The story of the 81 Dodgers and the baseball season as well. The author takes you through Lasrada becoming manager and then he brings in sayings Dodger's sayings that we all were used to him saying. He takes you through the losses of 77 and 78 to the Yankees and how when 1981 comes around it will likely be it for the infield of Garvey, Lopes, Russell, and Cey if they want to win this will be their last chance. He then goes into Fernando! How he exploded onto the scene and then goes into how and who found him in Mexico which was a fascinating story. Then you come to the strike and he speaks about it and how it affected some of the players and how some had to go out and work another job and how one player still got paid because he had it written in his contract. You then get to the playoffs then their win against the Yankees. A good book my only side commentary is I have always felt that Lasorda overworks Fernando always leaving him in past the ninth inning sometimes into the 11th and I remember one game where he went longer than that, not that we will see it again but he had multiple years where he was just short of 300 innings and had some years with 20 complete games by the time the Dodgers were done with him they were done with him. The book though is a very good book.

Veteran baseball author Jason Turbow has turned in another solid effort with his newest book, They Bled Blue, about the 1981 Los Angeles Dodgers.

Turbow covers the ending of the era of the seemingly permanent infield fixtures of Steve Garvey, Davey Lopes, Bill Russell, and Ron Cey, the enthusiastic Dodger blue evangelist Tommy Lasorda, solid pros such as Dusty Baker and Rick Monday, wacky characters like Jerry Reuss and Jay Johnstone, and of course Fernandomania.

The narrative does an outstanding job weaving the story of the Dodgers season in and out of explorations of the members of the team, the city of Los Angeles in the early 1980s, and the larger issue facing baseball in '81, the prolonged strike that wiped out a third of the season. The storyline transitions easily between subjects broad and narrow, with readers truly getting a sense of what it was like to be with and around that team at that point in time.

There are many books that cover the team over the course of one season, and this is among the better ones that I've read.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing an advanced reading copy in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this rollicking and well written account of the strike shortened 1981 MLB season.

The author has done his research and the book is packed full of insider details and stories from behind the scenes - some of which were new to me.

There was a good blend between game reports and analysis and there was also an excellent sense of time and place as a baseball mad Los Angeles comes to life in this book. I also enjoyed the descriptions of the madcap Tommy Lasorda and his passion for Dodger Blue.

Excellent and highly recommended.

Perhaps more than any other sport, baseball is entangled with its history. Even as we witness magnificent feats in the present, our eyes turn ever toward the past. Whether it is through statistics or stories, baseball fans love to look back.

Author Jason Turbow has a knack for transporting us to times gone by and thoroughly revisiting players and teams from the game’s history. We’re not talking about grainy black-and-white history, however – these are teams whose memories are still vivid in the minds of fans of a certain age.

His latest is “They Bled Blue: Fernandomania, Strike-Season Mayhem, and the Weirdest Championship Baseball Had Ever Seen: The 1981 Los Angeles Dodgers.” That mouthful of a title looks back nearly 40 years, digging into the particulars of an iconic franchise during one of the strangest seasons baseball had ever seen.

Seriously – the sport had never seen anything quite like the 1981 Dodgers. From the full-on phenomenon that was Fernando Valenzuela to the era-ending turn from one of the game’s longest-serving infields, from a season split in two by labor strife to the strangest postseason set-up ever, it was a time of turmoil and triumph.

Tommy Lasorda was at the helm of that team, still in the early stages of a managerial career that would land him in the Hall of Fame. He was the most ebullient, effusive skipper in the history of the Dodgers franchise – heck, probably in the history of professional baseball. His seemingly boundless devotion to the Dodgers served as the inspiration for this book’s title – Lasorda would tell anyone who would listen (and plenty who wouldn’t) that he bled Dodger blue.

This was the man in charge going into the 1981 season. The Dodgers were in the midst of a run of almost-greatness, having won the NL pennant a couple of times in the late 1970s, only to lose both times to the hated Yankees. After a couple of down years, it was starting to look as though the championship window might be closing.

That’s because the iconic Dodgers infield of first baseman Steve Garvey, second baseman Davey Lopes, shortstop Bill Russell and third baseman Ron Cey – a group that had been together and producing at a high level for nearly a decade, was beginning to show signs of age. Guys like Dusty Baker and Reggie Smith were starting to get a little grayer as well. These men, who had given their all, were getting a little long in the tooth. If they were going to get that elusive title, the clock was ticking.

On the other side of the aging curve was a young pitcher, not even old enough to drink, whose emergence onto the scene would become one of the biggest stories of the season. Sports have always featured their phenoms, young players who appear and take the field or court or ice by storm. Every sport – at every level – has youngsters who turn up and set the imaginations of fans ablaze.

But we had never seen anything quite like Fernando Valenzuela.

The young pitcher, with just a handful of big-league innings under his belt, began 1981 with an historic run of dominance. He started 8-0, hurling five shutouts and putting up a miniscule 0.50 ERA. The left-hander threw a screwball that proved nigh-impossible for even major league hitters to handle. And while the dominance itself was story enough, the fact that he was Mexican helped the Dodgers fully tap in to the sizeable Hispanic population that had yet to truly adopt the team as their own.

And of course, in the middle of it all, the strike, the first work stoppage since 1972 and the longest the game would see until 1994. Over a third of the season was lost, with the players striking on June 12 and not returning until a delayed All-Star Game on August 9. This led to an odd split-season playoff situation, with MLB crowning first-half and second-half winners that would then face off to determine division crowns before moving on to the Championship Series.

It was a season for the ages – one that helped the Dodgers reestablish themselves as one of the top-tier organizations in baseball. And hey – weird season or not, flags fly forever.

What Turbow does so well with “They Bled Blue” is capture the spirit of the moment. The game wasn’t yet the multi-billion-dollar industry it is today, though it was on its way. Free agency was still in its infancy, with the truly massive paydays still a decade or more in the future. Still, the game was in flux, as demonstrated by the willingness of the players to walk away in an effort to get what they felt was fair treatment.

The Dodgers roster was populated by characters. Yes, there was Fernando, though he was more exciting on the field than off. Guys like the squeaky-clean Garvey, who wasn’t as pure as fans might have believed. Speedster Lopes was fighting off the up-and-coming star Steve Sax. Ditto catcher Steve Yeager, who had Mike Scioscia in his rearview. Russell and Smith struggled with injuries, while the talented Pedro Guerrero was on the upswing.

And in the middle of it all, a perpetual motion machine powered by passion and profanity, was Tommy Lasorda, saying and doing whatever it took to keep the eyes of his squad on the prize – a World Series title.

“They Bled Blue” encapsulates the unique time and place in which this team existed. There was never a season quite like 1981, and there was never a team quite like the Dodgers. Lucky for us, we have someone like Jason Turbow ready to lay it all out for us. It is a delightful and detailed exploration of the game as it once was, an ideal summer read for any baseball fan interested in the stories of the sport.

1981 has been remembered as one of the strangest baseball seasons in the history of the game. The season was split in two due to a player’s strike and the division winners in each half made the postseason, even though that meant the two best overall teams in the National League missed the playoffs. A rookie pitcher who had a body that was closer to resembling a keg than a six pack took baseball by storm. Four infielders who had played together for nearly eight years were on their last quest together. The link for the last two points was the Los Angeles Dodgers, who ended up as the champions in three exciting postseason series. Their quest to the championship is documented in this breezy, fun-to-read book by Jason Turbow.

While the book reports on the 1981 Dodgers season in chronological order, it is not the typical “this happened, then that happened” type of season recap. It actually starts in 1978 when the New York Yankees defeated the Dodgers in that year’s World Series, winning the last four games after Los Angeles won the first two. That plays as motivation for many of the players who were on that team, including the four infielders who had been on the team and playing nearly every game since 1973. Along the way the reader will learn a lot about all four of them – first baseman Steve Garvey, second baseman Davey Lopes, shortstop Bill Russell and third baseman Ron Cey.

However, the best personal story in the book was also the best baseball story of that year. Turbow does an excellent job of bringing the reader into the world of Fernando Valenzuela, a 20 year old rookie pitcher with a portly body, a lack of ability to speak English and a devastating screwball. He won his first eight decisions with an ERA under one and took the baseball world by storm. Being of Mexican heritage, he became a hero to the Mexican population in Los Angeles, which makes up a significant portion of the city’s residents. How he handled this fame, especially when he was a guest of President Ronald Reagan at the White House, was the best reading in the book, along with stories about manager Tommy Lasorda.

The book was capped off by providing an excellent account of the Dodgers’ postseason run. In the Division Series (only made possible by the split season) they fell behind the Houston Astros two games to none in the best of five series, only to win three straight to capture the series. Then, in another best of five series, they defeated the Montreal Expos in thrilling fashion with Rick Monday hitting a homer to win the game for Los Angeles in the ninth inning of game five. Then the Dodgers made the three year wait to face the Yankees again worth it, defeating them in six games in the same manner as New York won in 1978 – lost the first two games, won the next four. The description of the games, the players’ emotions and the joy of the entire city was well written.

Dodger fans will want to add this book to their collection as it is very likely the best source of information on that crazy championship season for them. Baseball fans and historians who are interested in that team should pick it up as well.

I wish to thank Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for providing a copy of the book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

(I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.)

They Bled Blue is the rollicking yarn of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ crazy 1981 season, a watershed campaign that cemented the team’s place and reputation as fitting thoroughly within the surrounding LA culture. That it culminated in an unlikely World Series win — during a split season demarcated by a strike, no less — is not even the most interesting thing about this team. The Dodgers were led by the garrulous Tommy Lasorda, as much cheerleader as manager, whose office hosted a regular stream of Hollywood royalty. They had Steve Garvey, the first baseman with the movie-star good looks, whose seemingly impenetrable All-American façade was in the first stages of what would soon be total implosion. Garvey was teamed with Ron Cey, Davey Lopes, and Bill Russell in the most durable infield in major league history, with 1981 presenting their final chance to win a championship as a unit. The difference maker was entirely unexpected, a chubby kid, twenty years old and nearly straight out of Mexico, with a wild delivery and a screwball as his flippin’ out pitch. Fernando Valenzuela didn’t speak much English, but his baseball ability broke down cultural barriers and helped fill Dodger Stadium to the brim with a Southern California Latino population that had been thirsting for just such a success story.
The 1981 season saw the rise of Fernandomania, high drama surrounding the strike, and, as was the culture in Los Angeles at the time, lots of cocaine. In the Halberstam tradition of capturing a season through its unforgettable figures, They Bled Blue is a sprawling, mad tale of excess and exuberance, the likes of which could only have taken place at that time, and in that place.

I have recently become a fan of baseball - as an Australian, it isn't a sport I grew up with so I am reading through a lot of books about the sport. And I think this is the best one I have read so far.

Focusing on the 1981 season, this book chronicles the year of the Los Angeles Dodgers, a group of aging champions and up and coming players. A good mix of sporting history; biographies of key players; the players strike; an examination of the culture of the sport itself; and the story of a manager who was so exuberant, so in-your-face, it was hard to not like him.

The thing that really made me enjoy this was style. The author didn't present this as a "This happened, then this happened..." kind of tale. It was written with the casual fan in mind, making it easy to follow who was who and what was going on, but was packed with stats and players that the well-read baseball fan would take in their stride. It told the tale of how the strike affected the players and their families. It told the tale of drug addiction within the playing group. It told the tale of a group of players who, although they didn't like each other off the field, they came together as a team and played out of their skins.

I would have given this 5 stars if the biographical details of the players didn't interrupt the flow of the season. Maybe a section at the back detailing the players careers might have been a better option.

A vastly enjoyable story. Highly recommended for baseball fans, or those who like the underdog sports teams books.


Paul
ARH