Results tagged “tommylasorda”

It’s come down to this - a heavyweight divisional slugfest to duel for the National League West division title between the defending champions Los Angeles Dodgers and the little engine that could Colorado Rockies.

In a moment of insanity, a San Francisco county supervisor told the LA Times that former Dodgers coach Tommy Lasorda should be ousted as grand marshal of the city's Italian American parade on October 12. "We can't have Tommy Lasorda come to San Francisco for the Italian American parade... He's like enemy No. 1 right now. If you don't think this is important, you should move to L.A." So there you have it. Because everyone does as an elected official says, here come a bunch of people who don't think it's important... or maybe not and SFist readers respond WTF?

LA Dodgers defeat Pittsburgh Pirates 8-1. I left work late, so I missed the six runs the Dodgers scored in the first two innings. Apparently Matt Kemp avoided a run down by playing dead. Really. Brad Penny pitched a strong 5 2/3 innings and closer Takashi Saito pitched a perfect ninth to come back from his disastrous outing Monday night. James Loney has now gotten a hit in the first 15 games, and Rafael Furcal went 4-4 with a walk tonight.

We have no idea what inspired the 1986 Dodgers to make "The Baseball Boogie", which we bring to you via our sexy friends at WithLeather. Maybe it was the previous year's "Super Bowl Shuffle" phenomena. Maybe Pedro Guerrero was so bursting with creativity that the rest of the team got caught up in his enthusiasm. Maybe they knew that they would finish second-to-last that year, so they figured they it'd be more constructive to work on their choreography. Maybe they knew that in two years they'd have to toughen up, so they were getting all the musical theater out of their system. Maybe they all lost a bet to a noticeably absent Tommy Lasorda over if they could eat more hot dogs then him. Maybe it was their desire to eat free at Johnny Rocket's. Maybe it was their collective love of tight, white pants.

So the guys are in Vero Beach now, and now my sphincter pulsates in anticipation for March 31: Opening Day at Dodger Stadium.

Today marks Jackie Robinson's 89th birthday, and the Dodgers are celebrating it by educating the youngins.

Monday Shalom Auslander presents Foreskin's Lament 7pm @ Vroman's Valerie Plame Wilson presents Fair Game 7pm @ Carpenter Performing Arts Center, Long Beach Barbara Firestone presents Autism Heroes 7pm @ Dutton's Slash presents Slash 7pm @ Borders, Torrance Lawrence Wright presents The Looming Tower 7:30pm @ UCLA Tuesday David Plante, with host Mark Danielewski, presents ABC 7pm @ Book Soup Michael Lent presents Christmas Letters from Hell 7pm @ Vroman's Tommy Lasorda & Bill Plaschke...

Just stumbled onto this gem ... NSFW at all. Listen as LA Dodger great Tommy Lasorda goes on some of his finest, most profanity-laden rants. Happy off-season, everybody....

Giants 3, Dodgers 1 - Barry Bonds surprisingly was all smiles despite a bitter reception at Chavez Ravine. While he didn't tie Hammerin' Hank for the career home run title, he did reach base on two walks and scored a run. Brad Penny allowed all three runs in six innings for just his second loss of the year. Baseball royalty on hand included Tommy Lasorda, Bud Selig, and Alyssa Milano. Wait, did we just write...

Angels 7, A's 6 - Francisco Rodriguez blew a save opportunity despite a three run lead. Fortunately, he was saved by Maicer Izturis' RBI single with two out in the bottom of the ninth. Vladimir Guerrero took the day off and while the Halos generated plenty of offense without him, none of the 15 hits left the park. The team's recent home run slump coincides with Vlad's, who hasn't gone yard in 24 games despite...

This may be the first time anyone has ever heard me say this, but last night the Dodgers lost and I still feel like a winner. My sheer joy was a gift from a generous benefactor who will be referred to as JC, not only because those are his initials but also because he is now holier than Christ himself. JC hooked us up with seats in the Dugout Club, which is where I...

- National Spelling Bee is down to just 15 adorable nerds - LA Times (spoilers if you are going to watch it tonight)

Angels 8, Mariners 4 - Virginia Tech means a lot to Joe Saunders. His uncle went there. His dad went there. His mom went there. He went there. Drafted by Anaheim in 2002, he is the only Hokie alum in pro baseball. Under the circumstances, Commissioner Bud Selig allowed him to wear his college cap for Friday's game. In his first start since the tragedy at his alma mater he pitched six scoreless innings. His...

Hornets 86, Clippers 83 - Sports fans talk about "meaningless games" towards the end of the regular season. Those are contests held after a team is already in or out of the playoffs and seeding isn't a major issue. It's a common indicator of an exciting team in baseball. In this year's NBA playoff chase, the Clippers didn't play a single meaningless game. They did play roughly one meaningless quarter. Despite taking a solid lead...

ESPN's Eric Neel moved back home to Los Angeles recently and LA is already seeing the rewards. In a special site "Blue Heaven" launched this week over at ESPN.com, Neel has collaborated with photographer Gary Bogdon on a beautifully done photo essay + slideshow + narrative of the Dodgers' historic spring training facility in Dodgertown, Florida which the ballclub will leave in two years. As the photos appear and disappear revealing the carefree ease...

In just a few weeks baseball will be starting and as LAist continues to grow we want to make sure that the home team is taken care of.

- On his blog, Matt Welch often frowns on MLB teams giving huge sums of money to over-30-year-old baseball players (because they're fragile), so when 31-year-old David Beckham hurt his knee today, we thought of Welch cackling from his ivory tower - LA Times - For the second year in a row there was a fatality at the LA Marathon. This year a 50-year-old bicyclist had a heart attack and died at S. Catalina...

Kings 4, Ducks 3, OT - LAist revels in rivalries, especially local ones. Take Los Angeles and Anaheim. Despite gaining parity in baseball and cartoon production, they've seen a major gap in hockey. The Kings are at the bottom of the Western Conference standings, while the Ducks have spent most of the season on top. Yet when the teams face off, that doesn't mean a thing. Los Angeles won in overtime, giving them three wins...

Today was D-Day in the long and storied public life of Tommy Lasorda. Today was the day he promised that he would sue Jody "Babydol" Gibson, the convicted Hollywood Madam, if she went through with publishing her tell-all book where she had a full chapter about the former Dodger great, as well as many other chapters containing the sexual details of other famous Hollywood movers and shakers. "I have never heard of this woman...

Torn Ligaments 3, Intact Ligaments 1 - This is very bad news for Clipper fans. Shaun Livingston snapped his knee like a twig (WARNING: ABOVE VIDEO IS GRAPHIC AND NOT FOR THOSE WITH WEAK STOMACHS) and is out for the season --not this season, next season. It may be a career ending injury. Anybody remember Joe Theismann or Napoleon McCallum? This looked even worse. Kings Clean House - In three deals made hours before...

In what could turn out to be a long, expensive, and revealing lawsuit, Tommy Lasorda, the great former manager of the LA Dodgers, swears that he will sue if the tell-all autobiography "Secrets of a Hollywood Super Madam" is released on Thursday. Hollywood madam Jody "Babydol" Gibson was popped eight years ago for pimping out high-priced hookers, porn stars, and Playboy models throughout 16 states. She was given three years but served less than...

I can’t stand it anymore! I’m nervous with anticipation. My hands are clinched in a mighty fist. My eyes glare with steely determination. Hopeful exuberance is my demeanor. Passion is in my soul.

The best all-girl rock band ever to come out of Palo Alto is scheduled to rock the Universal Studios City Walk tonight as part of the festivities for the Dodger Rally, as the home team prepares to travel to the big apple to take on the New York Mets. From 6p-8p, FreeFM's morning radio cellar-dweller Adam Carolla will MC the party that will star Dodger greats like Ron Cey, Steve Garvey, and Tommy Lasorda....

A year after ending up 20 games under .500, the Dodgers have clinched a playoff spot after their sixth straight win. The champagne couldn't have tasted any better because the decisive game was against their longtime rivals, the San Fran Giants up in Frisco, thanks to the 40 year old arm of Greg Maddux (pictured, left), who also stole a base in the 4-2 win. "If you're going to cinch it, you want to...

back when, back on July 7, the Angels were dead last in the AL West, and ESPN's Keith Law recommended the Angels look toward 2007 and throw in the towel on 2006. Of course, a short note to Law revealed he had written the piece at the end of June when the team was seven games out and playing through a miserable stretch. Lackluster, error-prone, and unable, in Tommy Lasorda's memorable phrase, to hit water if they fell out of a boat, the Angels looked done for the year.

If there are two things that Randy and Jason Sklar know -- it's sports and comedy. The hosts of ESPN's Cheap Seats seemed like the perfect people to size up the LA sports scene so we decided to fire a few questions at them.

Ultimately, it came down to philosophy. Jim Tracy is a good manager, but it's not like he's Casey Stengel. It is essential for a GM and a manager to be on the same page. If they aren't, then a change needs to be made. Paul DePodesta probably wanted to jettison Tracy last year, but couldn't do so in good faith after the team made the playoffs. He might have been fine letting Tracy finish out his contract, but Tracy's demand for an extension coupled with his uncharacteristic criticisms of team management served as the catalyst for his ouster.

Even the most casual of Dodgers fans knows that we are fortunate enough to have here, in our beloved City of Angels, one of the most storied franchises in all the sporting world. In the new DVD from MLB Productions, Dodger Blue – The Championship Years, we are treated to a 60-minute retrospective that includes colorful-yet-concise vignettes on the world championship teams of 1955 (the famous “Boys of Summer” and the only Brooklyn team to win it all), ’59, ’63, ’65, ’81 and ’88, as well as a look at the National League Champion teams of 1974, ’77 and ’78. The Special Features section includes the Hall Of Fame acceptance speeches of Tommy Lasorda, Don Drysdale and Duke Snider.

Hindsight is 20/20, but it's pretty obvious today that the Mike Piazza trade was the worst move in Dodgers history. The Dodgers refused to sign the greatest hitting catcher ever in the prime of his career to what was effectively a market-level contract in a great economy. In return, the Dodgers got a worthless season from Bobby Bonilla, a worthless season and everlasting hatred from Charles Johnson, absolutely nothing out of Jim Eisenreich, Manuel Bairros' undistinguished minor league career, and of course, three years of headaches from Gary Sheffield.

Welcome to the new era of Dodger baseball. Offense is now in.