The Trolley Dodger

It’s tough sometimes to describe to those who aren’t sports fans why grown men playing a game generates such passions. Aren’t there more important things in life?

As a baseball fan, though, the game becomes so ingrained with those important things that it becomes inseparable from them. Bluetopia, the new Dodgers DVD, puts a spotlight on that relationship by following a range of fans throughout the 2008 season.

The team was good enough to invite a few Dodger bloggers to the premiere in Hollywood last night, so I got the chance to rub elbows with a big crowd of folks either directly or indirectly related to the team. As Jon Weisman terms it, “While you’ll find all these people at different parts of Dodger Stadium at any given game, you’ll rarely find them assimilated as one cohesive group.”

Jon has a segment in the film as well, in which his embarrassment at getting lost on the way to stadium (you try answering questions on camera while driving — you’ll wind up in the LA River) is more than made up for by an unforgettable meeting with Vin Scully.

Players, executives, broadcasters, stadium employees, journalists, bloggers, and fans mingled before and after the film. It’s quite a surreal experience to be glancing around the crowded room and finding it full of people you recognize yet have never met. (See below for more photos.)

Bluetopia touts itself as a celebration of the 2008 season, and there was a lot to be covered in a highlights-packed year. Everything from the LA Coliseum game to the last pitch of the NLCS is at least touched on, but as director Timothy Marx said before the film started, this isn’t really about the Dodgers. The real stars of the film are the fans.

In one respect, the fan stories are what you might expect from a sports team documentary — a dying mother, a redeemed gang member, a father mourning his own father with the grand children, a boy seeing his first game. If the filmmakers hadn’t been careful, that sort of movie could easily have descended into the maudlin.

Thankfully, they did their job right, and the results are respectful portraits of the fans and their stories. That many of those featured were also in the theater for the premiere lent it a sort of family-movie feel, in a good way, as cheers went up in different part of the theater. Speaking of cheers and Vin Scully, the biggest were reserved for any time he showed up on screen. I might need to get the DVD just to hear what he said. ;)

The season and playoff highlights were cool as well, though the best parts were the behind-the-scenes stuff — players ambushing Joe Torre to douse him with champagne, Russell Martin welcoming Manny Ramirez with “Now we’ll be on SportsCenter. Boyyeee!” You can see the immediate effect Manny had on the locker room, literally as he walked into the room the first time.

Those looking for a hard-hitting investigative report a la 60 Minutes will be disappointed, but every thing isn’t puppy dogs and rainbows. The 6-year-old’s first game is a loss, as is the redeemed gang member’s game. Twenty years since the 1988 win is mentioned multiple times, then the hopes and dreams of a World Series win are dashed again. Andruw Jones is shown, and a murmur of discontent ran through the audience at his first appearance.

You begin to feel almost sorry for the players having to carry the weight of all of these people: those who are dying and looking for relief, those fighting against the odds to stay on the straight and narrow, those little kids who live and die with every pitch. An entire city, millions of people, all with their own struggles and wishes, hoping against hope you will hit, throw, or catch a ball well. I know they make a lot of money to do those things, but if a guy has any empathy for his fellow humans, it must be hard to maintain your boundaries.

Yet in the end, the question of “Why Baseball is important?” is answered. Sure, it’s just a game. But it’s important because of the importance people invest in it. In other words, and as Yogi Berra might have said, it’s important because it’s important.

Thanks to Josh Rawitch and the rest of the Dodgers PR staff for the invitation. Also a tip of the cap to Son of Steve Garvey Alex Cora and the blogger from iSportsWeb whose name I missed (was it Ken Steinhorn?) — we formed a knot at the end of the blue carpet and managed to get some cool photograph opportunities. I got what might be my favorite autograph, Dodger organist Nancy Bea Hefley. :)

Sorry I missed Phil Gurnee of True Blue LA. His review is up, “BlueTopia – Were the best parts left on the cutting room floor?”

Matt Kemp

Vanessa Fayd, Matt Kemp, and Landon Heying of True Blue Tattoo

Clayton Kershaw

Andre Ethier