Greatest sports figures in L.A. history, No. 9: Fernando Valenzuela

Continuing our countdown of the 20 greatest figures in L.A. sports history, as chosen in voting by our online readers, with No. 9, Fernando Valenzuela.

No. 9 Fernando Valenzuela (53 first-place votes, 1,783 points)

Fernandomania. That's all you have to say to Dodgers fans to bring a smile to their face as they remember the glory days of Fernando Valenzuela.

Fernandomania was born in 1981, when Valenzuela started the season 8-0 with five shutouts and an earned-run average of 0.50. He became a sensation with the fans, drawing sellout crowds at Dodger Stadium, with ticket sales increasing whenever he pitched in other stadiums too, as fans wanted a glimpse of his unusual delivery, with his eyes looking skyward before delivering the ball to the plate. Valenzuela finished 1981 with a 13-7 record and a 2.48 ERA, leading all pitchers in complete games (11), shutouts (eight), innings pitched (192.1) and strikeouts (180). Valenzuela pitched a complete Game 3 of the World Series against the New York Yankees and helped the Dodgers win their first World Series title since 1965. After the season, he was named rookie of the year and won the Cy Young Award, still the only person to accomplish win both in the same year.

Valenzuela was the ace of the Dodgers staff from 1981 to 1987, with his best season coming in 1986, when he finished 21-11 with a 3.14 ERA and led the league in wins, complete games and innings pitched, finishing second in Cy Young Award voting to Mike Scott of the Houston Astros.

At the 1986 All-Star Game, Valenzuela made history by striking out five consecutive American League batters, tying a record set by Carl Hubbell in 1934.

In 1988, Valenzuela won just five games and missed much of the season. He went 10-13 in 1989 and 13-13 in 1990, which was the season of his last great moment, when on June 29, 1990, he threw a no-hitter against the St. Louis Cardinals.

Valenzuela was released by the Dodgers just before the 1991 season. He played part of that season with the Angels and bounced around baseball until retiring after the 1997 season with a career mark of 173-153.

He is currently a member of the Dodgers' Spanish-language broadcast team.

RELATED:

No. 10: Jackie Robinson

No. 11: Tommy Lasorda

No. 12: Wayne Gretzky

No. 13: Walter O'Malley

No. 14: Don Drysdale

No. 15: Merlin Olsen

No. 16: Jerry Buss

No. 17: Elgin Baylor

No. 18: Marcus Allen

No. 19: Jim Murray

No. 20: Wilt Chamberlain

Your votes are in: The 20 greatest sports figures in L.A. history

-- Houston Mitchell

Photo: Fernando Valenzuela with the Dodgers in 1981. Credit: Los Angeles Times

 

Did Topps turn down a deal on Maury Wills because he was such a bad prospect?

BASEBALL URBAN LEGEND: Maury Wills was such a longshot to make it in the Major Leagues that Topps turned down the opportunity to sign him to a $5 baseball card contract.

Maury Wills is a true Los Angeles Dodgers legend. The Dodgers won their first championship in Los Angeles in Wills' first season and went on to win two more titles during his first tenure with the team (1959-1966), with Wills being the team captain from 1963-1966. Wills made the All Star Game in five separate seasons and received the very first All Star Game Most Valuable Player Award ever in 1962! That same season, Wills beat out Willie Mays to win the National League Most Valuable Player Award. In 1962, Wills also won his second Gold Glove at shortstop and set a new Modern Era (post-1900) Major League record for the most stolen bases in a single season with 104 (the first player ever to steal over 100 bases in the Modern Era). Wills' revival of the stolen base is probably his greatest legacy. Before he stole 50 bases in 1960, no National Leaguer had stolen 50 bases since 1923! Players like Lou Brock, Rickey Henderson and Vince Coleman were all inspired by Wills. However, while Wills was setting records and showing up on Most Valuable Player ballots there was one place he was conspicuously absent - packs of Topps baseball cards! Wills did not have a Topps baseball card until 1967, nearly a decade into his Major League career! For a card company that prided itself on having basically every Major Leaguer in the game, Wills was a notable exception. What makes it even more notable is why Topps did not have a Maury Wills card. You see, Topps did not feel Wills was worth paying the $5 it would have taken to sign to a baseball card contract!

Read on to see how such a strange occurrence could have taken place!

Greatest sports figures in L.A. history, No. 10: Jackie Robinson



Continuing our countdown of the 20 greatest figures in L.A. sports history, as chosen in voting by our online readers, with No. 10, Jackie Robinson.

No. 10 Jackie Robinson (21 first-place votes, 1,702 points)

It was interesting to watch the votes come in for Jackie Robinson, particularly through the comments on our original blog post asking for votes. As soon as someone would vote for Robinson, it seemed someone else would chime in, chastising the person for not realizing Robinson never played with the Dodgers in L.A. Which just goes to show how a man can be remembered for one thing almost to the exclusion of everything else. When you think Jackie Robinson, you think "broke the color barrier in baseball" and have to be reminded of his outstanding legacy as one of the greatest athletes in UCLA history.

Robinson was UCLA's first athlete to win varsity letters in four sports: baseball, basketball, football and track. He was one of four black players on the 1939 UCLA Bruins football team (Woody Strode, Kenny Washington and Ray Bartlett were the others).

In track and field, Robinson won the long jump at the 1940 NCAA men's outdoor track and field championship, jumping 24 feet, 10 1/2 inches. 

In basketball, Robinson won two consecutive conference scoring titles.

He hit less than .200 with the Bruins baseball team, making baseball his worst sport at UCLA.

Robinson was also a standout athlete at Pasadena Muir High and Pasadena junior college.

Robinson's life after UCLA could fill several books. He is a more-than-worthy addition to this list. As former UCLA chancellor Norm Abrams once said: "He was the first athlete in UCLA history to letter in four sports in the same year, but it is his abiding dignity and unshakable conviction that we most appreciate and that made him a true champion. The entire Bruin family treasures his legacy."

RELATED:

No. 11: Tommy Lasorda

No. 12: Wayne Gretzky

No. 13: Walter O'Malley

No. 14: Don Drysdale

No. 15: Merlin Olsen

No. 16: Jerry Buss

No. 17: Elgin Baylor

No. 18: Marcus Allen

No. 19: Jim Murray

No. 20: Wilt Chamberlain

Your votes are in: The 20 greatest sports figures in L.A. history

-- Houston Mitchell

Photo: Jackie Robinson at UCLA. Credit: Los Angeles Times

Greatest sports figures in L.A. history, No. 11: Tommy Lasorda



Continuing our countdown of the 20 greatest figures in L.A. sports history, as chosen in voting by our online readers, with No. 11, Tommy Lasorda.

No. 11 Tommy Lasorda (39 first-place votes, 1,641 points)

There have been few figures in L.A. sports history who have been as larger-than-life as former Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda. You either love him or love to hate him, but it's almost guaranteed that everyone has some sort of opinion.

After serving four seasons as third-base coach, Lasorda became the Dodgers manager on Sept. 29, 1976, upon the retirement of the legendary Walter Alston. All Lasorda did in his 20 years as manager was win 1,599 games, two World Series championships (1981 and 1988), four National League pennants (1977, 78, 81 and 88)  and seven division titles (1977, 78, 81, 83, 85, 88, 95). The Dodgers also led the division when the rest of the 1994 season was canceled because of a labor dispute.

His final game was a 4-3 victory over the Houston Astros on June 23, 1996. The following day he drove himself to the hospital complaining of abdominal pains, and in fact he was having a heart attack. He officially retired on July 29, 1996. His 1,599 career wins rank 16th in MLB history.

He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1997 in his first year of eligibility and the Dodgers retired his uniform number, 2, on Aug. 15, 1997.

RELATED:

No. 12: Wayne Gretzky

No. 13: Walter O'Malley

No. 14: Don Drysdale

No. 15: Merlin Olsen

No. 16: Jerry Buss

No. 17: Elgin Baylor

No. 18: Marcus Allen

No. 19: Jim Murray

No. 20: Wilt Chamberlain

Your votes are in: The 20 greatest sports figures in L.A. history

--Houston Mitchell

Photo: Tommy Lasorda looks on from the dugout as he serves as an honorary coach during the game against the San Francisco Giants at Dodger Stadium on Sept. 22, 2011. Credit: Jeff Gross / Getty Images.

 

Greatest sports figures in L.A. history, No. 13: Walter O'Malley

Continuing our countdown of the 20 greatest figures in L.A. sports history with No. 13, Walter O'Malley.

No. 13 Walter O'Malley (12 first-place votes, 1,465 points)

Longtime Dodgers owner Walter O'Malley changed the landscape of baseball in many ways, one of the most notable being spearheading the move of baseball to the West Coast. O'Malley moved the Dodgers from Brooklyn to Los Angeles before the 1958 season, and also convinced New York Giants owner Horace Stoneham to move to San Francisco at the same time.

He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2007. In 1999, The Sporting News named O’Malley the 11th Most Powerful Person in sports in the last century, while ABC Sports ranked O’Malley in its Top 10 Most Influential People “off the field” in sports history.

O'Malley died of congestive heart failure on Aug. 9, 1979.

To say O'Malley was a controversial figure is understating the case. There is far too much, good and bad, that happened in O'Malley's life than can be captured in a short blog post. You can read a detailed biography of his life at walteromalley.com.

RELATED:

No. 14: Don Drysdale

No. 15: Merlin Olsen

No. 16: Jerry Buss

No. 17: Elgin Baylor

No. 18: Marcus Allen

No. 19: Jim Murray

No. 20: Wilt Chamberlain

Your votes are in: The 20 greatest sports figures in L.A. history

-- Houston Mitchell

Photo: Walter O'Malley stands outside a nearly completed Dodger Stadium in 1962. Credit: Los Angeles Public Library

 

 

Greatest sports figures in L.A. history No. 14: Don Drysdale

Continuing our countdown of the 20 greatest figures in L.A. sports history with No. 14, Don Drysdale.

No. 14 Don Drysdale (no first-place votes, 1,168 points)

Big D was one of the best pitchers in baseball during his time with the Dodgers. A larger-than-life character, not only was Drysdale notorious for knocking hitters down with pitches (his 154 hit batsmen remains the modern NL record), he later became an actor and an excellent baseball broadcaster.

Career highlights: In 1962, Drysdale won 25 games and the Cy Young Award. In 1965, he was the Dodgers' only .300 hitter and tied the National League record for home runs by a pitcher with seven. (The person whose record he tied? Don Drysdale.) In 1968, he set major league records with six consecutive shutouts and 58 consecutive scoreless innings (a record later broken by fellow Dodger Orel Hershiser in 1988). 

Drysdale was elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1984, and had his number 53 retired by the Dodgers the same year.

Don Drysdale retired in midseason in 1969 because of a shoulder injury. He segued into acting and broadcasting, including a memorable appearance on "The Brady Bunch." He became a broadcaster for not just the Dodgers (from 1988-1993), but also the Angels from 1973-79 and 1981.

On July 3, 1993, while working as a Dodgers broadcaster in Montreal, the 56-year-old Drysdale suffered a heart attack and died.

RELATED:

No. 15 Merlin Olsen

No. 16 Jerry Buss

No. 17: Elgin Baylor

No. 18: Marcus Allen

No. 19: Jim Murray

No. 20: Wilt Chamberlain

Your votes are in: The 20 greatest sports figures in L.A. history

--Houston Mitchell

 Photo: Don Drysdale in 1959. Credit: Associated Press.

Chicago White Sox hire former Dodger Robin Ventura as manager

The Chicago White Sox have hired Robin Ventura as their manager, the club announced Thursday.

Ventura, a two-time All-Star, was a third baseman and first baseman for the White Sox (1989–98), New York Mets (1999–2001), New York Yankees (2002–03) and the Dodgers (2003–04).

He is the 17th former White Sox player who has become team manager.

Ventura was hired by the White Sox in June as a special advisor to director of player development Buddy Bell. The White Sox said that Ventura agreed to a multiyear deal as manager.

Ventura will replace Ozzie Guillen, who resigned last week after eight seasons with the team. Guillen was immediately snatched up by the Florida Marlins as their manager.

MORE:

Matt Kemp: Bill Plaschke, T.J. Simers discuss paying the price

Before Dodgers' off-season plans unfold, first domino must fall

--Melissa Rohlin

Photo: Robin Ventura. Credit: Doug Benc / Getty Images

Matt Kemp: Bill Plaschke, T.J. Simers discuss paying the price

Matt Kemp finished the season with 39 home runs, 126 runs batted in and a very strong bid for the National League MVP.

After next season, he's up for free agency.

In a recent column, Bill Plaschke argued that the Dodgers must make Kemp the highest-paid player in franchise history in the next six months or he could jump ship. T.J. Simers called him the "Dodgers great hope ... for better days ahead."

But can a bankrupt team afford to pay the price for Kemp? And even if they can, should they make a roster change considering that the Dodgers were barely a .500 team (82-79) that missed postseason play?

Simers and Plaschke discuss the topic in their new video series, L.A. Loud, moderated by Times sports reporter Melissa Rohlin.

MORE:

Plaschke-Simers video: Should Kobe Bryant play overseas?

Plaschke-Simers video: Are the Chargers the best NFL team for L.A.?

Plaschke-Simers video: Should Clayton Kershaw win the Cy Young award?

-- Melissa Rohlin

Plaschke-Simers video: Should Clayton Kershaw win the Cy Young award?

In his final start of the season Sunday, Clayton Kershaw led the Dodgers to a 6-2 victory against the Padres. He went 7-1/3 innings, holding San Diego to two runs on four hits and a walk, and striking out six.

The 23-year-old leads the National League in earned run average (2.28) and strikeouts (248) and is tied with Arizona Diamondbacks' Ian Kennedy for most victories this season (21). Should he win the Cy Young award?

Times columnists T.J. Simers and Bill Plaschke disagree on the answer to that question.

Simers says no way. Kennedy deserves the award because he carried his team into postseason play.

Plaschke says team records are irrelevant. The only thing that matters is that Kershaw is the best pitcher in the league.

This is the second installment of a new weekly video series, L.A. Loud, moderated by L.A. Times sports reporter Melissa Rohlin. Check out the first video, in which Plaschke and Simers debate whether Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant should play overseas.

MORE:

 Dodgers-Padres box score

Clayton Kershaw makes his Cy Young closing statement

Dodgers statement: MLB trying to force distressed sale of the team

-- Melissa Rohlin

Clayton Kershaw: Should he win the NL Cy Young award? [Poll]

Clayton Kershaw got his 20th win of the season Tuesday night, which ties him with Arizona's Ian Kennedy for most wins in the National League (Kershaw does have five losses to Kennedy's four). The Dodgers ace also has amazing stats, including the best ERA in the NL (2.27) and the most strikeouts (242).

But will it be enough to win the NL Cy Young award this year? He faces some pretty stiff competition in Kennedy and Philadelphia's Cliff Lee and Roy Halladay, all of whom play for contenders (unlike Kershaw).

If you had a Cy Young vote, who would get it? Actually, you do have a vote -- right here! Pick the most deserving pitcher, then leave a comment explaining why you voted the way you did.

RELATED:

Clayton Kershaw makes those Sandy Koufax comparisons plausible

Frank McCourt vs. Fox: He's running out of partners to turn on

-- Chuck Schilken

Photo: Clayton Kershaw. Credit: Lawrence K. Ho/Los Angeles Times

T.J. Simers: Don't be fooled -- Vin Scully is a troublemaker

Now, I know all you folks are the right kinda people. I’m gonna be perfectly frank.

Would you like to know what kinda conversation goes on at home?

That’s right, it is time someone call out Vin Scully.

Well, either you’re closing your eyes to a situation you do not wish to acknowledge or you are not aware of the caliber of disaster indicated.

The guy is a true blue rabble-rouser.

I’m telling you, ya got Trouble, my friend, and that’s spelled with a capital T, and I wouldn’t be surprised later to learn Vin Scully has a pool table in his home.

I don’t know how he does it. It’s like Major League Baseball has these games scripted and Scully gets an early read and chooses to give away the ending.

He had Arizona’s Gerardo Parra pegged as the bad guy almost before Arizona came to town this week, singing Parra’s praises as he does and the hometown kids having no choice but to get irritated.

You might say, “Come on, they can’t hear him, so no harm, no reason for a bean ball.’’