Farewell to Dodgertown

Since 1948 the Brooklyn now Los Angeles Dodgers have held their spring training camp in Vero Beach, Fl. A small town, with a broken down military base was all Branch Rickey and the team needed to teach the Dodger way to play baseball. Dodgertown has street names named after Dodger legends like Jackie Robinson, Roy Campenella, Duke Snyder and Tommy Lasorda. The facility looks like a high school baseball park and is barely able to keep a major league team happy. But it does, and it did a great job for 60 years. Dodgertown is closing down because the team is moving to Phoenix because they want to be closer to their fan base, however the team has a great number of fans in Vero. Phoenix will offer the Dodgers financial consideration and a brand new state of the art facility to prepare for the season. What makes Dodgertown unique besides the history and the town, is the openness. There are no high fences, very few restricted areas and the players are within an arms reach, pretty much all the time. Since it’s an older facility, the players have to walk to and from the fields on the same paths the fans take. This allows for unparallel access to your favorite ballplayers. The Dodger Ambassador, former manager Tommy Lasorda still drives around the camp in his golf cart, kissing babies and signing autographs for kids. The memories that will be left in Vero will last a lifetime, and it is time for new memories to start in Arizona. Dodgertown will truly be missed. A video from the New York Times has a vdeo on this story here.