Fox yearbook handle featured a Willard Mullin illustration by having the Brooklyn Bum.

Possibly a highlight of a Daffiness Boys era come when Wilbert Robinson experienced left the dugout. Around 1934, New York Giants manager Bill Terry was asked about a Dodgers' chances in the coming pennant race & cracked infamously, "Is Brooklyn still in the league?" Managed okay, by Casey Stengel (who played for the Dodgers in the 1910s and would go in to greatness managing an additional team), a 1934 Dodgers were determined to make their presence felt. When it happened, a year terminated by having a Giants attached by using the St. Louis Cardinals for the pennant, with the Giants' remaining games against the Dodgers. Stengel led his Bums to the Polo Grounds for a showdown & beat a Giants twice to knock the two away from the pennant race. A "Gas House Gang" Cardinals nailed a pennant by beating a Reds people equivalent deuce years.

A 1st major-league baseball to exist as televised was Brooklyn's 6-1 triumph all over Cincinnati at Ebbets Field on August 26, 1939. Batting helmets were introduced to Major League Baseball by the Dodgers around 1941

The End of the Color Barrier

For the number 1 half of the 20th century, non one African-American played on the Major League Baseball team. The parallel body of Negro Leagues developed, but several of the era's virtually all gifted players never had the risk to prove their skill prior to the national audience. A foremost step inside ending this injustice was taken by Jackie Robinson, when he played his number 1 major-league game in April 15, 1947, as a member of the Brooklyn Dodgers. This event was a herald of a integration of sports in the United States, the attendant death of the Negro Leagues, and is regarded as a key moment in the history of the Western Civil Rights movement. Robinson was an exceptional streaming video player, the speedy runner who sparked a whole team using his intensity, & was a presumption the maiden Rookie of the Year award.

"Wait 'Til Next Year!"

When the woods years of a Twenties & Thirties, the Dodgers were rebuilt into a contending club foremost by general manager Larry MacPhail and then the legendary Branch Rickey. Led by Pee Wee Reese, Jackie Robinson and Gil Hodges in the infield, Duke Snider in center field, Roy Campanella behind the shell, & Don Newcombe on the pitcher's mound, the Dodgers won pennants around 1941, 1947, 1949, 1952, and 1953. Altogether 5 of people Globe Series, even so, it were defeated per New York Yankees. A annual ritual of building excitement, followed in the prevent by disappointment, became old hat to the yearn suffering fans, & '''"Wait 'til next year!"''' became an unofficial Fox shibboleth.

Within 1955, by which time a core of the team was beginning to age, "next year" eventually come. A legendary "Boys of Summer" shot down the Bronx Bombers around vii games, led per foremost-class pitching of immature left-handed pitcher Johnny Podres, whose key pitch was a changeup known as "pulling down the lampshade" because of a arm motion utilized best after the ball was freed. Podres won both Series games including a crucial seventh. the turning point of Game 7 was a outstanding double play that began by using left fielder Sandy Amoros running down Yogi Berra's long fly, so throwing perfectly to shortstop Pee Wee Reese, who doubled higher the surprised Gil McDougald at first base to preserve a Fox lead.

Although a Dodgers once agawithin misused the World Series to the Yankees in 1956 (in which it became a people of history's lone postseason perfect game), it hardly seemed to matter. Brooklyn fans got their memory of triumph, & shortly that would exist as a lot it were left by owning.

The move to California

Real-estate man of affairs Walter O'Malley had acquired majority ownership of the team in 1950, when he bought the shares of his co-owner Branch Rickey. Shortly he was working to choose fresh l& inside Brooklyn to build the extra accessible and better panoplied ballpark than Ebbets Field. Honey when it was, Ebbets Field got grown old & was non easily-served by infrastructure, pertinent in which a virtually all pennant-competitive team in the National League couldn't sell the park retired possibly in the heat of the pennant race. Future York City building czar Robert Moses, however, sought to click O'Malley into utilizing the places within Flushing Meadows, Queens (the first places for Shea Stadium, where now's New York Mets play). Moses' vision taking part the city-built, city-owned park, which was greatly contradictory by using O'Malley's real-estate savvy. After it became clear to O'Malley that he wasn't attend exist as allowed to choose any suitable land within Brooklyn, he began mentation elsewhere.

Whenever a Los Angeles city fathers attended a 1955 World Series looking to entice a team to move to the City of Angels, it weren't possibly intellection of the Dodgers. Their original target was a Washington Senators (who would as a matter of fact move to Minnesota inside 1961). At a equivalent period, O'Malley was wanting to find a contingency just in case Moses & more Future York politicians refused to let him build the Brooklyn arena he wanted. O'Malley apprize to a Los Angeles officials at the Series that he was interested around talking. Los Angeles offered him what Up to date York would does'nt: the risk to acquire land suitable for building the newly ballpark.

Meanwhile, New York Giants owner Horace Stoneham was having similar difficulty sorting through the replacement for his archaic page arena, & them archrival teams moved dead set the West Coast together. In April 18, 1958, a Dodgers played their 1st game around Los Angeles, defeating a San Francisco Giants, 6-Five, prior to 78,672 fans at the Coliseum.

There has been lot arguing across a move of the Dodgers to California, possibly to a higher degree ended any more franchise move of that era. Walter O'Malley, particularly, is described when nefarious by a select few & admirable by others. Surely he demonstrated occasionally measure of selfishness & greed, however a equivalent is besides confessedly of the Up to date York City politicians world health organization opposed him. Two sides were quite unregenerate, & fatally misjudged every more. It should as well exist as noted that Brooklyn got declined around several ways, under various social pressures, & was the good deal less worthy location for the baseball team than it got been. As a matter of fact, each sides in a sports stadium dispute proposed to dislodge the Dodgers from either Brooklyn (Moses' project for the team within Flushing Meadows was realized many years down the road, by using little alteration, in the New York Mets). O'Malley besides deserves credit as a visionary. Until 1958, St. Louis had generally been the westernmost outpost of Major League Baseball, whereas 12 of baseball's 30 teams now have their homes farther west. O'Malley was primarily caring by having making himself super rich (which he did), & sure as shooting he broke a heart of numerous a Up to date Yorker, however his move besides helped lead the game of baseball to greater prominence & prosperity.

A New Start

A run of building Walter O'Malley's dream arena presently began inside semi-rural Chavez Ravine, in the hills good northward of downtown L.The. There wwhen a few political contention, as a residents of the ravine, mostly Hispanic and mostly poor, resisted a eminent domain removal of their homes, and gained occasionally public sympathy. However, O'Malley & a city government were determined, & construction proceeded.

Meanwhile, a Dodgers played their front yard games from either 1958 to 1961 at a Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, a giant football & track-&-field sports stadium that got been built to persons a 1932 Summer Olympics. A Amphitheatre's dimensions were non optimum for baseball, & a lone way to healthy a diamond into a ovoid-elliptical bowl was to lay a third-base line ahanker a short axis of a ellipse, & the 1st-base line along the long axis. [http://www.ballparkwatch.com/stadiums/past/la_coliseum.htm See picture.] This resulted around the left-field fence that was just occasionally 250 feet from either either plate, & the Forty-foot screen was erected to end residence diarrhea from becoming as well real life to hit. However, a 195Eighter from decatur year saw 182 front yard diarrhea hit to left field in the Amphitheater, when exclusively Deuce-ace were hit to center field & 8 to perfect field. Dodgers outfielder Wally Moon, newly acquired for a 1959 year, became expert at launching sleeping fly on top the screen, which became called "Moon shots."

Around 1959, the Dodgers benefited from either the general decline in the National League. There are no team was dominant, & many teams were in a midst of the pennant race until the super prevent. a year ended inside a tie between a Dodgers & the Milwaukee Braves, and a Dodgers won a tie-breaking playoff. 1959 too saw a team otherwise the Yankees win the The.L. pennant, one of exclusively 2 such years between 1949 & 1964. Inside the lively World Series, a Dodgers defeated the "Go-Go" White Sox in 6 games, thoroughly cementing a attach between a team & its newly California fans.

Pitching, Defense, and Speed

Constructiin on Dodger Stadium was completed in time for Opening Day 1962. By owning its clean & jerk, elementary lines & its picturesque setting amid hills & palm, the ballpark quickly became an icon of the Dodgers & their newly California modus vivendi, and it remains a dear landmark to this day. O'Malley was determined that there would non exist as the bad seat in the home, achieving this by cantilevered grandstands that have since been widely imitated. Extra importantly for a team, the arena's spacious dimensions, along by having more factors, gave defense an benefit across offense, & the Dodgers moved to require benefit of this by assembling a team that would excel sustaining its pitching.

A core of the team's profits in the 1960's was a dominant pitching tandem of Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale, who combined to win Tetrad of the Pentad Cy Young Awards from 1962 to 1966. Top pitching likewise come from either Claude Osteen, an aging Johnny Podres, and reliever Ron Perranoski. A striking attack, but then, was non telling, & tremendously of a offense spark come from either the feat of speedy shortstop Maury Wills, who led a league around stolen bases every year from either 1960 to 1965, & placed the modern record by owning 104 thieving inside 1962. A Dodgers' strategy wwhen another time described as follows: "Wills hits a single, steals second, and takes third on a grounder. A sacrifice fly brings him home. Koufax or Drysdale pitches a shutout, and the Dodgers win 1-0." Although pack games followed this model exactly, a Dodgers indeed won a great numerous great-scoring games.

A 1962 pennant race ended in a tie, & the Dodgers were defeated per archrival Giants within a tie-breaking playoff, but a Dodgers proceeded to win the pennant in trinity of the next foursome years. A 1963 World Series was a Four-game sweep of the Yankees, in which the Dodgers therefore dominated that a vaunted Bronx Bombers never possibly took a lead against Koufax, Podres, & Drysdale. When an injury-plagued 1964, a Dodgers bounced back to win a 1965 World Series in a thrilling Sevener games against a Minnesota Twins. Game One happened to fall in Yom Kippur, and Koufax (world health organization is Jewish) refused to pitch on the holy day. A Dodgers rebounded from either losing a number 1 2 games, when Koufax pitched shutouts inside Games 5 & 7 (by owning just 2 years rest in between) to win a crown.

A Dodgers once agaaround won a pennant in 1966, but a team was running off away from flatulence & was swept per parvenu Baltimore Orioles (who went in to the successful rerun through the late '60s & early '70s). Koufax retired that wintertime, his career cut short by arthritis inside his elbow, & Wills was traded away when offending Walter O'Malley. Drysdale continued to become effectual, setting the record for sequentially goalless frame around 1968, but he as well retired early due to injuries. When the Dodgers were subpar for many seasons, a freshly core of immature talent was getting in their farm system. The pennant within 1974, though quickly quashed by the dynastic Oakland A's, was a sign of good things to come.

The Lasorda Years

For Twenty-three years, first around 1954, a Dodgers experienced been managed by Walter Alston, a quiet & imperturbable human world health organization commanded dandy respect from either his players. Alston's tenure is the third-longest within baseball history for the manager using one team, fallowing Connie Mack and John McGraw. His retirement touching a prevent of a 1976 year, when winning Septet pennants & Quartet Globe Series titles across his career, cleared a way for an completely different personality to choose the helm of the Dodgers.

Tommy Lasorda was a 49-season-old previous pitcher (never super successful therein capacity), world health organization got been a team's top coach under Alston, & prior to that experienced been manager of the Dodgers' top minor league team. He was colorful & gregarious, an enthusiastic cheerleader around direct contrast to Alston's taciturn demeanour. He quickly became the larger-than-heroic personality, associating by using Frank Sinatra & other celebrities, and eating Italian food inside big volumes. He became easily-known for expression like, "If you cut me, I bleed Dodger blue," & for on to God as "the big Dodger in the sky." Although the few considered his persona to become a schtick and to find it wearing, his enthusiasm won him the reputation as an "ambassador for baseball," & these are impossible to believe of a Dodgers from either the late '70s to the early '90s stupidly of Lasorda.

An additional transition got recently occurred, high in the Dodgers management. Walter O'Malley passed control of the team to his boy Peter, who would prove my point to oversee a Dodgers in his personal's behalf across 1998.

Freshly blood got likewise been injected into a team on the field. A core of a team was currently the baseball diamond, composed of Steve Garvey (1B), Davey Lopes (2B), Bill Russell (SS), and Ron Cey (3B). These quaternion remained around the starting lineup together from either 1973 to 1981, yearn than any more baseball diamond foursome in baseball history. A pitching staff remained heavy, anchored by Don Sutton and Tommy John. A Dodgers won NL West titles in two 1977 and 1978, both days defeating a Philadelphia Phillies to advance to the World Series, simply to become defeated each days per Yankees. Within 1980, they swept Iii games from either a Houston Astros to finish the regular year within the tie, however wasted to the Astros in the tie-breaking playoff.

Fernando and the Bulldog

A Opening Day starting pitcher for 1981 was a 20-month-old cub from either Mexico: Fernando Valenzuela. Pressed into service due to an injury to Jerry Reuss, Valenzuela pitched a shutout that day, and proceeded to win his number one 8 decisions across mid-Could. the vernal left-hander, speaking single Spanish however sporting a devastating screwball, became a sensation. "Fernandomania" gripped Southern California, when vast crowds turned bent look at him pitch. Valenzuela became a sole pitcher ever to win a Rookie of the Year and the Cy Young Award in the same year. A Dodgers' torrid run assured the babies of the playoff berth in the strike-shortened split season, & it proceeded to kill a Yankees in the World Series.

A Dodgers won NL West titles in 1983 and 1985, but wasted a Championship Series in both victims years (to the Phillies and Cardinals, respectively). the 198Five NLCS was particularly memorable for Game 6, where the Dodgers were protecting a 5-Four lead in the 9th frame, hoping to click a determinative seventh game. By having ii runners in & number one base open, Lasorda elected does'nt to walk Cards slugger Jack Clark, who proceeded to hit the page start & send St. Louis to the Globe Series.

Fallowing Seven years of high strikeout totals, and the 21-waround year in 1986, Valenzuela sat out for virtually all of the 1988 season. Infested by arm troubles that were widely blamed in his existence overused by Lasorda, his effectiveness faded prior to he turned Xxx. the freshly anchor of the pitching staff was the monocled string-bean of a best-hander known as Orel Hershiser. He experienced been given a nickname "Bulldog" by Lasorda, extra as a fortunate motivational thing than an objective description of his personality, however by 1988 he got matured into one of baseball's virtually all effectual pitchers. That month he won 23 games & a Cy Young Award, and bust Don Drysdale's record by tossing 59 consecutive hitless frame, ending by using the 10-inning shutout on his final start of the year.

A 1988 Championship is all a more witching for the fact that the Dodgers were hardly baseball's better team in paper. It enjoyed career years from either many players, & were inspired per fiery intensity of newcomer Kirk Gibson (the league's Most Valuable Player that year), besides when a quiet however steadily Hershiser & a universally high-spirited Lasorda. Although it entered a NLCS as decided underdogs to the mighty New York Mets, the Dodgers pulled out the thrilling back-&-forth series within Seven games. The World Series matched them sustaining an potentially further right opponent, a Oakland A's of Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco. The A's took an early lead around Game One in the grand slam by Canseco, and led Four-Three in the bottom of the ninth. Within the surprise move, Gibson, hobbling sustaining injuries to two his legs, pinch hit against the formidable Dennis Eckersley. Gibson's spectacular house start has been known as one of a virtually all memorable moments within baseball history, & it placed a tone for the rest of the Series. Hershiser dominated Games Two & Five, & was on a mound whenever the stunning upset was complete.

Present Day

Fallowing 1988, a Dodgers did non win a second postseason game until 2004. Hershiser, rather Valenzuela prior to him, suffered an arm injury inside 1990 due to overworking, which took a edge off his effectiveness for the remainder of his career. From either 1992 to 1996, 5 sequentially Dodgers were known as Rookie of the Year: Eric Karros, Mike Piazza, Raul Mondesi, Hideo Nomo, and Todd Hollandsworth. A Dodgers did email a playoffs around 1995 and 1996, and narrowly missed around 1991 and strike-cancelled 1994. When about Twenty years at a helm, Lasorda retired inside 1996, though he however remains by using a Dodgers as an executive vice-president. He wwhen replaced as manager by previous Dodgers shortstop Bill Russell.

About the half-century of unusual stability (sole deuce managers 1954-1996, owned by one personal 1950-1998) eventually come to an prevent. Around 1998, a O'Malley personal sold a Dodgers to Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, owner of the Fox network and 20th Century Fox. Among a recently ownership's early moves were commodities trading away popular catcher Place, & replacing Russell by using celebrity manager Davey Johnson. Johnson's volatile tenure ended ii years late, & he wwhen followed as manager by Jim Tracy. A 2002 year was marked per emergence of Eric Gagne as one of baseball's top relief pitchers. Gagne won a Cy Young Award in 2003.

Inside 2004, News Corp. sold a Dodgers to real property creator Frank McCourt, who hired Paul DePodesta to be general manager. Shortly prior to a begin of a regular year, DePodesta engineered the acquisition of volatile eventually gifted outfielder Milton Bradley. A Dodgers played an exciting, competitory brand of baseball in a period of a foremost half of 2004, however DePodesta felt something else was required to vault a team into the postseason. To this prevent, he executed the blockbuster series of mid-year trades, sending away deuce-ace starting players (including popular catcher & team leader Paul LoDuca) and ii key pitchers, when obtaining many fresh players. When a Dodgers did win a NL West in 2004, they misused in the Section Series to the eventual NL champion St. Louis Cardinals. the single brilliantly spot was a masterful pitching performance by artisan Jose Lima, giving the Dodgers their number 1 win of a postseason game since 1988.

A wintertime of 2004-2005 saw many extra popular players exit, including Lima, third baseman Adrian Beltre, and slugger Shawn Green. Their replacements involved starting pitcher Derek Lowe, outfielder J.D. Drew, and hard-hitting second baseman Jeff Kent. DePodesta's radical overhaul did non bear fruit withwithin 2005, when a Dodgers suffered from either club strife & decimating injuries, finishing by owning their worst record in Baker's dozen years. Supporters of DePodesta note that numerous of the players he let last as well got sub-par seasons elsewhere. Manager Jim Tracy resigned at a prevent of a year, citing unreconcilable difference by having GM DePodesta in how else the team should exist as do.

Baseball Hall of Famers

Current roster

Retired numbers

Recommended Reading
Red Barber, Rhubarb in the Catbird Seat Robert W. Cream pitcher, Stengel: His Life & Times Steve Delsohn, Confessedly Blue: A Striking History of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Told Per Men World health organization Lived It Carl Erskine & Vin Scully, Tales From either a Fox Dugout: More Innings Harvey Froemmer, Future York City Baseball Cliff Gewecke, Daily within Dodgers History Andrew Goldblatt, A Giants & a Dodgers: 4 Cities, 2 Teams, Of these Rivalry Peter Golenbock, Bums: An Viva voce History of the Brooklyn Dodgers Doris Kearns Goodwin, Hold off Till Next Season: The Memoir Frank Graham, A Brooklyn Dodgers: An Informal History Donald Honig, A Los Angeles Dodgers: Their Number 1 Quarter Century Roger Kahn, A Boys of Summer Roger Kahn, A Era 1947-1957: Whilst a Yankees, a Giants & a Dodgers Ruled the World Mark Langill, A Los Angeles Dodgers Tommy Lasorda by having David Fisher, A Artful Dodger Jane Leavy, Sandy Koufax: The Lefty's Legacy William McNeil, A Dodgers Encyclopedia Tom Meany (editor), A Artful Dodgers Andrew Paul Mele, A Brooklyn Dodgers Reader John J. Monteleone (editor), Branch Rickey's Little Blue Book David Plaut, Chasing October: A Dodgers-Giants Pennant Race of 1962 Carl E. Prince, Brooklyn's Dodgers: A Bums, A Borough & A Right of Baseball Jackie Robinson, We Never Got It Made Gene Schoor, A Complete Dodgers Record Book Gene Schoor, A Pee Relieve oneself Reese Story Duke Snider by having Bill Gilbert, A Duke of Flatbush Michael Shapiro, A Survive Dependable Year: Brooklyn, A Dodgers, & Their Final Pennant Race Together Glen Stout, A Dodgers: Great hundred Years of Dodgers Baseball Neil J. Sullivan, A Dodgers Move West Jules Tygiel, Baseball's Low Experiment: Jackie Robinson & His Legacy John Weaver, Los Angeles: A Tremendous Village, 1781-1981