Busy day in the nation's capital
Spent the morning at the Smithsonian, where Tommy Lasorda had his portrait put in the National Gallery. I guess that’s when you know you’ve made it, though I’m guessing Tommy probably knew that before.
He’s going to do a live web chat in about 45 minutes for those who read this as soon as I post, so please check it out.
From there, we headed to the White House for a tour and got to see some cool spots, including the White House media briefing room where you always see the Press Secretary give his briefings. Photos weren’t really allowed on the tour but there will be one group shot in today’s SooHoo gallery.
Here’s tonight’s lineup against the Nats:
Furcal, SS
Ethier, RF
Manny, LF
Kemp, CF
Loney, 1B
Blake, 3B
Belliard, 2B
Martin, C
Kuroda, P
Inside the Dodgers 
Thanks Josh! I will attempt to signon and ask a question.
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Happy Birthday Tommy! and Congratulations!!
Emma
http://crzblue.mlblogs.com/
Well then…Thanks Nelly it was fabulous…:-)
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Weve seen this line – up before 🙂
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LET’S GO DODGERS, LET’S GO
Nice lineup of course. Does anyone read “Sarah’s Take”? Talk about master of the obvious.
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Sarah’s Take: Oxygen Vital for Breathing
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOMMY!!!!
Dodger4life – told ya so 🙂
Sounds like you had fun Josh!!! ………and thanks for the lineup!! It’s looking good.
LET’S GO DODGERS, LET’S GO!!!!!!
I can never connect to the chats. It always gives me ‘the chat server is down or is not responding. I know is on my side as chat is one of our servers. ughh
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Saw Nelly’s question about Ethier
Chase Utley on Jayson Werth:
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“I remember thinking at the time, ‘This guy is a good player. Why would they non-tender him?'” Utley says. “Just playing GM in the offseason, I thought he would be a good addition.”
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This made room for Gonzalez and Pierre and the rest is history. Thanks Ned!!
Happy B-Day Tommy!!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TOMMY!!!!!
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GO DODGERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By the way, LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this lineup!!!!!!
Scott, I seldom read Sarah’s posts after the first few started to appear a few years ago but if you don’t know already, her story is interesting. She is a big Dodger fan just like the rest of us and the Dodgers and mlb.com have been kind enough to give her a forum.
I found Utley’s comment on Werth interesting only because everything is hindsight. Really, no one knew for sure what Werth could do because he was injured much of the time while with the Dodgers. Yes, he did show some promise but at the time Ned seemed to favor experience over promise. Perhaps without all the injuries things would have worked out differently for Werth and we will never know. The Dodgers decided not to take a chance on Werth and the Phillies did. So in hindsight that decision is to the benefit of Werth and the Phillies. I don’t much care about the Phillies but I am happy for Werth. He seems to be a good guy and fortunately for him he was able to take advantage of the opportunity. I will take what we have now in center and right field and bear with what we have in left.
Not complaining about the lineup at this point, but it does remind me of when Kent was still with us. He had the power, or at least the power potential, but he was like a stiff board playing second base. Can’t count how many games Hudson has saved us with his defense, but I guess his time may be over with us. I expect that we won’t be the high bidder for his services after this year, but it would be helpful if he is at his peak for us during the playoffs. That’s not likely with him on the bench for much of the remaining games.
Scott ~ we are famous (or should I say infamous) for critiquing everything! That’s what makes us so special and so much fun.
Damn, I’m in a time warp already!!!
ibirken, yeah thanks, I’ve read Sarah’s story. Is it cruel or something to critique her columns? My bad then.
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Also in the Werth article is mention of “misdiagnosed” injury. Werth had looked promising up to that point. Have we seen any other incorrect evaluations during Colletti’s time as GM? So it’s not just hindsight. Think about all of the long mysterious misdiagnosed/botched injuries the last few years. Repko, Werth, Abreu, Schmidt, Jones, Penny, Furcal, – I’m probably forgetting others…
I want revenge from the Nationals so bad after that game when we had a 6-0 1st inning lead for Wolf. Kemp had a career day with 5 rbi’s and a grand slam in the 1st inning and let’s not forget it was these same Nats that we had a 14-0 home record streak on the line.
Wolf batting 8th and Pierre batting 9th in that game. It doesn’t seem fair why we have to play those 3 up in Washington and only had them played 2 times at DS. I think we should bring back the 2 divisions and didn’t we used to play the other division 12 times and our own division around 18 times. I really missed the old day when we had the Braves, Reds and Astros all in the same west division.
This 2nd games was the beginning of Manny 50 games suspension for Manny .The last time we played them they had Belliard (now with the Dodgers), Beimel (Rockies), Johnson (Marlins and never though he would get traded in the same division) and the impressive streak of Zimmerman ended this game with a 25th games hitting streak.
Dang it forgot to copy the rested of the post I’ve posted earlier with link.
Scott, point taken about the so called misdiagnosed injuries. I had not thought about that issue. As for Sarah, I suppose it is o.k. to critique her views but I suppose her situation does provide a bit of leeway compared to professional media types who actually have access to the organizations and players. I don’t think she knows any more than any of us do.
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=290507119&teams=washington-nationals-vs-los-angeles-dodgers
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/boxscore?gameId=290507119&teams=washington-nationals-vs-los-angeles-dodgers
LET’S GO DODGERS, LET’S GO!!!!!!!!!!!
I sent that question into the Chat with Tommy about 1:55, not thinking it had a chance. Andre must have been a good topic to choose. I had assumed all the other good questions had already been asked, which they had. That is pretty cool he is enshrined into the Smithsonian. That is just fantastic!!!
I guess it won’t posted the less than and greater than sign by them forgot they don’t need them on this blog to click the link.
lbirken, agree. It is hindsight in the sense that there’s nothing we can do about it now.
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If we keep this lineup the rest of the way, the Dodgers can win 100 games still. No resting players. We need to pound these pathetic clubs into the ground and go into the playoffs with home field and riding high!!
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LET”S GO!!!!
Oh yeah I also don’t like us getting sweep here last year.
Happy Bday Tommy
Scott, I agree. This is no time to relax. We don’t talk much about baseball teams peaking but wouldn’t it be great if that really did happen for the Dodgers? We also don’t talk about “trap” games in baseball but these games against the Nats and Pirates certainly could qualify. Just win so it makes no difference what any other club does and let’s gat that home field advantage!
Dang I was hoping Adam Dunn was back with the dback lol.
lol you mean the Nationals fans actually booed Manny to?
Gosh damn Manny first pitch hacking
Wow I didn’t know. Casey Blake has the highest fielding 3rd baseman in a Dodgers uniform.
Livan looked happy to get out of that inning. I don’t think he’ll be smiling for to long. When he was with the Mets back in July the Dodgers blasted him 11-2. I saw the carnage in person.
Contract details for Orlando Hudson
By Tony Jackson on February 23, 2009 4:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | ShareThis
OK, I’m giving you fair warning that this is going to give you a headache. I can’t imagine what the conversation must have been like when Colletti and Ng were working these details out with O-Dawg’s agent. But here it is:
$380,000 signing bonus, deferred without interest to a time not designated
$3 million base salary for 2009
$150,000 each for 150 and 175 plate appearances
$200,000 each for 200, 225, 250, 275 and 300 plate appearances
$250,000 each for 325, 350, 375, 400, 425, 450, 475, 500, 525, 550, 575 PAs
and then, there is this:
$10,000 for EVERY plate appearance from PA #576 through PA #632. That’s 57 PAs for total of $570,000.
also, BEGINNING WITH 550 PAs, every one of these incentives, including that $570k, is deferred without interest to a time not designated. And the contract requires O-Dawg to donate $25,000 to the Dodgers Dream Foundation, something I’m sure he has no problem with because he is heavily involved in charity work to begin with, with a focus on the battle against autism.
Have you hit the Advil yet?
Interested
In other words it’s costing Hudson big time to be sitting on the bench. I expect Frank passed the word on to Torre, so Frank can save some bucks. MCCHEAP bast***!!!
Maybe they didn’t even realize Odog was going to stay healthy all year after having back to back years in a row he seem to get injury in Sept.
Of course you can played the ODog but can Belliard played SS or moved the Odog to SS? I don’t like Belliard number on defense but he has been good as 2nd and 3rd.
Hi ITD
Had a busy day, Even missed Lasorda’s chat, Well Happy Birthday to him and many more. I missed the first two batters tonight. But I’m here tonight.
What’s wrong with Hudson?
GO DODGERS!!!!!!
I think Belliard is wrong with Hudson. He has the hot hand right now. Not convinced the incentives in Hudson’s contract have anything to do with whether or not he is in the lineup. Maybe he needs to get his mom to complain, that might work.
lol @ that poll question and I’d expected 100% voting for Ethier. You known it’s going to be alot of non Dodgers fans voting for the other 2.
Did anyone notice the camera position from behind home plate when the batter hits the ball? It looks like it’s on the roof. Why so high?
To be honest I think Torre is playing the hot hand.
I remember last year when someone was talking about Pierremommy complaining for playing time.
Yeah I did true.
Manny is now 8/12 against Livan.
Great goin’ M A N N Y.
All right Manny nice hit!
Nice played Kuroda
Nice to see Furcal starting to come alive. I’d like to see him finish with a .260 or better average. It would be great for us if he can get hot through the playoffs.
Ouch Furcal if he only had half of those errors we would be #1.
Urgh thanks Furcal.
When Dunn came to the plate, I was thinking that Furcal gave them another run, I expected the HR.
Damn error! It always seems to happen that way.
While the two errors certainly helped, the key to the big inning was Karoda not hitting into a double play.
I meant Kuroda, and this time warp continues to be a pain.
BELI’S BEEN BIG.
Oh come on IBB to face the pitcher. I don’t know why the Nats even care.
Come on Furcal you need to pay for that error.
WAY TO GO GUYS, LET’S KEEP IT GOING!!!
As I type that Furcal is 3/3
O.K. R A F F Y
Good job Andre!
ANDRE’ Just doing his job.
That’s was Furcal 19 errors this season in 140 games/132 games started and 2 years in 139 games he has the same number of errors
Should be 2 years ago.
Let’s go Kemp and let’s see a 3 runs homeruns like you had your grand slam the last time we face them and then the nightmare game.
Marvelous MATTY.
Funny we only play these National Expos 5 times this year.
Twice in LA.
Furcal is now at .261 and I also forgot that Furcal owned Livan in his career at .361.
What did I say. See you Livan. Just like when he was with the Mets.
Way to go James!!!!!
J A M E S
I still don’t like we have to played 3 games there and only have 2 at DS at least let’s us have more home games against them or split it.
Oh the president race totally forgot.
The only negative thing I can think of is that we have a long way to go in this game.
You gotta love the crooked number on the scoreboard!
I had a feeling Ethier would get 92% of that vote.
That’s right You_know_ something.
We shut them down after the big inning.
THAT 152 PLAY SHOWS THE Dodgers aren’t giving any runs away.
Great after a big inning and a 5 pitch 1 2 3 innings.
I want another crocked numbers against the worst bullpen in the league and after putting up that crocked numbers against our bullpen at DS in the 8th.
I wanted a 4th hits by Furcal.
Let’s have another 1 2 3 innings with less than 10 pitches.
Shad ~ Does this make up for blowing that 6-0 lead yet?
I think Ethier was trying to be on top 10 espn highlight for great catching but I think he would still had caught it.
Yeah for now but if we scored 8 more runs it would look nice lol.
My gosh they didn’t need to check with the 1st base ump that was a swing.
Wow normally Pierre would PH for Manny this early but I guess Torre want to give Manny one more ab’s.
I’m waiting for Manny 20th HR.
Ethier has 1 rbi’s less than Dunn. Glad that walk didn’t cost us and nice dp. Nice a 6 pitches inning after walking Dunn 4 straight.
We just seen a rare 6 innings where a very good team dominates a very bad team.
CASEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
BLAKE’s 18 was a long time in come, but it came nonetheless.
The way Kuroda started the game I was a bit concerned but he certainly got it going! What a great start to the road trip to keep pace towards home field advantage.
hahaha no ibb this time me to.
The way Belliard is going ODawg makes a great cheer leader in that dugout.
So much for the Padres 2-0 lead.
All right THE MIGHTY CASEY comes through again!
I think Kuroda should swing away but we know he’s going to bunt.
hahahaha nice Torre let Kuroda swing away.
Now we see the other part of the Belliard trade.
I notice NellyJune asked Lasorda what he thought of Ethier.
That Ethierholic hasn’t got anything else on her mind. LOL.
We could have used about half of these runs to give Billingsley a cushion for tomorrow night. He might need it but lets hope not.
Furcal 4 hits and 4 rbi’s he’s getting hot at the right time.
YEAH R A F F Y
Shad ~ There’s your four hits for Furcal.
I guess Repko going to hit for Manny.
Yeah I’m right and there goes the nats bullpen getting tag for 4 runs so far.
At least Repko got his 1st rbi’s this year.
To bad we don’t have a 3rd OF’s to PH for Kemp.
I ask for 8 and now we got 6 in this inning. Wow that must be a first and Loney coming up twice in a inning two times.
Dewitt would gotten an rbi’s nice played by the SS.
This is fun.
Something to think about to keep our minds off Bills.
There’s your crooked number against their bullpen. I guess we’re even now.
Dang I was hoping Kuroda would had pitch 1 more inning since he let’s Kuroda hit.
Nice holding them BELI.
I expected something like this last year when I went Washington D.C. but the Dodgers got swept instead.
Nice town though.
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I keep getting these redirect loops so these comment may end up anywhere.
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Kershaw looked there, that’s great news.
Wow I’m good but dang Belisario as that crooked number if runs you issued a 1 out walk hate that but he does need the work.
That way Bills has been pitching, we need all the runs we can get.
Great play by Loney! Up by 12 runs and he’s still diving all over the place, That’s why we’re in first place.
Dang that was an useless ab’s byThome that could had been error #4. I would had like to see Hu there.
Speaking of the devil Hu is batting.
That inning was encouraging for Kershaw. He looked his old self.
I bet Loretta is upset he couldn’t even get an ab’s and when was the last time Ausmus played?
Look like Hu still can’t hit major league pitching after a 2 years absent. I guess Loretta is mad he can’t even played in a blowout game.
Yeah Padres 6-5.
This was a great game for the Dodgers Statisticwise and especially for Furcal.
We need Furcal to be hot in the playoffs. Looks like he is firing on all cylinders now.
6-6 tied
WAY TO GO DODGERS!!!!!!! LET’S DO IT AGAIN TOMORROW!!!!
LET’S GO BILLINGSLEY.
Yeah #1 best team in the league lower their team ERA to under 3.41 since both of Kuroda runs were unearned thanks to Raffy. We we’re 2nd in Starters ERA at 3.60, the Giants 3rd with a 3.51 and the Braves still leading at 3.56. The biggest part in that 3.41 overall ERA is our bullpen ERA with a 3.11 despite having the 2nd most innings from the relievers in the NL and going to get dropped some more points and the Giants are 2nd with a 3.53 and just a month ago both team were flipping and flopping for 1st and 2nd. The Giants pitching been falling apart this month are been much better this month and all season long.
1 LA Dodgers 18 12 6 2.74 6 0 0 164.1 0 50 58 44 138 .233
2 San Diego 18 12 6 2.74 7 0 0 164.0 0 50 59 70 143 .225
3 Chicago Cubs 20 12 8 3.18 8 0 0 178.1 0 63 76 72 168 .247
4 Cincinnati 19 11 8 3.20 10 0 0 168.2 0 60 64 59 126 .233
The Dodgers and Padres are tied with the 2nd best record this month going 12-6 but the Rockies have a better one at 13-6.
Actually that’s should be 3.61 not 3.51.
BTW those numbers don’t count all the games today so we would be number 1 in this month team ERA.
Seeing the Rockies win, yet again, got me to wondering. Will Tracy pursue the division title in earnest once they eliminate the Gnats, or will he rest players and set up his playoff rotation? It’s ironic to me that probably the WORST thing that could happen to BOTH teams would be a season-ending, weekend series for the division title. That happened in 1996. Dodgers held a two-game lead on Pods coming into final weekend. BOTH teams had already made the playoffs. Padres swept in a hard-fought series, won the division by one game….and BOTH got swept 3-0 in the first round.
I knew we should’ve had fired him in the first place so what he had his worst record that year but still.
Wow!!! I know we wanted them to go in there and take care of business and boy did they!! Nice to see everyone contributing in today’s game.
At least the Padres made it interested
lol at the Giants coming back.
My gosh the Yankees are curse at the big A’s.
So much for the 2nd best pitching team in the league. Cain got a beat down and RJ gave up a homerun to Ryal and should retired now.
1
2
3
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10!!!!!!
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Nelly, I am glad you had the opportunity to ask Tommy about Andre 🙂
Why are we counting? LOL!!!
I really didn’t expect my question to go through. I had just finished a math lesson, the kids were have some free activity time and I just checked into ITD for the lineup. I went to the homepage, logged in and was reminded of the chat, figuring I could read some before recess. In that 5 minutes, I figured why not ask a question. I figured Tommy had already been log jammed with questions of the past, which many questions involved that. So, I thought, “Why not ask a question about our current team, which in most part, is what we talk about on ITD. Andre was a given at that point. I am an Ethieraholic so why wouldn’t I? …….And, of course, I liked his answer 🙂
I don’t know if I ever mentioned this story on ITD (Goodness, does that sound like dodgereric or what?), but my father-in-law had the opportunity to meet Tommy right here in Merced. We were living in Memphis at the time, but he came to Merced to talk at a luncheon with some local coaches. My father-in-law was the baseball God around here back then. He was mostly involved in the American Legion Baseball Program, but he also coached at a local junior high, where the field was named after him sometime later. So, somewhere in the house, we have pictures of Tommy and my father-in-law on that day. A very memorable day for him, and I only wished I could have been there.
11
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Outstanding Nelly…That must of been some day for your father in law, and Tommy as well 🙂
11? Go Denny Hamlin!!! LOL!!!!!
Ykn,
I miss Tony Jackson 😦
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and I also missed Sweet Lou Johnson’s birthday (9/22).
Happy birthday Sweet Lou! You know we luv ya!
Happy 75h!
Emma
http://crzblue.mlblogs.com/
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEAR MATTY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU…..AND MANY MORE!!!!!!
Hard to believe he just 25 years old. Happy Bday Kemp
HAPPY 25TH BIRTHDAY MATTHEW RYAN KEMP!!! Knock a Homerun out for your birthday. We won’t mind one bit!!!!!
GO DODGERS!!!!!!!!!!!!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MATT KEMP!
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NELLY….great story…that probably means that deep deep…DEEEEEEP down inside your father-in-law LIKES the DODGERS…cause of Lasorad. But just deep down! And thanks for sharing. So is there any new Dodger fans in your class?
Good Morning ITD, Dodger Faithful and Our Beloved Boy’s in Blue……………………
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Happy Birthday Matt Kemp!
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Bills…. This a new beginning, be at ease and in control, my friend…… Its just a ballgame, youv’e done this before, you’ve had success at it and will again. I have faith in your ability to overcome and get it done…..
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GO DODGERS GO
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BRING THE RING TO L.A. IN 2009!!!!!!!!!
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Outstanding game and momentum change last night gentlemen….Keep on keep’n on!!!!
D4L: Last nights game was just a big WOW! I am glad KURODA did not give up after the HR the Nationals did. Good job KURODA…actuall GREAT JOB BOYS IN BLUE!
Greinke bolstered his Cy Young credentials by holding Boston to two hits in six scoreless innings, leading the Royals to a 5-1 victory over the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday night.
“I am biased,” the Royals manager said. “Part of that bias is I’ve seen all his starts. I have a very difficult time believing there is anybody better in the major leagues, that’s as good a pitcher as Zack Greinke is in the year 2009.”
Greinke is 3-0 with a 0.26 ERA in his past five starts, allowing 18 hits and one earned run in 35 innings. With the stingy stretch, Greinke has lowered his major league-leading ERA to 2.08.
Greinke (15-8) became the first Royals pitcher to win at least 15 games in a season since Paul Byrd(notes) won 17 in 2002. Byrd (1-2) was the losing pitcher Tuesday. Greinke has two starts left and knows the Cy Young could be at stake.
Wow 1 earned run in 35 innings?
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/players/7257/gamelog;_ylt=ApFqSw8qx0VSbDmroBMeS6WFCLcF
How is that Greinke is this good now and for the past 3 years?
But he did goes 6-0 with 2 ER’s in 45 innings.
Rose – Bill’s dad was mostly an A’s fan (the team he watched/listened to most, but he was a fan of baseball in general so I am not sure there was any team he didn’t like.
As far as my class, there are a couple, but they not as vocal about it like last year, but it’s early still. I do have quite a few A’s fans, a White Sox fan, and a couple who like the Angels. However, my students from last year are still keeping track and there were a few students who went to one of the two Dodgers/Giants series at AT&T Park. The two girls that were avid fans (and mini-Ethieraholics) last year are no longer at our school. This year I haven’t done too much Dodger talk. I have a student teacher until Thanksgiving, and during my down time I am talking to her versus talking to my students about baseball and the Dodgers. However, no fear, there will be plenty of time until Opening Day 2010 to get them thinking in Dodger Blue.
• RHP Chad Billingsley(notes) will return to the rotation today at Washington after having his last start skipped because of poor performance. Billingsley posted a 6.11 ERA in his last four starts, and he is 3-6 with a 5.49 ERA since the All-Star break. He was 9-4 with a 3.38 ERA before the break and was selected to the NL All-Star team.
• RF Andre Ethier is tied for third in the National League with 41 doubles. The last Dodger to lead the NL in doubles was Wes Parker with 47 in 1970. Ethier is also fourth in the NL in extra-base hits with 75.
We need the good Bills back since everyone is clicking at the same time. I’m not worry about Kershaw he look good last night. Well we have one Parker streak snap so let’s try to break another one.
Baseball begins and ends at home plate. RBIs and HRs get the headlines…but QUICK!!….who leads the Dodgers in runs scored? You know, the guy who has touched home plate the most times. Correct! Matt Kemp.
Congratulation’s Mr. and Mrs. Perumike, I wish you many more……
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The line up last night did have some fire power…..It is all good if we can maintain our productivity and achieve our goals though.
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Welcome back to the line up O-Dog…We love ya…
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GO DODGERS GO!!!!
BRING THE RING TO L.A. IN 2009!!!!!